Warren Anderson. Warren Anderson. Photo: Tony McDonough
Property developer Warren Anderson's 20-year legal bid to recuperate more than $90 million from the West Australian government after the infamous WA Inc era has failed completely.
The High Court of Australia yesterday rejected Mr Anderson's claim that a former chief-of-staff to former WA premier Peter Dowding gave him a verbal assurance the state would guarantee $50 million he provided in 1988 to prop up Laurie Connell's merchant bank Rothwells.
A High Court hearing was the businessman's last hope after the WA Supreme Court of Appeal dismissed his claim in 2006.
Outside the High Court, Mr Anderson fumed about the level of injustice served by the state government's actions.
"In my 50 years of business, never have I seen anything like it in my life," he told ABC radio.
Mr Anderson's private company Tipperary Developments first launched the claim in 1992, in which Mr Anderson said Mr Dowding also gave him a verbal assurance that the money would be covered by the State Government if Rothwells could not repay the amount.
He said Mr Dowding had declined to enter into a written agreement.
Immediately after the $50 million was invested, it was withdrawn from Rothwells and transferred to the Government Employees Superannuation Board (GESB), which had invested in Rothwells.
The bank collapsed some months after.
Mr Anderson had agreed to the condition to hand over the $50 million in return for a tender agreement for a CBD site put up for sale by the WA government.
Kerry Packer's Consolidated Press Holdings was involved with Mr Anderson in a consortium which later bought the site, but Mr Packer declined to provide any of the $50 million attached to the deal.
Mr Anderson's lawyers argued at a 2006 trial, which ended in his defeat, that with accrued interest he was entitled to about $90 million.
He received $24 million.
The 1980s were labelled the WA Inc era after former premier Brian Burke's Labor government became embroiled in a number of failed corporate deals and financial disasters, including the collapse of Rothwells.
Hundreds of millions of taxpayer dollars were lost during the scandal.

http://www.australian-news.com.au/Packer.htm
EXCERPT:

The Goanna is dead: long live the Goanna

Elizabeth Krantz - 31 December 2005
How wealth and power corrupt. Since the death of Kerry Packer the Australian public has been treated to the unedifying spectacle of hordes of sycophantic journalists and politicians sucking up to the mighty Packer empire and eulogising one of Australia's most ruthless and brutal business operators.
To put it into some perspective, Kerry Packer was a ruthless robber baron who used his enormous wealth and power to intimidate and bully politicians, staff and rivals into submission, in order to further the wealth of his tribe.
The whimpering lapdogs are calling him a great Australian. Well, what has he done for Australia? Nothing much, but he has amassed an obscene fortune for himself and his family.
The Packer toadys are saying he revolutionised the game of cricket. Maybe he did, but only because he started a rival to the traditional game when the Australian Cricket Board refused his application to broadcast cricket games on his Channel Nine.
How can anyone say he has interests of Australian families at heart when his company has just bid $780 for the rights to broadcast AFL football. If it wins the bid, the result will be struggling families paying even more to watch their favourite game while further enriching himself together with a bunch of young sportsmen, many of whom are unprepared to deal with their sudden wealth.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brian_Burke
EXCERPT:
Brian Thomas Burke (born in Perth, 25 February 1947) was Labor premier of Western Australia from 25 February 1983 until his resignation on 25 February 1988. Burke was imprisoned for seven months in 1994, after being convicted of "false pretence" regarding travel expenses.[1]
In following decades, Burke continued to maintain his Labor party contacts and parliamentary influence, using them to further his career as a pro-business lobbyist. Burke worked both sides of politics in partnership with disgraced former ministerial colleague Julian Grill and assisted by former senator, Noel Crichton-Browne, to influence Liberal parliamentarians.[2]

http://www.abc.net.au/7.30/content/2007/s1864727.htm
EXCERPT:
Australia and New Zealand's 40 RichestThe ListJames Thomson 03.20.08, 5:00 PM ET
Forbes Magazine dated April 07, 2008
Australia’s resource-rich land, and demand for its metals and minerals, especially from China, is pumping up the fortunes of the nation’s miners. Indeed the resources boom propelled Andrew Forrest, the chief of iron-ore miner Fortescue Metals, to the top of FORBES ASIA’s fourth annual list of Australia and New Zealand’s 40 wealthiest. Forrest is worth $6.6 billion, up from $1.2 billion last year. Iron-ore heiress Gina Rinehart, the richest woman, saw her fortune jump to $2.4 billion, up from $1 billion.