Fishers vs GPC class action: new trial date due to COVID

The first class action case to be tried in a Queensland court has moved its scheduled trial date due to COVID-19 restrictions impacting expert reports and evidence gathering.

Gladstone Fish Market owner Ted Whittingham in the cream jacket and pants), Urangan Fisheries owner Nick Schulz with Law Essentials principle Chris Thompson and Clyde and Co partner Maurice Thompson with plaintiffs in the class action against Gladstone Ports Corporation.

The first class action case to be tried in a Queensland court has moved its scheduled trial date due to COVID-19 restrictions impacting expert reports and evidence gathering.

More than 150 people (commercial fishermen and associated businesses) have filed a class action case against Gladstone Ports Corporation, seeking up to $150 million in damages.

The claim by fishers from Bowen to Sydney including Keppel Bay, Stanage Bay and Gladstone region, is dredging and associated works in 2011 during the Gladstone Port expansion project polluted waters and seas, degrading the quality and quantity of fish, impacting commercial fishermen and associated businesses’ livelihoods.

The claim by fishers is that dredging and associated works in 2011 during the Gladstone Port expansion project polluted waters and seas, degrading the quality and quantity of fish, impacting commercial fishermen and associated businesses’ livelihoods.

The complex case is continually mentioned in the Supreme Court in Rockhampton as it progresses towards a trial date, which was originally scheduled for April 2022.

However, last month, Justice Graeme Crow granted an application to reschedule the trial, and gave fishers more time for their experts to complete reports as part of the plaintiffs’ evidence.

The trial will now start on July 25, 2022, and is expected to take 11 weeks.

Lachlan Armstrong QC, representing the fishers and associated businesses, told the court on April 22 despite the “very exhausting efforts” made by Clyde and Co (plaintiff’s lawyers) to meet the schedule, experts were sorting through “an enormous amount of evidence”.

He said the process had proceed more slowly than originally set out and this was the sixth extension sought by the plaintiffs due to the complexity of the case.

Chris Thompson of Law Essentials, who represented the first plaintiffs in the case and remains part of the plaintiff team, said COVID-19 restrictions over the past 12 months caused delays in the preparation of the plaintiffs’ lay and expert evidence and resulted in the granting of various amendments to the court’s timetable to accommodate the additional time the plaintiffs’ experts needed to prepare their reports.

More stories:

Last-ditch effort to stop fishers class action against GPC

Gladstone Ports Corp class action evidence ‘missing’

Fishing class action win against Department of Fisheries
GPC lawyers call deal vexatious under 400-year-old tort

Originally published as Fishers vs GPC class action: new trial date due to COVID