‘Loyalty, trust’: Simple proposition at heart of WA’s biggest case
Mining pioneer Peter Wright did his share of heavy lifting when he and Pilbara icon Lang Hancock set about building what would become a multibillion-dollar iron ore empire, a court heard on Monday. So Wright’s descendants should share equally in the royalty payments that still flow from their partnership, their lawyer said.
In opening remarks in a case that pits two legendary names in the West Australian iron ore industry’s against one another, John Rowland KC told the Supreme Court the matter rests on the “relatively simple” proposition that the partnership the two men forged in the 1950s – based on “loyalty, trust, confidence and good faith” – has endured to this day.
After a decade of delay and peripheral court skirmishes, dozens of lawyers descended on Perth’s Supreme Court where Hancock’s daughter, Australia’s richest person Gina Rinehart, squared off against Wright’s family.
Julie Taylor SC, representing Wright Prospecting Pty Ltd, enters WA’s Supreme Court on Monday. Bohdan Warchomij
With the court’s largest room set aside for what is expected to be a marathon trial, Rowland KC and Julie Taylor SC, representing Wright Prospecting Pty Ltd, started outlining the family’s claim to a portion of the past and future royalties flowing from Hancock Prospecting’s Hope Downs mines in WA’s vast Pilbara.
Wright’s lawyers will rely on 1500 pages of evidence, including old maps and correspondence between the two men to illustrate the amount of work Wright was involved in securing the mining tenements now known as Hope Downs.
Any royalties received by Hancock Prospecting from Rio Tinto, which runs Hope Downs 1, 2 and 3, should be shared equally with Wright Prospecting under the terms of the partnership agreements, they claim.
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