MILKED DRY
AFTER six generations on their Wongawallan dairy farm, the Currey family, fatigued and close to financially broken may be today forced onto the street after a decade of battles with Commonwealth Bank of Australia.
With a small herd of jersey cows, a dozen chickens and three dogs, three generations of Curreys now live under the one roof after being closed in from forced sales.
Potentially homeless within the day, the owners of the organic Wallan Vale Dairy will today take their fight to the Court of Appeal, to seek a stay on foreclosure orders on their family home.
The family will also take their battle to financial watchdog ASIC and the Royal Commission into Misconduct in the Banking sector, where Cade Currey (pictured) believes they can reveal unconscionable behaviour by the bank which has slowly claimed their property piece by piece.
AFTER six generations on their Wongawallan dairy farm, the Currey family, fatigued and close to financially broken, may be today forced on to the street after a decade of battles with Commonwealth Bank of Australia.
With a small herd of jersey cows, a dozen chickens and three dogs, three generations of Curreys now live under the one roof after being closed in from forced sales on all sides.
Potentially homeless within the day, the owners of the organic Wallan Vale Dairy will today take their fight to the Court of Appeal, to seek a stay on foreclosure orders on their family home.
The family will also take their battle to financial watchdog ASIC and the Royal Commission into Misconduct in the Banking, where Cade Currey believes they can reveal unconscionable behaviour by the bank which has slowly claimed their property piece by piece.
Mr Currey, who has taken up the fight for his father and his mother suffering stage four cancer has spent sleepless nights piecing the situation together.
Without the resources for a lawyer, Mr Currey, a nursery owner by trade has represented his family’s situation in court on numerous occasions.
“It started when my 86year-old grandfather was signed on to a reverse mortgage, it has gone on from there,” he said.
“It has been a string of behaviour, the banks took the cattle so then there was no way the farm could make an income or repayments could be made,” he said.
“We have been forced into desperate situations.”
In March the bank then took possession of one of the two homes on the property.
Locked out, the Curreys belongings were moved to storage containers where the family is charged an extra monthly fee of $600.
“They took the house from mum and dad, they had to move in with me at the farm house,” Mr Currey explained. “It’s hard to function as a family like this, it has destroyed everything.
“The stress mum and dad have gone through from this process – it has just left them distraught.”
“Mum had to do a lot of the legal work herself at the beginning, but she was diagnosed (and) has just gone through chemo, it’s too much,” he said.
The passionate Wongawallan man said losing the property would be akin to losing a limb.
“The land has been part of me and family our whole life, it would be like losing an arm,” he said.
Cade’s father Kevyn Grant Currey spent what could be his last 24 hours on the land, doing what he has always done, milking the cows and selling his product at local markets.
Since the herd was repossessed they had managed to buy back a few head of cattle to ensure a little income could trickle in.
“We bottle our own milk here, and take 600-700 litres a week to market,” he said.
“I grew up here, I went to Upper Coomera State School when they had just 32 students. My family moved here in the 1870s, so, no, I don’t know what is next,” he said.
Federal member for Forde Bert van Manen who met with the family said he would assist them with their situation.
“I met with the family on their property as soon as I was made aware. I will continue to work with them where I can,” he said.
Since the turn of the century dairy farms in Queensland have dramatically declined, from 1500 farms in 1999 to less than 500 today, according to the Queensland Dairy Farmers Organisation.
The Bulletin made repeated attempts to contact the Commonwealth Bank yesterday but they did not respond.