National Bank the only Bob Day creditor to get any money, liquidators say
Every creditor of former senator Bob Day’s home building group except National Australia Bank is likely to come away with nothing, liquidators have said.
Liquidators for the Home Australia group met creditors in Sydney and Melbourne on Thursday. “The information available to us suggests unsecured creditors will not receive any money,” McGrathNicol’s Matt Caddy said in Melbourne.
The creditors for Huxley Homes, the NSW arm of the group, were told it had $150 in the bank and the group owed $19m.
The Sydney meeting was told all employees had been made redundant and selling the whole business would not recoup costs.
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The only secured creditor is National Australia Bank, which liquidator McGrathNicol’s records show is owed $11.44m.
More than 200 customers across all the arms of the group have been left with unfinished homes.
Day quit his role as a Family First senator for South Australia on Tuesday to deal with the fallout from the company liquidation.
He had intended to stay in parliament if a major investor’s offer for the whole group went ahead, but the third-party bid was withdrawn.
The meetings were told investigators were looking at allegations of insolvent trading, breaches of directors’ duties, unfair preferences and uncommercial transactions.
Any evidence of offences would be referred to the Australian Securities and Investments Commission.
The liquidators said the causes of the company failure appeared to be significant trading losses and cash flow problems as well as construction disputes.
And houses were being sold for less than they cost to build.
One Huxley customer said he was “shocked and confused” and had not received any resolution from the meeting on Thursday.
Day faces a further challenge as the Senate considers referring his election to the high court.
The government wants the court to decide whether Day was eligible to run for parliament given that he may have directly or indirectly benefited from the commonwealth through a lease arrangement relating to his Adelaide electoral office.
Such a benefit disqualifies a person under the constitution from running for parliament.
Another businessman-turned-senator was due to face a creditors’ meeting in Perth.
One Nation senator Rod Culleton’s company, Elite Grains, is believed to owe dozens of creditors more than $6m.
Before the meeting, Culleton became angry when he saw a reporter with a camera, which he tried to take, but was restrained by his chief of staff, Margaret Menzel.