The Victorian Supreme Court will push ahead with a hearing for a group costs order in a class action by Arrium shareholders despite requests by the applicants that it be put off until after judgment is issued on the second-ever group costs order request.
Two class actions against Pitcher Partners and Arnold Bloch Leibler over advice given ahead of Slater & Gordon’s disastrous $1.2 billion Quindell acquisition will proceed to trial next month after mediation between the parties failed to resolve the cases.
A Victoria Supreme Court judge will hear the second ever application for a group costs order in a shareholder class action against G8 Education, saying she hoped to deal with the bid in a “straightforward way”.
A judge has refused a bid by accounting firms Pitcher Partners and EY to access share trading data of unregistered group members in a securities class action over advice to Slater & Gordon, despite claims upcoming mediation will be “pointless” without the information.
A ruling this week that rejected the first application for a group costs order in a class action because the applicants were better off with their existing no win, no fee arrangement was the right decision given the limits of the legislation, experts say.
A judge has signed off on a proposal by two law firms to jointly run a consolidated class action against Allianz over add-on car insurance, shooting down the insurer’s argument that a beauty contest would promote competitive contingency fee rates.
Saying the interests of class action members “must be given primacy”, a judge has rejected the first bid for a group costs order in a class action since contingency fee legislation passed in Victoria.
A judge has again suggested the Full Court should weigh in on whether the court has the power to make class closure orders, but the barrister for the applicant in an underpayments class action against Domino’s Pizza told the judge her client may not want to be the test case.
The judge overseeing class actions against Commonwealth Bank over its money laundering compliance failures has threatened to force the parties to go to trial by a certain date if they can’t agree to “sensible” time limits to ready the case for hearing, noting he would reach retirement age in 2024.
Consolidation of two consumer class actions against Allianz would do away with competition in a contest to lead a single case that would force a drop in the contingency fee rates of the rival law firms, the insurance giant has told a court.