Where the applicants applied for declarations as to the operation of a contract and an injunction to prohibit breach of the contract. Each applicant was a grower of sugar cane in the area of a sugar mill or mills operated by the respondent in the Mackay region of North Queensland. The respondent was a mill owner operating four mills in the Mackay region and Mossman.
The contract was a standard form “Cane Supply and Processing Agreement” (“CSPA”) supply contract between the respondent and growers for the supply of sugar cane by growers to the respondent.
The two questions were, firstly, did the respondent and bargaining representatives of the growers have power to vary provisions of the CSPA for the growers represented by the bargaining representatives? Secondly, did the respondent have a unilateral express contractual power to deem a charge to be an expense applicable to all sales of sugar?
Michael Hodge (leading F Lubett) appeared for the Respondent, instructed by McCullough Robertson.
The judgment is published here.