Uber must hand over in-house legal team's emails

The Maurice Blackburn class action against Uber Technologies (Uber) was instigated by Rod Barton MP and Transport Alliance Director, André Baruch on behalf of Melbourne, Sydney and Perth taxi and hire car licence owners.

There is also a lawsuit filed against Uber by the Sydney based company behind ride-booking platform GoCatch, Taxi Apps.

Both the class action and lawsuit have accused Uber of conspiring to illegally operate UberX in NSW, Queensland and Western Australia since April 2014, and in Victoria since it was regulated in 2017.

Taxi Apps also claims that Uber’s alleged illegal operation gave it an unfair advantage when it first appeared in the market, and that it attempted to damage GoCatch by using a spy software called Surfcam to steal its data and drivers. Taxi Apps is seeking compensation for damages and loss to GoCatch as well as GoCar, its own car service, a direct competitor to UberX.

Uber has denied these allegations, insisting Taxi Apps’ revenues were already dropping before UberX came into the market and any other financial loss was caused by changes in legislation.

The lead plaintiff of the class action and lawsuit, Nicos Andrianakis and Taxi Apps respectively, wanted discovery (the court process of providing the other side documents relevant to the case) from Uber illustrating the strategy it created and actioned to establish itself in Australia and demonstrating how lawful or unlawful its actions have been.

In a hearing on Wednesday 4 November in the Victoria Supreme Court, Andrianakis' barrister Melanie Szydzik of Maurice Blackburn, voiced that these documents were crucial, as they would hugely support the allegations brought in the class action proceedings.

Taxi Apps barrister Tony Bannon of Corrs Chambers Westgarth, pointed out that there was no question lawyers played a considerable part in deciding Uber’s strategy and the four members of the in-house legal team were holding documents that would be significant in this case.
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Uber lost its bid to keep its legal team from handing over documents as Justice Cameron Macaulay ordered the email accounts of Uber’s four senior lawyers be searched, with relevant documents to go to Andrianakis and Taxi Apps.

​Article from DRIVE A2B's November 2020 Issue here.