Baker McKenzie

Opposition leader Peter Dutton has questioned a costs agreement between refugee activist Shane Bazzi and his solicitors in a defamation dispute, raising the possibility that “sham bills” may have been provided to the court to assess the costs to which Bazzi is entitled for his successful appeal.

The largest shareholder in payday lender Nimble has lost its challenge to a decision blocking it from accessing company documents about an impending debt refinance, with an appeals court finding the investor’s concerns had “an air of commercial unreality”.

Several lenders have appealed a ruling that found they failed to prove steel giant Arrium falsified representations on loan drawdown notices ahead of its $2.8 billion collapse, saying it was a “no brainer” that the company was in dire straits when its directors sought extra funds.

Mastercard had a legitimate and pro-competitive reason for reaching agreements with major retailers to choose its network over Eftpos for debit card processing, a court was told Wednesday in the competition regulator’s misuse of market power case against the financial services behemoth.

A judge has allowed receivers to sell the Dover Heights mansion of Sydney fraudster Melissa Caddick without any distribution of proceeds, saying the sale “should take place post-haste”.

ASIC has called for a $15 million penalty against GetSwift and 12-year bans against its directors, who moved the logistics company overseas as the regulator’s enforcement action was on foot, a move the court on Tuesday said was “unprecedented”.

Opposition leader Peter Dutton has asked the High Court to overturn an appeals court judgment that found a tweet labelling him a “rape apologist” was not defamatory.

A judge has questioned how the court will award costs in refugee activist Shane Bazzi’s successful appeal against coalition leader Peter Dutton, saying crowdfunding for the activist’s legal costs made the issue “complicated and difficult”.

Settlement talks in a class action on behalf of women injured by allegedly defective pelvic mesh products have failed after Astora Health took a long-standing $27 million settlement offer off the table. 

An appeals court has set aside a judgment awarding federal minister Peter Dutton $35,000 in his defamation case over a tweet by a refugee activist labelling him a “rape apologist”.