...and some very good news.
From the AOA 2 July 2003:
Success in the Legal Case in Australia
A hearing was held in the High Court in Sydney today. The defendants (CX and Veta) sought to have the case on behalf of the Australian based 49ers taken from the Industrial Relations Commission (IRC) and heard in the High Court on the basis that the IRC does not have jurisdiction. This was subsequent to a similar hearing held approximately 5 weeks earlier where they attempted to put forward 9 separate arguments as to why the IRC should be barred from hearing the case. At that time, the judge dismissed 7 of their arguments and suggested that they should concentrate on the remaining 2.
This they did today. The judge ruled against their arguments and remitted the case to the IRC for a full hearing on the merits of the case.
Costs were awarded against the defendants.
The defendants indicated to the judge at the previous hearing that they would appeal his decision, if his decision was in fact as he has now decided, on the basis that the High Court [in their opinion] only has authority to refer a case back to another "court" and that the IRC does not meet this definition. We understand that that this line of 'defence' is unlikely to succeed.
We await the next step but today's ruling must be very good news for our 49ers in Australia - and their colleagues elsewhere. Well done the
Australian legal team.