The Commonwealth Bank of Australia has argued that disclosing its money laundering failures before AUSTRAC brought proceedings would have misled the market, as the bank takes the rare move of defending a shareholder class action at trial.
A judge overseeing a class action over AMP’s fees for no service practice has dismissed the applicant’s bid to access communications between AMP and law firm Clayton Utz that led up to an ostensibly independent report that allegedly went through 25 rounds of edits with the wealth manager’s inhouse lawyers.
The New South Wales government has rejected a class action’s claims that it dropped the ball in relation to the identification and management of underground utilities which caused delays in Sydney’s $3 billion light rail project.
Legislation introduced in the wake of massive cyberattacks against Optus and Medibank that will increase penalties for serious privacy law violations to $50 million has sailed through the House just two weeks after being introduced.
The former general manager of sales for Fiat Chrysler Australia has sued the car company for allegedly terminating him for taking two periods of leave after being diagnosed with an auto-immune condition.
Liberty Financial unit Minerva has challenged a judgment that found two schemes it carried out were done with the primary purpose of securing a tax advantage.
A class action investigation over the data breach that exposed the personal information of almost 10 million Medibank customers is underway, with two law firms teaming up to probe whether the private health insurer is liable for damages.
While CBA’s defence to a shareholder class action argues the bank did not need to disclose money laundering failures because it doubted AUSTRAC would take legal action, communications show it was drafting a defence six months before proceedings started, a trial has heard.
A judge has signed off on a group costs order in a shareholder class action against food company Noumi and auditor Deloitte guaranteeing group members a return of at least 78 per cent, but noted the law firms’ cut may need to be reviewed to avoid a “disproportionate return”.
A second securities class action has been filed against failed Blue Sky Alternative Investments and auditor EY alleging financial reports materially overstated the health of the asset manager ahead of its collapse three years ago.
For information on rights and reprints, contact subscriptions@lawyerly.com.au
