Fighting for Subbies Rights
The feeding frenzy continues on the carcass of the mortally wounded Wildebeest..
Results Legal are a law firm acting for Hume Doors who are seeking to have a liquidator appointed to Bloomer Constructions instead of going to a DoCA.
Results Legal have indicated that they conservatively estimate between 10% and 20% of Bloomer subbies will be sued for voidable preferences if a liquidator is appointed instead of going to a DoCA. They will go back 6 months before the winding up application by Hume Doors if Hume Doors succeed in their action to put Bloomer Constructions into Liquidation. If 10 to 20% is conservative, there is no known limit of subbies who will be sued so brace yourselves subbies.
This is an extract from the Results Legal letter to the Administrators dated 26 May 2017
"Conservatively, in our experience, a more accurate estimate of voidable transactions may be between 10% and 20% of the payments made.
This would be approximately $3.5M to $7M plus an allowance of say $2M to $4M for the third party arrangements noted below.
(i) The payments total (see table on page 51 at heading 8.8):
(A) approximately $58,250,661 from 1 November 2016 to the date of appointment; and
(B) approximately $35,099,809 from 1 December 2016 to the date of appointment.
(a) Despite request, there is no information provided detailing any payments or transactions with the Goddard Entities. Please provide these details urgently".
Questions from me to Results Legal;
- Which of the Goddard entities are you referring to Results Legal? Last time I looked there was only one that was a creditor of Bloomers.
- Wouldn't it be equally as pertinent to ask for payments or transactions made to all 600 Bloomer subcontractors & suppliers or are you just interested in besmirching my good name because you perceive that SubbiesUnited poses a threat to your ambition?
- Have payments been made to your own clients?
- Does your client hold personal guarantees from the directors of Bloomers which is usually a boiler plate component of any application for credit to a supplier of building products?
Comments made by Results Legal imply that I or SubbiesUnited have acted inappropriately in a number of ways. Any such implications are emphatically denied.
In addition to those actions, Results Legal sent me an email they wanted me to approve on the "Great Bloomer Debate - The Forum is Open". I did not approve publication of the email.
As a consequence, Results Legal have said;
"The moderator has recently been censoring and vetting the posts by removing comments of dissent and by removing comments that diverge from the position adopted by Subbies United".
There have been no comments removed from the Great Bloomer Debate, there was only one post not approved and that was the one from Results Legal on the 9th June because:
- Hume Doors did not prepare or provide the material but Results Legal did;
- Hume Doors are not Subcontractors; and
- Results Legal are not Subcontractors;
- In case it has escaped anyone’s attention, this site is “SubbiesUnited”. It is not “SuppliersUnited” or “LawyersUnited”.
You have your own forum to make your case, it's called the Supreme Court or Queensland.
There were 2 comments removed from the private members forum posted by 2 ex SubbiesUnited members on the thread "Bloomer Constructions In Administration" because they clearly breached our;
- Terms of Access
- the Defamation Act
- the Criminal Code
- the Privacy Act in reference to people that were not officers, agents or employees of Bloomers by listing people’s names, addresses and were extremely vitriolic, abusive and inciting criminal behaviour. I asked them both to cease and desist with their abuse, they said they were entitled to be "outraged" and "furious" and continued with their behaviour.
When you look at the posts you will see that there are people who do not agree with the DoCA posting on the threads and those posts have not been removed because they comply with the sites rules, the Defamation Act, the Criminal Code and the Privacy Act and were posted by subbies.
Voidable Preference
- An unfair preference or "voidable preference" is a legal term arising in bankruptcy and insolvency law where a person or company transfers assets or pays a debt to a creditor shortly before going into bankruptcy, that payment or transfer can be set aside on the application of the liquidator or trustee in bankruptcy as an unfair payment.
If Hume Doors are successful in their Supreme Court windup application, by Results Legal's own assertions, conservatively, 10 - 20% of Bloomer subbies and suppliers can expect to be sued and have their payments clawed back for a 6 months period from the relation back day 10th April 2017.
Therefore, that begs the question;
- Who will get the legal work suing in excess of 150 Bloomer subbies, some of whom are not necessarily still creditors?
- It also raises the proposition that if money is clawed back from subcontractors, it enables them to increase the amount they claimed in the proof of debt by the amount clawed back.
While Results Legal have asked creditors with claims not to vote with respect to the DoCA, they have not in any way indicated to the court or to any of the creditors that they would similarly not act on behalf of the liquidators in commencing actions against any of the creditors alleged to have received an unfair preference.
As you can understand, the income for any law firm that is engaged by the liquidators to perform that work would be substantial.
Concerned Bloomer creditors have contacted me.
Many creditors have some questions for Results Legal who have been working bewilderingly and aggressively hard to put Bloomer Constructions into liquidation for a debt of $157,000 owed to their client Hume Doors.
Results Legal have also been contacting numerous creditors and providing written advice that liquidation is in the best interests of creditors.
Did Results Legal also advise the creditors they have contacted with free advice on the following issues:
- Will Results Legal be the law firm for the liquidator that Hume Doors will appoint if they win their case and Bloomer Constructions is placed in liquidation?
- The value of the legal fees the liquidators’ solicitor will make in a liquidation. The legal fees incurred by the liquidators’ solicitors could run into millions of Dollars making lawyers the main beneficiary of a liquidation.
- All of these legal fees, along with liquidators fees, rank before unsecured creditors and have to be paid in full before those creditors receive any financial return.
- That lawyers for a liquidator will pursue subbies for voidable preferences relating to payments made in the 6 months prior to 10th April 2017?
- That there is a probable financial risk to the creditors Results Legal are lobbying to vote for Bloomers liquidation?
- If Results Legal are the law firm for a future liquidator, that they would be the firm suing the same creditors who Results Legal lobbied to place Bloomer into liquidation?
- What was the last liquidation Results Legal were involved in where subbies were sued for preferences?
- How much money was obtained by suing the subbies for preferences?
- What were the legal fees earned by Results Legal?
- What was the monetary return to unsecured creditors in that liquidation?
All of these questions should be answered by Results Legal for transparency and to assist creditors in determining how to vote at the upcoming creditors meeting because to date, concerned creditors receiving free advice have not seen any mention of these risks in any of Results Legal’s correspondence or other material.
Unsecured creditors should consider who the real beneficiaries of Bloomer Constructions liquidation would be then make their decision.
