Mills Oakley

An adjudicator’s finding that it had no jurisdiction to rule on a payment claim in a dispute over a Sydney development was a binding determination under SOPA, an appeals court has said in upholding a decision that a builder’s pursuit of a second, favourable adjudication was an abuse of process.

The High Court has declined to grant special leave to a prefab home builder that was hit with $500,000 in damages for engaging in misleading and deceptive conduct by convincing a couple to vary their contract to allow the use of cladding they had previously rejected.

Real estate data company BCI and US analytics firm CoreLogic are fighting over expert evidence in a novel IP case over alleged data scraping, with CoreLogic saying a report by BCI’s accountant makes changes to its case two months out from trial.

In BCI’s data-scraping case against CoreLogic, which is set down for trial in April, a judge has thrown out a strike-out application she said was brought five months too late.

A director of developer Villawood has lost his bid to bring an alternative claim in his case against the company’s subsidiary alleging he is entitled to part of a property said to be worth $295 million.

Monarch Building Solutions has lost its bid to strike out waterproofing contractor PJG Frawley Construction’s claim for payment for work allegedly completed on a community-led project to replace buildings destroyed in bushfires in Cobargo. 

A court has signed off on a $6.8 million settlement in a class action against a Queensland trucking company on behalf of owners of cargo on a freight train derailed by a truck at a level crossing.

A Sydney developer has successfully challenged a decision which rejected its plans to demolish a 32-room boarding house for the construction of four luxury residences in Paddington, with a judge calling the decision "personal and idiosyncratic".

A wellness retreat has launched an intellectual property suit against luxury Queensland resort Elysium Noosa, claiming that a recent rebrand amounts to passing off.

McCullough Robertson has nabbed a construction law expert from Mills Oakley to join the firm's partnership.