Liquidator under fire

Ostwald Bros creditors committee wants PwC pulled from role

THE committee representing the hundreds of creditors of failed Darling Downs company Ostwald Bros have demanded the liquidator be sacked.

Committee members filed the meeting notice last week with the Australian Securities and Investment Commission, asking PriceWaterhouseCoopers liquidator Derrick Vickers to hold a creditors meeting to vote on his removal.

The 11-member committee, made up of companies like Wagners, Hastings Deering, Ezy Quip Hire and the Australian Tax Office, said in the notice it wanted to resolve that “it has no trust or faith in PwC and Mr Vickers to continue to conduct the liquidation”.

Ostwald Bros Pty Ltd and its subsidiaries were placed into administration by the directors in September.

Mr Vickers was appointed at the time, and proceeded to sack hundreds of workers before ordering the firm’s liquidation in December.

A letter to certain committee members by Mr Vickers and colleague Sam Marsden, obtained by The Chronicle, said that PwC had agreed to resign from the liquidation on April 30.

But committee spokesman Jon Whybird, who lodged the ASIC notice, said Mr Vickers now wanted to stay on past the agreed date.

“We believe that it is in the best interest to bring in a new entity to look at Ostwalds,” he said.

Any move to sack PwC would require a majority vote from the unsecured creditors.

The news comes after Brendan, Matthew and Daniel Ostwald resurrected part of the company through a new entity, Surat Basin Construction Materials.

A spokeswoman for PwC said the liquidator still had a responsibility to the creditors.

“The liquidators do not accept that the agitation by those creditors has a proper basis,” she said.

The meeting in Brisbane is scheduled for April 26 at 11am.