Liquidator in court probe of failed Queensland One Homes

HOT on the heels of the JM Kelly investigation, the circumstances surrounding another collapsed Queensland building company is scheduled to be probed in court.

THE figures behind the collapse of Gold Coast-based Queensland One Homes will be questioned in the Federal Court later this month.

Queensland One Homes went under in July 2017 with more than $5.9 million estimated to be owed to subbies, financiers and the Australian Taxation Office.

Liquidator Michael Caspaney, of Menzies Advisory, said a five-day public examination into the collapse will be held in the Federal Court from September 30. Company directors and others involved in the firm are expected to give evidence.

The date of a previously announced examination into the collapse of Cullen Group Australia is yet to be determined. Cullen Group Australia and Cullen Group went under in December 2016, owing creditors about $45 million.

The Queensland One Homes probe follows a separate public examination by PwC liquidator Derrick Vickers last month into the $30 million collapse of Rockhampton-based JM Kelly Group. The JM Kelly examination will reconvene in October with witnesses expected to include company director John Murphy and his sister Elizabeth.

The website of Queensland One Homes, which went into liquidation more than two years ago. Photo: Supplied

The Queensland Building and Construction Commission (QBCC) has contributed funds for both public examinations amid rising concern about insolvencies and a lack of corporate transparency in the construction industry.

More than 1400 companies in the state’s construction sector have entered administration in the past five years with subcontractors and others losing hundreds of millions of dollars.

Mr Caspaney has said the public examinations would help determine whether the companies had exceeded their financial limits and been involved in alleged phoenix operations. Phoenixing is the creation of new companies to avoid paying creditors.

Mr Caspaney said the public examination powers contained in the Corporations Act were a powerful weapon in a liquidator’s hands. “It gives us quasi-judicial powers and we can compel directors and other officers of a company to appear,” he said. “My main job is to get a better return for creditors.”

Originally published as Liquidator in court probe of failed Queensland One Homes