De Simone v Legal Services Board (costs)
[2017] VSC 644
•20 October 2017
| IN THE SUPREME COURT OF VICTORIA | Not Restricted |
AT MELBOURNE
COMMON LAW DIVISION
PROFESSIONAL LIABILITY LIST
S CI 2013 01485
| GIUSEPPE DE SIMONE (& ORS ACCORDING TO THE SCHEDULE) | Plaintiffs |
| v | |
| LEGAL SERVICES BOARD | Defendant |
| MICHAEL RICHARD BRERETON AND OTHERS (according to the attached schedule) | Third Parties |
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JUDGE: | MACAULAY J |
WHERE HELD: | Melbourne |
DATE OF HEARING: | On the papers (submissions filed 30 August 2017 and 6 September 2017) |
DATE OF RULING: | 20 October 2017 |
CASE MAY BE CITED AS: | De Simone v Legal Services Board (costs) |
MEDIUM NEUTRAL CITATION: | [2017] VSC 644 |
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COSTS — Costs of appeal under s 3.6.23 of the Legal Profession Act2004 (Vic) — Costs of a claim exercising rights of subrogation under s 3.6.19 of the Legal Profession Act2004 (Vic) brought as third party proceedings in an appeal — Oxenbould v The Solicitors’ Trust (No 2) [2011] TASSC 63; The Solicitors’ Trust v Oxenbould [2013] TASFC 2; Oshlackv Richmond River Council [1998] 193 CLR 72.
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APPEARANCES: | Counsel | Solicitors |
| For the Plaintiffs | Peter Lustig | |
| For the Defendant | Mr S R Senathirajah | Legal Services Board |
| For the First Third Party | ||
| For the Second Third Party | Mr T Stuart |
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Introduction......................................................................................................................................... 1
The Board’s application for costs.................................................................................................... 3
Relevant principles....................................................................................................................... 3
Grounds for the application........................................................................................................ 3
Third parties’ application for costs................................................................................................. 9
The nature of the third party claims........................................................................................... 9
Relevant principles..................................................................................................................... 10
Grounds for the application...................................................................................................... 11
Conclusion and orders.................................................................................................................... 13
HIS HONOUR:
Introduction
After a trial lasting six days in February 2017, on 16 August 2017 I handed down reasons for judgment in this proceeding (the reasons),[1] affirming the decision of the Legal Services Board of Victoria (the Board) to deny the plaintiffs’ claim against the Fidelity Fund (the Fund). The Fund is maintained by the Board to compensate persons who suffer losses arising out of defaults by law practices in connection with money passing through their trust accounts. As a consequence of that result, I dismissed the plaintiffs’ appeal to this Court and third party claims which had been brought by the Board against Michael Brereton and David McLeod.
[1]De Simone v Legal Service Board [2017] VSC 471.
Before turning to the question of costs, it is convenient to briefly summarise the essential issues in the proceeding and my findings in relation to each of them. The first task was to identify the true nature of the appeal and the basis on which it would be conducted; the second was to decide, on the facts established, whether there had been a default to which Part 3.6 of the Legal Profession Act2004 (Vic) (the Act) applied; the third question was whether any of the plaintiffs suffered any pecuniary loss because of a relevant default; the fourth issue was whether the plaintiffs’ claims were defeated by releases they had signed in 2004 and 2007; and finally, having decided those issues, it was necessary to consider whether the Board’s decision had been wrong, and, if so, what orders I should make including whether the Board was entitled to recover from either or both of the third parties.
My findings were as follows:
(a) first, the terms of the Act required me to conduct the appeal as a hearing de novo;
(b) secondly, there had not been a default to which Part 3.6 of the Act applied;
(c) thirdly, because there had not been a default to which Part 3.6 applied, it was not necessary to determine whether any of the plaintiffs had suffered a pecuniary loss because of a proven default;
(d) fourthly, the combined effect of the releases contained in the 2004 deed and the 2007 deed was to release Michael Brereton – and, by extension, on the appeal, the Board – from any claim which any of the plaintiffs (other than Serafino De Simone) had against him for losses claimed against the Fund; and
(e) lastly, in light of the above, that the Board’s decision be affirmed and the third party claims dismissed.
Importantly, in affirming the Board’s decision I reiterated that the appeal had been conducted as a hearing de novo, and that affirming the Board’s decision did not imply that I had reached the decision for the same reasons given by the Board. This has relevance for reasons I will explain below.
The appeal was brought under s 3.6.23 of the Act. The prima facie position on costs in an appeal of that kind is set out in s 3.6.23(7) as follows –
No order for costs is to be made on an appeal under this section unless the… court is satisfied that an order for costs should be made in the interests of justice.
In handing down the reasons I reserved the question of costs and invited any party wishing to displace the prima facie position to file written submissions setting out why this Court should be satisfied that it was in the interests of justice to do so. I received written submissions from each of the parties.[2]
[2]Defendant’s submissions on costs dated 30 August 2017; first third party’s submissions on costs dated 30 August 2017; costs submissions of second third party dated 30 August 2017; plaintiff’s submissions in reply to application for costs made by the defendant dated 6 September 2017; defendant’s submissions responding to applications by the third parties for costs dated 6 September 2017.
The Board, the successful party in the appeal, applied for its costs of the proceeding to be paid by the plaintiffs. The plaintiffs resisted that application and submitted that there should be no order as to costs.
Further, Michael Brereton and David McLeod, the first and second third parties respectively, applied for their costs of the third party proceedings to be paid by the Board, it being the party that joined them to the proceeding. The Board submitted that the plaintiffs should pay the third parties’ costs either directly or by paying to the Board any costs the Board is ordered to pay the third parties. Alternatively, it submitted that the third parties ought not be entitled to any costs or, at least, not all of them.
The Board’s application for costs
Relevant principles
As a species of costs provision, s 3.6.23(7) falls into what Basten JA (with whom Santow and Bryson JJA agreed) in Hunter Development Brokerage Pty Ltd v Cessnock City Council (No 2)[3] described as the ‘third category of cases’, namely cases which provide as a general rule that there shall be no order as to costs, with a discretionary power to depart from that rule in particular circumstances.[4] In the case of an appeal of this nature, the discretionary power is enlivened if a court is satisfied that it is in the interests of justice to depart from the general rule.
[3](2006) 68 NSWLR 177, 182 [19] (‘Hunter Development Brokerage’).
[4]Blow J, as he then was, came to the same conclusion in relation to the same provision in Tasmanian legislation: Oxenbould v The Solicitors’ Trust (No 2) [2011] TASSC 63, upheld on appeal The Solicitors’ Trust v Oxenbould [2013] TASFC 2. The same conclusion was also reached by Derham AsJ in relation to the Victorian provision in his decision on an early application made in this proceeding: De Simone v Legal Services Board (Ruling) [2015] VSC 286 [15].
Section 3.6.23(7) does not specify or confine the matters that are to be taken into account when determining whether an order for costs should be made in the interests of justice. It follows that all circumstances may be taken into account (including the scheme of the Act and the circumstances of the case being considered).[5]
[5]The Solicitors’ Trust v Oxenbould [2013] TASFC 2 [107].
Grounds for the application
The Board submitted that four circumstances justified an order being made in its favour in the interest of justice, namely:
(a) the plaintiffs failed to obtain a more favourable result in the proceeding than offers that had been made by the Board on 7 April 2014 and 2 December 2016, relying upon the Calderbank principles;
(b) on the eve of the commencement of the trial of the proceeding, the plaintiffs abandoned that part of their claim that relied upon the alleged Lyle default;
(c) on the second day of trial, the plaintiffs significantly recast the remaining part of the claim (i.e. the alleged Brereton default); and
(d) the delays, costs and inconvenience caused by the plaintiffs’ failures to comply with various interlocutory timetables ordered by the Court.
The so called Calderbank offer made by the Board in April 2014 was an offer by the Board to bear its own costs if the plaintiffs discontinued their proceeding. There was no offer of any payment of money. The Board’s offer to bear its own costs was, in substance, an offer to abide the usual outcome under s 3.6.23(7) in the absence of the Court making any different order. The Board’s offer was contained in two letters: one in respect of the claim based upon the alleged Brereton default and the other in respect of the claim based upon the alleged Lyle default. In each, the Board set out its arguments as to why the plaintiffs’ claim would fail.
The arguments as to why the plaintiffs’ claim would fail in respect of the alleged Brereton default were not all upheld in my ultimate decision although, at a general level, some were. The position in relation to the claim based upon the alleged Lyle default is more conveniently addressed under the Board’s second ground. I did not have to consider the alleged Lyle default and so the basis upon which it might have failed or succeeded was never fully analysed.
As a matter of general observation, the reasons demonstrate the relative complexity and sophistication of the analysis required to resolve the claim based upon the alleged Brereton default; the legislative provisions were difficult to construe and apply and were relatively free from authority; and to the extent there was authority, it was not straightforward. Both parties struggled, over the whole course of the proceeding, to identify, refine and articulate the precise arguments which they considered to be germane to the resolution of the proceeding. As my reasons indicated, both sides enjoyed a mixture of success and failure on individual components of their arguments although, in the end, fundamental points were found in the Board’s favour that were fatal to the plaintiffs’ claim.
Additionally, as alluded to above, my reasons for affirming the Board’s decision to deny the claim differed in material respects from the reasons given by the Board for doing so. From that perspective, the plaintiffs may well have been justified to challenge the Board’s decision given the reasons it advanced.
In those circumstances I am not persuaded (on this ground) that the fact that the plaintiffs did no better than the Board’s offer that their claim be discontinued without them being liable for the Board’s costs warrants any departure from the prima facie position that each party must bear their own costs of the appeal. That is, at least insofar as the claim was pursued in respect of the alleged Brereton default.
As I have said, the claim based upon the alleged Lyle default is more conveniently addressed under the Board’s second ground. But, before turning to it, I note that the Board reiterated its offer in respect of the claim based upon the alleged Lyle default by a further Calderbank letter in December 2016. The reiteration of the offer in respect of the alleged Lyle claim and the reasons articulated by the Board for the plaintiffs to discontinue it, taken in combination with the plaintiffs abandoning that claim on the eve of trial, reinforces the view which I come to next.
The claim based upon the alleged Lyle default was, on its face, somewhat strained and convoluted. The Board applied to have it determined as a separate question in mid-2015 but, given the general complexity of the Act and the potential forensic connections between the resolution of the claims based upon the Brereton default and the Lyle default, at that stage I did not consider it was appropriate to order the trial of a separate question.[6] But, the combined force of the strained nature of the claim, the Board’s reasonable attempt to have it determined separately, the Board’s detailed articulation on two occasions why the claim would fail and the plaintiffs’ ultimate abandonment of it on the eve of trial, satisfies me that, in respect of the costs of that component of the claim, I should depart from the default rule in respect of costs. The plaintiffs should pay the Board’s costs in respect of that component of its claim.
[6]De Simone v Victorian Legal Services Board (Ruling No 3) [2015] VSC 451.
Accordingly, I will order that the plaintiffs pay the Board’s costs of and incidental to the plaintiffs’ claim as articulated in paragraphs B12-B27 of the plaintiffs’ amended statement of claim dated 25 May 2012 and the abandonment of that claim at trial. The plaintiffs submit that the Board is wrong in characterising those paragraphs as comprising ‘in effect, one half of their original claim’ because the plaintiffs could not have received both the Lyle amount and the Brereton amount. In other words, it could not be said that the abandonment of the Lyle claim necessarily meant that at least half the costs of the proceeding were wasted. That argument may well be correct but it is not for me to determine. I will leave that for the Costs Court, if necessary, to quantify any additional component of the overall costs of the proceeding attributed to the inclusion of the claim based upon the alleged Lyle default.
The third ground relied on by the Board rested upon the significant recasting of the plaintiffs’ case, on the second day of trial, in respect of the alleged Brereton default. Against the Board’s opposition, I allowed the plaintiffs to amend their claim to pursue ‘a new legal characterisation’ in respect of that part of the claim. In doing so, I expressed some sympathy with the Board’s complaint about the lateness of the amendment but said that any prejudice could be cured by, amongst other things, an award of costs. But I also said at the time that it had not been suggested that those amendments would add significantly, if at all, to the cost or timely resolution of the proceeding. Further, it was clear that the Board was quite prepared to meet those new contentions although some amendments to pleadings were required.
In the context of the whole scheme of this large and complex proceeding I am not satisfied that the interests of justice call for a departure from the default rule in relation to costs merely because of that late re-characterisation of an aspect of the plaintiffs’ claim, either alone or together with other considerations.
Finally, the Board’s fourth ground rested on the ‘plaintiffs’ alleged repeated failures to comply with Court ordered interlocutory timetables’. There is no doubt that, from time to time, the plaintiffs were dilatory in their compliance with court ordered timetables. Some orders were made against them along the way where it was clear to the relevant judicial officer that the plaintiffs’ non-compliance justified a costs order being made against them. On other occasions costs were reserved. Apart from one issue I will come to in a moment, in the circumstances I will briefly describe I am not satisfied that the interests of justice require further cost consequences to be visited on the plaintiffs due to alleged non-compliance with interlocutory orders.
Generally, I take into account the interrelationship between the plaintiffs’ ability to comply with orders, on the one hand, and the difficulties they encountered over a period of years in trying to obtain documents with which to advance their case. It is to be noted that the persons with direct personal knowledge of many of the relevant facts, and possession of the critical documents, were persons other than the plaintiffs and (arguably) the Board. Initially, that knowledge and those documents were possessed by Brereton and his legal practice and possibly by McLeod. Later, many of the relevant documents came into the possession of the trust account investigator for the Law Institute of Victoria and then the Legal Services Commissioner. After that, transitional provisions of succeeding iterations of the regulatory statutes complicated the analysis as to whether possession of documents by the Legal Services Commissioner amounted to possession of documents by the Legal Services Board for the purposes of giving discovery in this proceeding.[7]
[7]De Simone v Victorian Legal Services Board (Discovery ruling)(Ruling No 4) (Unreported, 15 June 2016, Macaulay J).
I made certain remarks about the poor discovery performance of the Board in this proceeding when resolving a particular discovery application in 2016.[8] In the result, it is far from clear where the justice of the situation rests as between the Board and the plaintiffs in terms of responsibility for delay in this case: probably, fault rests on both sides.
[8]Ibid [49]-[51].
There is one specific matter of delay which I think stands in a different category. On 17 June 2016 the proceeding was set down for trial on 6 February 2017. Various orders were made and subsequently extended from time to time requiring the plaintiffs to prepare court books for trial (in addition to other orders such as outlines of evidence, submissions etc). Initially the trial had to be delayed for two days (to 8 February 2017) because of the plaintiffs’ delay in putting together the court book. Meanwhile the Board had to prepare court books for its counsel so that they could ready themselves for trial. The case was adjourned for a further five days from 8 February to 13 February due to the abandonment of the claim based upon the Lyle default and the re-pleading that was required.
Insofar as the Board incurred additional costs due to the plaintiffs not preparing the court books in a timely manner I consider the plaintiffs should meet those costs. The reasons for that delay were plainly on the plaintiffs’ side and in the interests of justice the plaintiffs should be responsible for the consequences of that delay.
Other than the Board’s costs due to delay in the preparation of the court book as described, on this ground I am not satisfied that the interests of justice call for the plaintiffs to pay the Board’s costs beyond those which are already the subject of costs orders which I will not disturb.
In summary, I will order that the plaintiffs pay the Board’s costs of and incidental:
(a) to the plaintiffs’ claim as articulated in paragraphs B12-B27 of the plaintiffs’ amended statement of claim dated 25 May 2012, and its abandonment on 8 February 2017; and
(b) to the plaintiffs’ default in respect of paragraph 6 of the orders made 16 December 2016 by Associate Justice Daly for the preparation of the court book for trial.
Otherwise, on the plaintiffs’ appeal, except as to orders for costs previously made, there shall be no order as to costs.
Third parties’ application for costs
The nature of the third party claims
The Board’s third party notice directed to both Michael Brereton and David McLeod was filed on 30 April 2013. By that notice the Board claimed indemnities from Brereton and McLeod in respect of any order, including for interest and costs, made in the plaintiffs’ favour against the Board in respect of the actions of Brereton and McLeod respectively.
By its pleading in the third party statement of claim the Board alleged, in paragraph 1(d), that ‘pursuant to s 3.6.19 of the Act, on payment of a claim from the Fidelity Fund, [the Board] is subrogated to the rights and remedies of the claimant against any person in relation to the default to which the claim relates’. The Board summarised the plaintiffs’ claims made against Brereton and McLeod as the foundation for the claim that the plaintiffs made upon the Fidelity Fund. The Board alleged (at paragraph 16) that, if the Court found the Board liable to the plaintiffs because of the conduct of Brereton and McLeod and the plaintiffs were entitled to compensation from the Fidelity Fund, then the plaintiffs also had rights and remedies against Brereton and McLeod in respect of that conduct.
Section 3.6.19 of the Act is headed ‘subrogation’. Subsections (1) and (4) provided:
(1)On payment of a claim from the Fidelity Fund, the Board is subrogated to the rights and remedies of the claimant against any person in relation to the default to which the claim relates.
…
(4)The Board may exercise its rights and remedies under this section in its own name or in the name of the claimant.
The Board relied upon s 3.6.19 in claiming (at paragraph 17) that Brereton and McLeod were ‘..liable to the Board for the payment of $4,436,010.52 [the sum claimed by the plaintiffs from the Fund] in compensation out of the Fidelity Fund to [Management] and [Village] in relation to the [conduct of Brereton and McLeod]’.
Relevant principles
No provision was made in s 3.6.19 as to how a court should determine the liability for the costs in relation to any subrogated claim brought under that section. I agree with the submissions of the third parties that, prima facie, the ‘no costs’ rule in s 3.6.23(7) only applies to appeals under that section and does not apply to claims made using the rights of subrogation granted to the Board under s 3.6.19. So, in my view, the prima facie position for costs is covered by s 24 of the Supreme Court Act 1986 (Vic) which states:
(1)Unless otherwise expressly provided by this or any other Act or by the Rules, the costs of and incidental to all matters in the Court, including the administration of estates and trusts, is in the discretion of the Court and the Court has full power to determine by whom and to what extent the costs are to be paid.
Part 2 of Order 63 of the Rules provides some specific rules with respect to entitlement to costs in a number of instances but does not modify the general operation of s 24 of the Supreme Court Act in respect of this kind of claim.
Section 24 of the Supreme Court Act provides a statutory power to award costs that conforms to the first of the three categories referred to in Hunter Development Brokerage. There Basten JA described this kind of power as:
.. an unconstrained conferral of power without direction or limitation… As was explained by Gaudron J and Gummow J in Oshlack [v Richmond River Council [1998] 193 CLR 72], adapting the words of Dixon J in Water Conservation and Irrigation Commission (NSW) v Browning (1947) 74 CLR 492 at 505 the power is ‘unconfined except insofar as “the subject matter, the scope and purpose” of the legislation may enable an appellate court to pronounce the reasons given by the primary judge to be “definitely extraneous to any objects the legislature could have had in view”’: Oshlack (at 81 [22]).[9]
[9]Hunter Development Brokerage (2006) 68 NSWLR 177, 181 [16].
The power to award costs under such a provision is to be exercised judicially, that is to say not arbitrarily, capriciously or so as to frustrate the legislative intent.[10] The general rule that a wholly successful defendant should receive his costs unless good reason is shown to the contrary is to be understood against the broader principle that the width of a statutory discretion is determined by the statute and cannot be narrowed by any legal rule devised by a court to control its exercise.[11] There is no absolute rule with respect to the exercise of a power such as s 24 of the Supreme Court Act that, in the absence of disentitling conduct, a successful party is to be compensated by the unsuccessful party.[12]
[10]Oshlackv Richmond River Council [1998] 193 CLR 72, 89 [22] (‘Oshlack’).
[11]Ibid at 93 [35]; citing Norbis v Norbis (1986) 161 CLR 513 at 537.
[12]Ibid at 94-95 [40].
Grounds for the application
The third parties have argued, in substance, that they should be entitled to their costs—each on a ‘solicitor/client basis’—because:
(a) in the absence of special circumstances a successful litigant should receive his or her costs;
(b) the third parties have been ‘dragged unwillingly’ into the dispute; and
(c) in relation to Brereton, a solicitor then acting on his behalf submitted two suggestions to the Board as alternative means of dealing with the proposed third party claim which, if accepted, would arguably have avoided or limited the Board’s costs exposure in the circumstances which have now arisen.
In my view there is a collection of factors which should to be taken into account in exercising the discretion afforded under s 24 of the Supreme Court Act to award costs in respect of the third party actions. Those factors are as follows:
(a) the third party claims were not made strictly in accordance with s 3.6.19 of the Act because a claim under that section is predicated upon a payment made out of the Fund, after a successful claim by a claimant, giving rise to rights of subrogation by which the Board may then make a claim against third parties;
(b) nevertheless, the procedure adopted by the Board was probably justified under r 11.01(c) of the Supreme Court (General Civil Procedure) Rules 2015 (Vic) as a means of determining a question relating to or connected with the plaintiffs’ appeal against the Board’s determination so as to bind the third parties to that result and avoid a multiplicity of proceedings;
(c) in any event, by not seeking to strike out the third party notices the third parties at least acquiesced in this procedure;
(d) although each filed appearances to the third party claims and took some steps in the proceeding, neither Brereton or McLeod made any meaningful or substantive contribution to the conduct of the proceedings –
(i) although he engaged a solicitor to appear for him at directions hearings in interlocutory stages, Brereton then terminated that lawyer’s instructions and neither attended the trial, made submissions or gave evidence[13] despite the fact that his evidence might have been of much assistance; and
[13]Brereton sought leave to give evidence by video link from Thailand shortly prior to trial but for reasons which I gave on 30 January 2017, I refused his application (Transcript, De Simone v Legal Services Board, unreported, 30 January 2017, Macaulay J).
(ii) although he appeared and was represented on the trial, McLeod did not give evidence (again, his evidence may have assisted the Court), made no relevant or independent submissions and in the absence of giving evidence or making submissions his attendance was largely if not wholly unnecessary.
(e) no actual determination was made on the merits of the underlying claims that the plaintiffs may have had against the third parties to which the Board would have been subrogated had it paid compensation to the plaintiffs—indeed, having regard to the facts summarised in the reasons,[14] I accept the Board’s submission it would be entirely inappropriate to treat Brereton and McLeod as parties who were, in any practical sense, ‘dragged’ into a dispute that was not of their making; and
(f) although the plaintiffs initiated the appeal against the Board it was not necessarily foreseeable by them that the Board would instigate third party proceedings relying upon s 3.6.19 (as explained above) as it does not envisage the making of a subrogation claim unless and until payment is made by the Board which, in turn, assumes a successful claim by the plaintiffs.
[14]De Simone v Legal Service Board [2017] VSC 471 [15] – [76].
Drawing all of these factors together, I consider that there is good reason to depart from the usual rule that a successful litigant should be entitled to his or her costs, at least to a degree. The expression ‘successful’ applied to Brereton and McLeod in this case has a certain hollow ring to it. Their respective roles (as seen from the facts outlined in my reasons) was the real genesis of the plaintiffs’ claim against the Board and neither of them can claim that the proceeding has exonerated them from the responsibility for causing the dispute between the plaintiffs and the Board. Their participation in the proceeding, while entirely permissible and justified in a technical sense, added nothing of value and was largely unnecessary.
Nevertheless claims were made against them. Those claims were brought by the Board to protect its own interests but have not resulted in any relief obtained against the third parties. The Board elected to take a procedure which was not entirely consonant with the rights afforded to it under the Act although it did so for understandable reasons and the process was not opposed by the third parties themselves. The third parties, as they were entitled to do, appeared to that claim and took steps in the proceeding.
Taking everything into account, I consider it just that the Board be ordered to pay 40 percent of the costs of each of the third parties on a standard basis. It would not be just, in the circumstances, to require the plaintiffs to indemnify the Board for those costs or to pay them directly to the third parties.
Conclusion and orders
To give effect to these conclusions, the orders that I propose to make are as follows:
1. The plaintiffs pay the defendant’s costs of and incidental to:
a. The claim alleged in paragraphs B12 - B27 of the Amended Statement of Claim filed 25 May 2012, and the discontinuance of that claim on 8 February 2017; and
b. The plaintiffs’ failure to comply with paragraph 6 of the orders made 16 December 2016 by Associate Justice Daly for the preparation of the Court book for trial.
2. Save as provided in paragraph 1, and without affecting any previous orders for costs, there be no order as to costs as between the plaintiff and the defendants or the plaintiffs and the third parties.
3. The defendant pay 40% of each third party’s costs of the third party proceeding.
4. In default of agreement, all costs be taxed on a standard basis.
SCHEDULE OF PARTIES
S CI 2013 01485
GIUSEPPE DE SIMONE First Plaintiff SERAFINO DE SIMONE Second Plaintiff DE SIMONE NOMINEES PTY LTD (ACN 006 463 421) Third Plaintiff SEACHANGE MANAGEMENT PTY LTD (ACN 091 443 211) Fourth Plaintiff SEACHANGE PROJECT NOMINEES PTY LTD (ACN 149 258 033) Fifth Plaintiff SEACHANGE VILLAGE NOMINEES PTY LTD (ACN 091 526 215) Sixth Plaintiff - and - LEGAL SERVICES BOARD Defendant - and - MICHAEL RICHARD BRERETON First Third Party DAVID MCLEOD Second Third Party
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