Darren Lockyer suing prestigious Brisbane law firm for $46m

Rugby league legend Darren Lockyer is embroiled in a sensational $46m legal stoush against a prestigious Brisbane law firm which is accused of costing the star and his business partners a fortune in potential profits.

Rugby league great Darren Lockyer is embroiled in a sensational $46m legal stoush against a prestigious Brisbane law firm which is accused of costing the star and his business partners a fortune in potential profits.

Lockyer’s company and four others, which were all part owners in a labour-hire business, claim top lawyers, McCullough Robertson (McCullough) gave them bad business advice which collectively cost them tens of millions of dollars.

The former co-owners are suing the firm in the Supreme Court for negligence and breach of contract.

The claim alleges that the bad advice resulted in One Key Resources having an invalid enterprise agreement (EA) that prevented them from making maximum profits and lost the shareholders more than $17m in the sale of the company.

It also claims that the company could have been sold for a much higher price, had sound advice been given by McCullough.

One Key Resources was sold to a UK private equity player for a “maximum price” of $33.2m in 2016, but only $15.8m was paid after the new owners were hit with a massive bill for previous unpaid staff leave and redundancy payments after an EA was overturned in court, the claim states.

DarrenLockyer’s company and four others, which were all part owners in a labour-hire business, claim top lawyers, McCullough Robertson (McCullough) gave them bad business advice which collectively cost them tens of millions of dollars. Pic Peter Wallis

The five plaintiffs allege that if McCullough Robertson lawyers Michael Andrew Moy, an Industrial Relations specialist who advised on the EA, and Isaac Clifford West, a commercial law specialist who advised on the sale, had not negligently given them bad advice from 2014 to 2016, they would have received more money.

The claim alleges that sound advice would have been to delay the sale of OKR to late 2018, giving them time to move their workers onto a new valid enterprise agreement.

The five companies claim that company earnings would have then grown, reaching $13m in June 2018, and they would then have been able to cash in by selling their company for $44m.

The claim for loss is $46m, calculated by adding the estimated profits for 2017 and 2018 with the projected higher sale price.

The lawsuit alleges that Mr Moy advised then-One Key managing director Grant Wechsel in 2015 to enter into a new EA using the name of RECS (Qld) Pty Ltd, because RECS was a company that was not known within the resources industry.

The claim alleges that Mr Moy advised Mr Wechsel that “it was common for the unions to raise issues with enterprise agreements”, and that the EA would likely “slip through” the Fair Work Commission without issue, if it was in the name of RECS (Qld) Pty Ltd, and that they only needed to find “two or three friendly employees to enter into the new” EA.

The EA was approved by the FWC in October 2015, and shortly after all their current employees were transferred to the RECS EA.

Three years later, after the Construction Forestry Maritime Mining and Energy Union took the case to the FWC, the EA was found to be invalid, because it was only voted on by a handful of workers, and the company collapsed because it owed massive debts to its workers who now needed to be paid higher rates according to their industry awards, the claim states.

Mr Lockyer was a director of One Key Resources’ parent company One Key Holdings (OKH) from December 2014 until the sale in May 2016, and Lockyer Enterprises held 2800 shares in OKH until May 2016.

In May 2016 Mr Lockyer was paid $374,999 for his shares in OKH, and he got a further $188,630 in October 2016 for his shares, the claim states.

The other companies who are suing McCullough belong to Mr Wechsel, who owned the largest stake, as well as Cairns developer Darren Halpin from Edge Hill and Andrew Holder from Mt Low.

Lockyer, a father of three, has worked as a league commentator for the Nine TV network and he is a non-executive director of stockmarket listed Brisbane Broncos Ltd and is the business affairs manager at ASX-listed Mayur Resources, a Brisbane based company which owns mining tenements in PNG.

No defence has been filed and no hearing date has been set.

Lockyer’s management did not respond to requests for comment.