A judge has dismissed a bid by PriceWaterhouseCoopers to have one of two law firms bow out of a joint class action against the accounting giant after a lead applicant died.
BHP Billiton is facing the possibility of a second shareholder class action over the Fundao dam failure at its mine in Brazil, but the cases may be put on hold pending the outcome of homicide charges against company employees.
The country’s biggest law firms were among the first in line to weigh in on changes to the class action regime proposed by the Australian Law Reform Commission, with one global firm cautioning against a weakening of continuous disclosure laws.
Forcing courts to choose a single winner in the battle over competing class actions would exacerbate the problems of overlapping cases and encourage the race to court, class action powerhouse Maurice Blackburn said Wednesday.
The timing of an email from a Herbert Smith Freehills solicitor alerting the Fair Work Commission to union contempt proceedings, which the firm argued early this year was grounds for halting the amalgamation of the CFMEU with two other unions, points to ‘a high level of collusion’ to block the merger, a judge said Tuesday.
Lawyers for two competing class actions against the Commonwealth Bank of Australia over breaches of anti-money laundering laws say the cases can happily co-exist, but whether the court will agree may well depend on the outcome of a closely-watched appeal in a separate battle over multiple proceedings.
The applicants in a class action against Radio Rentals alleging its rental practices violate responsible lending laws say the company is dragging its feet on discovery, after the company accused the applicants’ lawyers of using discovery to delay the case.
Cash Converters has been ordered to turn over information on people it provided payday loans to in Queensland in a class action alleging it charged a brokerage fee to borrowers for services they never received.
Johnson Winter & Slattery has been pulled into a class action against failed educational training company Vocation and its auditor PricewaterhouseCoopers, with the auditor saying the firm’s advice to Vocation constituted misleading and deceptive conduct.
A barrister representing Radio Rentals in a class action alleging its rental practices violated responsible lending laws has told a Federal Court judge that repeated delays by the Maurice Blackburn-led class could damage the company.