Eight years after floods in Southeast Queensland destroyed more than 2,000 homes, a judge will deliver his ruling in two class actions seeking a record $1 billion in damages, and the decision could well come down to which of two conflicting flood modeling reports the judge sides with.
The Commonwealth Bank of Australia’s insurance division, CommInsure, has been fined $700,000 for breaching insurance hawking laws in Australia’s first post-Royal Commission criminal conviction, dodging a maximum fine of over $1.8 million through an early guilty plea and cooperation with ASIC.
Accounting giant Deloitte Touche Tohmatsu will not face cross claims over the collapse of failed retailer Dick Smith when a hearing of three shareholder class actions kicks off in three months.
Two Westpac units have defended their choice to charge higher superannuation fees, saying in their responses to a Slater and Gordon class action that customers received numerous positive benefits in exchange for the charges.
Westpac CEO Brian Hartzer has stepped down after admitting he was “ultimately accountable” for failures detailed in an AUSTRAC lawsuit alleging over 23 million breaches of anti-money laundering and counter-terrorism financing laws.
The judge overseeing a class action against car maker Ford over its allegedly defective PowerShift transmission has shot down the applicant’s request for additional discovery, saying that after multiple delays in the case “the well has run dry”.
Slater and Gordon is planning class actions against ANZ and Westpac over allegedly worthless insurance, fresh off of winning a $49.5 million settlement in a junk insurance class action against the National Australia Bank.
A judge has consolidated competing shareholder class actions against builder Lendlease brought by rival plaintiffs law firms, but has rejected the firms’ bid to jointly run the litigation and says one of them must go.
Shareholders have appealed a ruling that found a “serious problem” with market-based causation and dismissed three cases against the liquidator of failed global financial services firm Babcock & Brown.
Johnson & Johnson did not adequately warn of the risks of its pelvic mesh implants and is liable to pay damages to thousands of Australian women who suffered severe injuries from the devices, a judge has ruled in a long awaited decision in a class action launched more than seven years ago.