Class action: Black Saturday survivors handed $418.5m in compensation

EXCLUSIVE: MORE than eight years after Black Saturday, survivors of the deadly Kilmore East-Kinglake and Murrindindi fires have been handed $418.5 million as part of a class action.

• Black Saturday class action settles

BLACK Saturday survivors have been handed $418.5 million as part of a class action over the Kilmore East-Kinglake and Murrindindi fires.

Cheques have been mailed out to those affected by the devastating fires, 2973 days after the February 7, 2009, events.

Chris Hobbs, who lost his house on Black Saturday, said the money had been a long time coming.

“But you have to get these things right,” he said. “Had I not got this settlement, I probably would have had to have sold and moved somewhere cheaper, which is the last thing at my age I wanted to do. I’m very happy here.”

The Kilmore East-Kinglake bushfire resulted in 119 deaths, the destruction of 1242 homes, damage to a further 1084 homes, and the burning of more than 125,000ha of land.

Forty people died in the Murrindindi fire and an estimated 500 homes were destroyed.

The Kinglake fire was caused when a live power line hit a power pole cable stay, igniting surrounding vegetation while the Murrundindi blaze was sparked by a break in an electrical conductor on a power pole near the Murrindindi Saw Mill.

Black Saturday survivors will finally receive their compensation payments. Picture: David Caird.

Power company SP AusNet and four other defendants reached an agreement to settle the class action for the record settlement in July 2014.

The Supreme Court approved it and the proposed settlement distribution scheme in December that year.

Maurice Blackburn is administering the settlement, which saw more than 10,000 individual claims registered as part of the class action.

The Supreme Court advised that nearly all of the group members who suffered personal injuries because of the bushfire had received their compensation payment of about $158.5 million.

Survivors who claimed economic loss or property damage had, or would be, receiving about $260 million.

Maurice Blackburn spokesman Cameron Scott said about 4000 claimants would receive payments this week, totalling more than $496 million.

The payments come on top of more than $192.4 million paid to 1800 claimants in personal injury money last year.

The figure pushes the amount paid to Black Saturday survivors as part of the class action to more than $688 million.

Mr Hobbs, who received his cheque this week, said the money offered him some much-needed breathing space.

Chris Hobbs who lives in Marysville is a Black Saturday and all the survivor are finally getting their compensation payments. Picture: David Caird

“The money just clears all those things like credit cards … I won’t have to beg, borrow or whatever,” he said. “Most people I know here are very happy with the outcome.”

Maurice Blackburn principal Andrew Watson said it had achieved the two highest class action settlements in Australian history on behalf of survivors of the Black Saturday fires.