Federal Court orders release of documents revealing groups behind alleged OTR smear
The groups behind an alleged smear campaign against OTR could be revealed to the company within days following a court order and as a potential trial looms.
The identities of groups behind an alleged smear campaign against OTR are likely to be revealed to the petrol and convenience store giant within days, but will be shielded from the public ahead of a potential Federal Court trial.
OTR commenced court proceedings against influential public relations and lobbying firm The Civic Partnership in March, over claims one of its senior executives set up fake social media identities to damage the reputation of the company while it was defending a multimillion-dollar underpayment class action.
This week Federal Court judge Patrick O’Sullivan ordered that documents confirming the identity of clients who engaged The Civic Partnership to undertake the campaign be provided to OTR as part of a pre-trial discovery process.
The Civic Partnership has been given seven days to provide a list of documents that discloses the terms of any retainer or scope of engagement between the PR firm and its clients, the instructions given by the clients to undertake the campaign, and any records of payments made by the clients to The Civic Partnership.
Any documents provided to OTR will be withheld from the public, but details could be revealed if the matter progresses to a trial.
However, the move could also prompt an early settlement between OTR and The Civic Partnership as part of an ongoing mediation process.
OTR, the company established by the Shahin family’s Peregrine Corporation and acquired by fuel giant Viva Energy for $1.2bn this year, has accused The Civic Partnership of running a campaign designed to damage the company’s reputation in the wake of a class action that alleged OTR underpaid hundreds of staff over several years.
A $5.8m settlement of the class action was reached in August 2022.
OTR claims The Civic Partnership and David Lau, one of the PR firm’s senior executives at the time, were acting on behalf of clients whose identities have so far been secret.
In its statement of claim, the company alleges that over the course of 2021 and 2022, Mr Lau created a website and petition, and used social media platforms Facebook and X, to share stories of aliases appearing to be aggrieved former employees and victims of misconduct by OTR, but who were in fact fabricated identities created by Mr Lau to promote the interests of The Civic Partnership’s clients.
OTR claims none of the aliases created by Mr Lau – including “Jack Musk”, “Sean Cook” and “Joey Wong” – had ever been employees of the company, and argues the scheme amounted to misleading and deceptive conduct that damaged the reputation of the company.
Mr Lau left The Civic Partnership in April 2023, four months after he resigned from the Liberal Party, following an admission that he used the fake identity – “Sean Cook” – in a bid to shut down reporting of Victorian state MP Renee Heath’s ties to her father Brian’s controversial City Builders Church.
Mr Lau, a former Liberal administrative committee member, is not a party to the OTR proceedings.
In its defence filed with the court, The Civic Partnership admits that aliases were created by Mr Lau as part of a social media campaign “in relation to the OTR business”, but denies the campaign was “designed to damage the applicants’ business and reputation”.
It claims the reputation of OTR had already been damaged by widely publicised allegations of wage theft, judicial findings of wage underpayments, the multimillion-dollar settlement payout, and OTR’s 2018 appointment of former chief executive Warren Wilmot, who had been embroiled in an underpayment scandal while CEO at rival 7-Eleven.
Legal representatives for The Civic Partnership previously told The Australian that OTR’s statement of claim contained “numerous unsubstantiated claims that will be defended”.
It declined to comment on the matter on Wednesday. Lawyers for OTR declined to comment.
A case management hearing has been scheduled for August 21.
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