Emotional baggage that doesn't match

AH claims its costs are "at least" $300,000, plus interest.

The legal action was initiated by the three founders of the corporate law firm Chang, Pistilli & Simmons in 2007 - Diana Chang, Mark Pistilli and Danny Simmons - who claimed they were owed $30,000 in fees for their last month at AH. They split off to form CPS in mid-2006.

More than eight months since a magistrate in Downing Centre Local Court, Daphne Kok, dismissed the case, the period for CPS to appeal against a more recent decision on costs lapsed on Friday. "Far too much time and money has been spent," Kok said in her judgment.

Atanaskovic said: "It eludes me why CPS instituted their hopeless claims in the first place, let alone why they rejected our repeated offers, made over the first 30 months of the case, that each party should walk away from the case with no order as to costs."

The $300,000-odd in costs do not include the fees charged to CPS by its lawyers, Clayton Utz.

Atanaskovic said he found it "hard to understand" why CPS pursued the claim, which ended up costing it "in excess of 20 times the amount they unsuccessfully claimed". "The only response to the costs query I can venture is that, in court cases, the combination of poor legal analysis and emotional baggage on the part of the plaintiffs usually proves ultimately to be quite expensive and counterproductive for them," he said.

Pistilli told Lawyers Weekly that Atanaskovic's costs of $300,000 seemed high.

"I don't regret the initial legal action we took and overall, I am satisfied with how this matter finished up and with the work of our external legal advisers."

ON AUTOPILOT

Jetset Travelworld received relatively gentle treatment from shareholders at its annual meeting yesterday, in light of the uninspiring performance of its share price since its merger with the Qantas travel agency business in 2008 and its merger with the struggling CVC Asia Pacific-owned Stella Travel Services this year.

The chairman of Jetset, Tom Dery, breezed through the first six resolutions without a moan from the half-dozen shareholders who bothered to attend. The only thing Dery's fellow Jetset directors - which include CVC's Adrian MacKenzie and Andrew Cummins, and Qantas chief bean counter Gareth Evans - had to do was stay awake.

The only whimper of protest came when shareholders were asked to approve resolution seven, the $700,000 lift in the pool of non-executive director fees to $1.5 million. One shareholder lamented: "It staggers me that non-executive directors got a 40 per cent increase in the fee. I only wish that my investment in the company gets a 40 per cent increase."

Dery said the fee increase was justified given that the business had increased in size and complexity after it merged with Stella.

Interestingly, Jetset's market capitalisation of $375 million is only slightly higher than where it was in 2007, before it merged with Qantas Holidays and Stella. Its shares have fallen by more than three-quarters since their October 2007 peak.

PRICES A-LEAPING

A Pittsburgh financial services group, PNC, has warned of big cost blowouts for people who like to celebrate the 12 days of Christmas. Countering the fears of deflation in the US, PNC has reported a 9.2 per cent price lift for the gifts mentioned in the song The Twelve Days of Christmas.

The firm yesterday announced that based on "whimsical economic analysis", the PNC Christmas Price Index had staged its the second biggest annual percentage rise in its 27-year history. Thanks to the recent surge in precious metal prices, PNC said the cost of five gold rings had risen 30 per cent. The index was also skewed by the price of two turtle doves rising 78.6 per cent to $US100 and three French hens surging 233 per cent to $US150. All of the presents in the song now cost $US23,439. In 1984 they would have cost $US12,674.

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