Australian Tax Office abandons bid to put Damian Griffiths’ Bubbles Bar and Bistro into liquidation

THE Australian Taxation Office has abandoned a bid to put Damian Griffiths’ Bubbles Bar and Bistro company into liquidation after previously lodging an application to wind it up.

Damian Griffiths’ Les Bubbles restaurant on Wickham Street, Fortitude Valley. Picture: Marc Robertson

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THE Australian Taxation Office has abandoned a bid to put Damian Griffiths’ Bubbles Bar and Bistro company into liquidation after creditors already voted to do so yesterday.

The case was mentioned briefly in the Federal Court this morning and was dismissed by a registrar.

The ATO had lodged an application to wind up Bubbles Bar and Bistro, trading as Les Bubbles, on November 15.

Griffiths also owns popular ventures Doughnut Time and the Alfred & Constance Hotel.

Creditors yesterday voted at 3pm to tip Bubbles Bar and Bistro into liquidation and Deloitte was appointed to handle the wind up.

Damian Griffiths in his Fortitude Valley venue Les Bubbles.

It came after a scathing administrator’s report which claimed the company “may have been insolvent from as early as December 2015”.

Bubbles Bar and Bistro collapsed in December owing $1.32 million and had just $5.62 in the bank.

It is alleged that after the ATO launched legal action, Griffiths sold the business for just $52, 383 to a company controlled by his top lieutenant, Dan Strachotta.