AFL legend Greg ‘Diesel’ Williams in Barwon Heads golf resort court battle

AFL legend Greg ‘Diesel’ Williams has conceded he has “memory issues” stemming from his football career in a tribunal hearing over a resort he part owns.

Carlton legend Greg ‘Diesel’ Williams is embroiled in a bitter court battle over the swanky Barwon Heads golf course resort he bought into at the end of his stellar football career.

Williams - who has previously revealed he has the devastating brain disease chronic traumatic encephalopathy (CTE) from repeated concussions during his playing days - also claims to have “fallen out” with his resort business partners.

Williams has been fighting the resort’s managers Susan and Michael Cook at VCAT over rent allegedly owed for lease of the Barwon Heads Resort at 13th Beach.

The luxury resort is nestled between two premier golf courses in the 13th Beach Golf Links Estate and includes apartments, a conference centre, day spa, restaurant and function rooms.

In early 2011, Carlton spruiked Williams’ new business venture on its website saying “together with his devoted wife Mary and a group of real estate associates” Williams had “taken ownership of Barwon Heads Resort at 13th Beach on the southern shores of the idyllic Bellarine Peninsula”.

A year later the AFL trumpeted “Diesel owns and runs a highly-acclaimed golf course and resort” and had proven himself a successful businessman.

AFL legend Greg Williams mentors kids at Carlton training. Photo: Michael Klein

Williams claims to have fallen out with his Barwon Heads Resort business partners and says he was “kicked off” as a director.

A former Geelong and Sydney Swans player and Carlton legend, Williams is a dual Brownlow medallist and four-time All-Australian.

He has said CTE has left him unable to recall life highlights such as the 1995 Blues premiership, in which he kicked five goals and won the Norm Smith Medal.

At the heart of the Victorian Civil and Administrative Tribunal dispute is the Cooks’ lease of the resort and whether Williams told them, as they claim, their rent would not be increased before December 15, 2020, and would remain at $66,852 a year.

The Cooks’ family company, Lismore, was later invoiced for a series of five per cent rent rises over multiple years and sent a Section 146 default notice for rent allegedly owed.

A Section 146 is commonly a precursor to termination of a lease.

“They had years of believing that what had been represented to them (by Williams about the rent) was, in fact, the truth,” the Cooks’ lawyer Sazz Nasimi said.

Williams told the Herald Sun he had once been close friends with the Cooks but they had grown apart over the years.

VCAT heard the Cooks were “not particularly sophisticated yet very trusting and honest” and that Williams “accepted he had some memory issues after years of playing contact sport”.

Williams told the Herald Sun there had also been a falling out with his business partners in the resort, Ian Robinson and Victor Bulhakow - who were also involved in the VCAT case - and had been “kicked off” as a company director.

The Barwon Heads Resort at 13th Beach is a golfers’ paradise.

The resort is now at the centre of a VCAT stoush.

Company ASIC documents show Williams remains an equal shareholder in the resort and confirm Ian Robinson and Victor Bulhakow are directors, while he is a former director.

“It’s complicated and I’m just trying to move on from it all,” Williams said.

As well as being an owner of the resort, Williams had secured its management rights shortly after purchase, the Herald Sun was told.

Documents show the Cooks later bought those rights from Williams for $1m, and it’s understood this may have led to bad blood between the directors.

The tribunal heard the Williams trained the Cooks for two months to take over the running of the luxury resort, after which the Cooks managed it independently.

VCAT senior member Leneen Forde said Lismore issued proceedings against the owners’ company, referred to as Barwon, in March 2020 to stop it actioning the Section 146 default notice.

“Lismore subsequently filed points of claim against Barwon seeking various declarations, 16 in total, about the status of its lease and the rent payable and a claim for damages,” Ms Forde said.

Maintenance matters including grease trap and toilet repairs, a cool room leak and conference centre replacement carpet costs formed part of the Cooks’ claim.

Ms Forde this week ruled the Section 146 default notice given to the Cooks was defective and ordered it be set aside.

She also ordered the resort owners pay the Cooks more than $4000 for repair costs and replace the conference centre carpet.

Greg ‘Diesel’ Williams at Carlton training in early 2022. Picture: Michael Klein

The Cooks were also given the option of pursuing costs against Barwon, which Mr Nasimi said his clients were considering.

No ruling on whether rent was owed was made but Mr Nashimi said the Cooks were seeking Covid rental relief through a mediation process with the Small Business Commissioner.

“At the time of lockdown, we applied for rent relief but Barwon Heads (the owners) wouldn’t give it to us, so it went off to mediation,” he said.

“They adjourned the mediation because they (the owners) thought that they were going to be successful in holding up the 146 notice, in which case they’d kick us out and there wouldn’t be any need for rent reduction.

“Our client respects the tribunal’s decision and welcomes the clarity that it provides in what, up to this point, appears to be a dysfunctional landlord entity.”