The Murray Goulburn class action run by Elliott Legal bears similarities to the Banksia class action, a case rife with scandal and offered up by opponents as proof of the problems with the class action regime. The leading lawyers were the same in both cases. In one they have abandoned any claim to their fees and have walked away from their careers. In the other they walked away with $5 million.
Former Macquarie Bank financial advisers who claimed their commission pay structure left them shortchanged have won their case for back pay for annual and personal leave, in the first decision in a group of cases against the wealth manager.
A judge has ordered Australia and New Zealand Banking Group to pay $10 million in penalties after finding that the bank engaged in unconscionable conduct and breached its obligations by slugging customers $3 million in periodic payment fees it was not entitled to charge.
Viagogo has been ordered to pay a $7 million penalty for misleading customers into thinking the ticket reseller was an official vendor and failing to disclose booking fees of around 28 per cent.
An appeals court has dismissed a second bid by lawyer Alex Elliott to have the judge overseeing the Banksia class action disqualified from hearing claims that he, like his late father, was party to an alleged fraudulent scheme in running the litigation.
In an “ode to a dying corporation” a Western Australia judge known for his droll judgments has waxed poetic in approving the end of a quarter century of litigation over the collapse of Alan Bond’s Bell Group of companies, penning what he described in mock solemnity as “more of a requiem than a judgment”.
The corporate regulator has brought action against Allianz Australia alleging the insurer misled consumers who purhased travel insurance on Expedia websites by failing to disclose how premiums were calculated and selling policies to ineligible customers.
ASIC’s case against GetSwift and its founders Joel Macdonald and Bane Hunter makes accusations against both directors but relies on alleged conduct by only Hunter, a lawyer for Macdonald has told a court on the last day of trial in the corporate regulator’s case.
Payday lenders Cigno and BHF Solutions are facing enforcement action by the corporate regulator alleging they breached the credit laws by lending to hundreds of thousands of consumers with a licence and charging $78 million in fees.
A judge has scrapped a proposed video link sought by Slater and Gordon to be included in an opt out notice to group members in a class action over alleged junk insurance sold by Westpac, saying the video had the “flavour” of promoting the proceeding.