Blue Chip's Bryers banned from managing NZ firms for 7 years
Blue Chip's Bryers banned from managing NZ firms for 7 more years, bankruptcy lifted
By Paul McBeth
March 6 (BusinessDesk) - Former Blue Chip boss
Mark Bryers has been discharged from his five-and-a-half
year bankruptcy, though he's banned from acting as a manager
or director in New Zealand for another seven years because
of the risk he poses to the public.
In the High Court
in Auckland, Associate Judge Jeremy Doogue today lifted the
long-running bankruptcy order hanging over Bryers' head,
that prevented him from holding director or management roles
in Australia, where he's lived since 2006. The judge decided
Bryers still poses a continuing risk, and has "little
insight into the harm that he has done", though the chance
of returning to New Zealand was a small one.
"It is
clear that the reason why he wishes to be discharged from
bankruptcy is not so that he can return to New Zealand to
resume business, but so that he can play an active part in
businesses in Australia, such as the Talos enterprise,
without risking contravention of Australian Corporation
Law," the judgment said. "Whether it would be desirable for
him to do so from the perspective of the Australian public
is not something I need to comment on. It will be for the
responsible authorities in Australia to judge that
question."
At the two-day hearing this week, the court
was told Bryers' $230 million debts were unrelated to Blue
Chip’s 2011 collapse, and were a result of personal
guarantees he had made to financiers for third-party
property developments and to Mide, the New Zealand
franchisee of Australian-based Blue Chip Financial Solutions
(later Northern Crest) which were never pursued by the
parent company.
The judge said Bryers alone was the
author of the transactions that caused his personal debts,
and structured his affairs in such a way so that he would
not have rights to access various assets held in
trusts.
"Even if attention is confined to the question
of the debts that Mr Bryers personal incurred, the picture
that emerges is of a business person who is prepared to
structure his arrangements in such a way that large-scale
losses could not be avoided by creditors having assets to
resort to," the judge said. "The fact that the guarantees
were inherently risky meant that the overall position that
Mr Bryers got himself into was hazardous."
Because of the risk Bryers still posed, the judge made orders restraining his business activities in New Zealand for another seven years. Those orders prevent Bryers from taking part in the management of any business, being a director of a company, being employed by a relative or any entity controlled by a relative.
The judge said Bryers' role at Talos
Accounting Group contained management functions, but wasn't
at a director level, and didn't breach New Zealand
law.
(BusinessDesk)