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Speaker 1: Northland's entirely avoidable multi day power outage is headed to court.

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Speaker 1: Two firms, one of them are law firms, one as Australian,

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Speaker 1: one as New Zealand, have launched a class action lawsuit

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Speaker 1: against Transpower and the contractor Omixom, whose staff member pulled

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Speaker 1: the nuts out of the pylon's legs which caused the

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Speaker 1: thing to fall over. This whole thing cost Northland businesses millions.

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Speaker 1: Mike Colson Casey is helping with the case home.

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Speaker 2: Mike, Hi, Hey, how are you?

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Speaker 1: I'm very well? Thank you? What does it makes you

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Speaker 1: think you've got a case here?

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Speaker 2: I can't get into the precise prospects of the case

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Speaker 2: because it's before the courts, but I think the two

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Speaker 2: independent reports really speak for themselves. There was one that

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Speaker 2: was commissioned by Transpower and there was one that was

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Speaker 2: commissioned by the Electricity Authority. There's some fairly strong factual

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Speaker 2: statements in those reports and that's really the basis for

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Speaker 2: the case.

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Speaker 1: Do you have like a handle yourself on how much

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Speaker 1: business is up in Northland actually lost during this power outage?

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Speaker 2: We don't have that precise a data at the moment.

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Speaker 2: There whereas you may recall reports at the time there

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Speaker 2: were estimates by economists as to what the losses were.

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Speaker 2: We have done some sampling amongst the businesses which we

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Speaker 2: can extrapolate that we probably don't want to or can't

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Speaker 2: get into the precise details of losses at this time.

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Speaker 1: Now, can I deduce from the fact that Omni Bridgeway

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Speaker 1: is funding the case that Omni Bridgeway thinks there's a

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Speaker 1: reasonable chance of success here?

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Speaker 2: Yes, I think that would be Omni Bridgeway's view. There

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Speaker 2: obviously a commercial litigation funder the use to making decisions

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Speaker 2: on which litigation they want to back, and they're backing

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Speaker 2: it with a considerable amount of money.

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Speaker 1: When the payout, if there is a payout, when that

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Speaker 1: is finally determined, is it based on is it likely

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Speaker 1: to be based on what the actual losses were? Or

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Speaker 1: is it based on actual losses plus a whole bunch

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Speaker 1: of other stuff.

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Speaker 2: Ultimately, if we were successful, and there's a whole lot

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Speaker 2: of hypotheticals associated with that, of course heither it would

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Speaker 2: be based on the businesses actual losses. So we would

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Speaker 2: be asking them to put forward swalling statements and other

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Speaker 2: evidence as to the losses they've suffered. And they'd be

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Speaker 2: distributed proportionately according to that. Again, I should say that's

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Speaker 2: all subject to the court's orders and applications at the

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Speaker 2: time in the future, but that's the usual process.

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Speaker 1: Now, Mike, I heard a little bit of commentary this

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Speaker 1: morning on Mike Hoskins Show that suggested that this is

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Speaker 1: not the key we weigh and we don't want this

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Speaker 1: kind of litigation coming into the country. How do you feel.

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Speaker 2: About it, Well, in terms of this type of litigation

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Speaker 2: coming into the country, it's just rereading a Law Commission

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Speaker 2: report from a couple of years ago which indicated there've

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Speaker 2: been forty seven class or representative actions approved in New

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Speaker 2: Zealand in the last twenty years. It's not something that's

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Speaker 2: particularly new. Some people may oppose class actions, and that's

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Speaker 2: understandable if they wish to do that. But I suppose

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Speaker 2: what this is about really is giving northern businesses an

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Speaker 2: opportunity potentially to be compensated, and second an opportunity potentially

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Speaker 2: to incentivize those working on critical infrastructure to take reasonable

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Speaker 2: care or do a good job out of it. Now,

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Speaker 2: as I should stress, the orders we are seeking what

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Speaker 2: are called opt out orders. That means that if Northland

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Speaker 2: businesses or a particular Northland business doesn't want to be

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Speaker 2: part of the litigation, they can opt out and they

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Speaker 2: will no longer be part of it. Otherwise they are

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Speaker 2: deemed to be in that it's entirely their decision as

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Speaker 2: to whether or not they want to remain in.

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Speaker 1: Mike Listen, thanks for talking us WED appreciated. Mike Colson KC.

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