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[2003] QSC 269
procedural. The application was adjourned to the next available chamber day in Cairns, without prejudice to a party's right to seek an earlier hearing. Costs were reserved. The Court did not decide the...
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The applicant said it needed access to tea-tree plantations to perform its role in a grower scheme. Its asserted access depended, in part, on agreements between it and individual growers. The evidence included draft or pro forma documents, but did not satisfactorily establish which growers had made the relevant agreements. The judge therefore put the injunction application off to a further hearing so the evidence could be supplemented, rather than deciding whether the applicant had the claimed access right. Costs were left open.
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2,041 words · generated 30/09/2026
In Oilgrowers Management Ltd v Essential Asset Management Ltd & Ors [2003] QSC 269, Mackenzie J dealt with an application for injunctions about access to land used in a tea-tree oil scheme. The decision was delivered on 29 August 2003 after a hearing on 26 August. It is a short procedural ruling, not a final decision on whether the applicant had a right to enter the land or whether an injunction should issue.
The applicant, Oilgrowers Management Ltd, described itself as the responsible entity of Oilgrowers Tea-Tree Project No 3, a registered management scheme intended to extract and sell tea-tree oil. Its director deposed that the scheme had about 380 members, although the Court noted that the scheme itself was not exhibited in the affidavit material (paragraph 2).
The land and contractual structure were not fully clear on the evidence. Tower Trust (SA) Ltd was described as custodian, holding assets as agent for the applicant, and as lessee of three properties: Burditt Farm, Martin Farm and Melaleuca (paragraph 3). The evidence about the relevant entities was incomplete. For example, a lease for Martin Farm identified FNQ Oilgrowers Pty Ltd as lessor and IOOF Australia Trustees Ltd as lessee, and the Court said it was unclear whether those entities were the respondents or Tower under another name, or had transferred their interests (paragraph 4).
The material included a pro forma licence agreement under which growers could establish and maintain tea-tree plantations and harvest them. It also included a draft management agreement. That draft said, among other things, that the grower appointed the applicant as manager of the grower's business, and clause 10 provided for the manager to enter the plantation to perform its obligations (paragraphs 5–7). The applicant's case was that these grower agreements, combined with the lease arrangements, gave it a right of access which the respondents could not prevent unless the leases were terminated (paragraph 8).
The respondents disputed the sufficiency of the evidence. They relied on the absence of executed copies of critical agreements and the failure to identify growers who had entered management agreements (paragraph 9). The Court agreed that the material did not yet satisfactorily establish the basic proposition needed to support the asserted access across the land (paragraph 10).
The Court did not dismiss the application. It adjourned it to the next available chamber day in Cairns, without prejudice to a party seeking an earlier hearing, and reserved costs (paragraph 13). The applicant's substantive claim remained unresolved.
The central difficulty was proof. The applicant's asserted access to the whole of the properties appeared to depend on a number of individual management agreements, each relating to a grower's plantation. The Court recognised that there might be many agreements, and that producing every document could impose a burden. But that practical difficulty did not remove the need to prove the essential factual basis for the right asserted (paragraph 10).
The judgment makes a careful distinction between the form of proof and the need for proof. Mackenzie J did not say that every signed agreement had to be placed before the Court. The Court said it "may not be necessary to produce each and every document" and accepted that "other satisfactory ways" of proving the proposition could exist (paragraph 10). It nevertheless found that the evidence then before it fell short. A draft agreement and a pro forma licence showed a possible contractual structure, but did not, without more, establish which growers had actually entered binding management agreements or how those agreements covered the land for which access was claimed.
The result followed from that evidentiary gap. The Court had been asked to consider injunctive relief, but did not move on to a substantive assessment of the wider disputes. It considered that once supplementation of the evidence was required, it was undesirable to discuss those issues (paragraph 11). This explains why the reasons do not determine whether the lease-based argument was correct, whether the respondents could lawfully prevent access, or what significance to attach to the respondents' stated concerns about the scheme.
The Court also recognised circumstances that could make timing significant. It referred to a dispute about the need to harvest promptly, and to uncertainty about the worth of an undertaking as to damages from the applicant and whether the respondents would give an undertaking (paragraph 11). Those matters were not resolved. Their mention explains why the Court directed that the adjournment be to no later than the next available chamber day in Cairns, while preserving the possibility of an earlier hearing (paragraph 12).
The choice to adjourn rather than dismiss was therefore a case-management response to a potentially curable evidentiary deficiency. The Court anticipated that the application would next be heard on "amplified material" (paragraph 12). It did not say that the applicant had established its right, or that the respondents' position was wrong. Nor did it decide the ultimate availability of injunctive relief.
This judgment does not set out a general test for injunctions or explain the wider law of equitable remedies. Although the catchwords refer to injunction jurisdiction and availability, the reasons do not decide those issues. No statutory provisions, prior judgments or other legal authorities are cited in the supplied reasons.
The decision's limited contribution is about the evidence needed for the particular claim as presented. Before the ruling, the applicant's case, as described by the Court, relied on the relationship between leases, grower licences and individual management agreements. The Court identified the proof needed to connect that structure to the claimed right of entry over the properties: satisfactory evidence that growers had entered the relevant management agreements, or another satisfactory means of establishing that proposition (paragraphs 8–10).
After the ruling, the underlying legal position remained open. The adjournment did not establish a new general legal rule that executed copies are always required, or that draft documents are never sufficient. Indeed, the Court expressly left room for proof by means other than producing every agreement (paragraph 10). It also did not decide whether the claimed agreements in fact granted an enforceable access right, whether the leases supported that right, or whether the respondents had grounds to prevent access.
Accordingly, the judgment is most safely understood as a procedural decision about the state of the evidence at one hearing. It illustrates the importance, in an application founded on multiple underlying agreements, of proving the existence and reach of those agreements. It should not be read as deciding the substantive contractual or equitable questions that the Court expressly left for later consideration.
At paragraph 10, the Court explained that the claimed access over all the land might rest on many agreements for individual plantations. It acknowledged the burden of proving a large number of agreements, but added: "the right asserted may depend on proving this proposition in a satisfactory way." In plain English, the applicant had to show a sufficient factual basis for the claimed access, even if the evidence did not necessarily have to include every agreement in full.
The next sentence is important: "It may not be necessary to produce each and every document to do this but sufficiency of proof is a matter for the applicant to consider." This does not prescribe a single evidentiary method. Rather, it leaves open how the applicant could prove the necessary facts while making clear that the proof had to be satisfactory. The Court then concluded, on the material before it, that "the material falls short of satisfactory proof of the basic proposition at this point" (paragraph 10). The qualification "at this point" fits the later decision to adjourn instead of dismiss.
At paragraph 11, the Court stated: "Having reached the conclusion that the evidence is in need of supplementation, it is undesirable to embark on a discussion of the wider issues raised in the respective submissions of counsel." In plain English, the judge deliberately did not decide wider arguments once he found that a key factual foundation had not been adequately shown. This limits the judgment's value as a determination of the parties' substantive rights.
Finally, paragraph 12 says the application should be adjourned rather than dismissed, and anticipates that it would be heard on "amplified material". In practical terms, the proceeding remained alive for a further hearing on a fuller evidentiary record. The order did not grant the requested injunction.
The decision is relevant as a procedural illustration where a party seeks urgent or interlocutory relief based on a chain of contractual relationships, and the claimed right depends on many underlying agreements. Here, the asserted chain involved leases, a custodian, grower licences and management agreements (paragraphs 3–8). The specific difficulty was that the applicant claimed access over extensive land through multiple individual grower arrangements, while the evidence did not identify the growers who were parties to those arrangements (paragraphs 9–10).
The reasoning may be useful to understand the evidentiary question in a case where draft forms or pro forma agreements describe a contractual structure, but the evidence does not clearly establish that the relevant parties actually entered those agreements or that the agreements cover the area at issue. The judgment does not establish that such evidence will always be insufficient. Its finding was specific to the material in that application.
It is also relevant to the procedural situation in which an evidentiary gap may be capable of correction. The Court chose an adjournment because it expected the application could return on supplemented material (paragraph 12). It does not establish that adjournment is required whenever evidence is incomplete. Nor does it resolve whether urgency, potential loss, or an undertaking as to damages would affect the outcome of an injunction application. Those matters were noted but left undecided (paragraph 11).
The supplied judgment contains no discussion of later cases, and the materials provided do not include any subsequent judicial treatment. It would therefore be unsupported to state whether later courts followed, distinguished, applied or questioned this decision.
Within this judgment, there are no cited precedents or statutory authorities, so the "precedent relationships" field is empty. The decision itself refers to no earlier case as the source of its approach. Its reasoning is confined to the evidentiary deficiencies and procedural order in this application.
For research purposes, any conclusion about later treatment would require checking an authoritative case-law database or other current legal research source. This response is limited to the judgment text supplied here and does not claim to have established its subsequent citation history.
The principal unresolved issue was whether the applicant could sufficiently establish that growers had entered management agreements giving it the claimed rights of entry. The Court did not determine what evidence would ultimately be sufficient, and expressly left open the possibility of proving the proposition without producing every individual agreement (paragraph 10).
The identity and continuity of interests among the entities involved were also unclear on the record. The Court noted uncertainty about the parties identified in the Martin Farm lease and whether they were the respondents or Tower under another name, or had transferred interests (paragraph 4). The judgment does not resolve those questions.
The legal effect of the lease, licence and management-agreement arrangements remained undecided. The Court did not determine whether the respondents could prevent entry, whether the applicant's argument that access continued unless a lease was terminated was correct, or whether the respondents' concerns about the scheme were relevant. Those were submissions summarised at paragraph 8, not conclusions adopted by the Court.
Finally, urgency and undertakings were unresolved. The Court referred to a dispute about prompt harvesting and uncertainty over the applicant's undertaking as to damages and the respondents' willingness to give any undertaking (paragraph 11). It did not decide how those matters affected the application. The order simply set a prompt further hearing, reserved costs and allowed a party to seek an earlier hearing (paragraph 13).
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[2] MACKENZIE J: The originating application in this matter seeks what might be summarised as injunctions restraining the respondents from preventing the applicant from carrying out what are alleged to be its functions and duties as responsible entity of Oilgrowers Tea-Tree Project No 3. The scheme is a registered management scheme, the purpose of which is to extract and sell tea-tree oil. Mr Mark Daulby, director of the applicant, deposes that there are about 380 members of the scheme. The scheme itself is not, as far as I can ascertain, exhibited to any of the affidavits. The information which follows has been extracted from the material before me.
[3] Tower Trust (SA) Ltd ("Tower") was engaged by the applicant as custodian to hold certain assets as agent for it. Tower, as custodian, is lessee of three properties known as Burditt Farm, Martin Farm and Melaleuca.
[4] The original lessor of Burditt Farm was the second respondent. However, by a contract executed in or about April 2002 the freehold of the land was transferred by the second respondent to the first respondent. The lease executed in relation to Martin Farm shows FNQ Oilgrowers Pty Ltd as lessor and IOOF Australia Trustees Ltd as lessee. Whether any of these are the same entities as either of the respondents or Tower under a different name or have divested their interests to them is not clear on the evidence. The only evidence that the lessor and lessee are now one of the respondents or Tower respectively is to be gleaned from Mr Daulby's first affidavit where he deposes that Tower is lessee of the three properties and evidence to like effect from Mr Huxtable, a manager of Tower.
[5] It is deposed that Tower, as custodian, has granted each grower a licence to enable the grower to establish and maintain a plantation of tea-trees and harvest them. A pro forma licence agreement exhibited to Mr Daulby's affidavit shows the parties as Tower as licensor, the applicant ("manager") as agent for the landholder (the second respondent) and the grower. Under the licence agreement the grower agreed to pay a licence fee to the landholder second respondent at the direction of the licensor (Tower). The trees were to be the property of the landholder and the oil the property of the grower.
[6] A draft management agreement provided, inter alia, that the grower appointed the applicant as manager of the grower's business. The manager was obliged to do a variety of things for the purpose of cultivating, tending and caring for the trees and managing the grower's business in a commercial manner in keeping with normal practice of the tea-tree industry. The manager was entitled to a variety of fees, disbursement of which was to be governed by the constitution, defined as "the deed dated 12 May 1999 by the manager". As far as I am aware the deed is not among the documents before me.
[7] Clause 10 of the management agreement gives the right, as between the manager and the grower, for the manager to enter upon the plantation for the purpose of discharging the manager's obligations pursuant to the management agreement. By definition, the right of entry relates to that piece of land on which the grower will be entitled to establish its business. It is this right of entry that is at the heart of the applicant's present application.
[8] The applicant's argument is as follows. The lessee from the first and second respondents has given licences to growers which recognised that a management agreement may be entered into by growers. The management agreement gives a right of entry in respect of that individual grower's plantation to the applicant for the purposes previously described. The respondents do not have the right to prevent the applicant from entering the property pursuant to and for the purposes of the rights and duties it has under the management agreement. The management agreement is founded on the lessees' rights under the lease. Short of termination of the lease, the respondents have no right to prevent the applicant having access. Concerns on the part of the third and fourth respondents as to the viability of the scheme or, at worst, the existence of a collateral purpose of forcing the applicant to cooperate in restructuring the scheme are irrelevant to the present application. The respondents' only interest is in payment of rental due under the leases to Tower.
[9] On the other hand the respondents argue that the evidence in support of the application is deficient in a number of respects including the absence of executed copies of critical agreements and lack of identification of the growers who are parties to management agreements. If an application for adjournment because of late service of material was refused, the application should be dismissed because of the identified deficiencies, or, if not, adjourned so that they were the subject of evidence.
[10] It may be observed that the right of entry to the whole of the lands seems to depend on the existence of agreements with individual growers so that entry to the whole of lands may be achieved because there are a multiplicity of individual agreements relating to contiguous "plantations". I am conscious of the burden on resources of establishing this if there are a large number of licensees. However the right asserted may depend on proving this proposition in a satisfactory way. It may not be necessary to produce each and every document to do this but sufficiency of proof is a matter for the applicant to consider. There may be other satisfactory ways as well. However, in my view the material falls short of satisfactory proof of the basic proposition at this point.
[11] Reference has been made above to other documents which may be desirably included and other deficiencies that may need to be addressed when the matter next comes on for hearing. I am conscious of the fact that there is a dispute as to the necessity to harvest the plants promptly and that there is some obscurity as to the worth of any undertaking as to damages on the part of the applicant and as to the existence of willingness on the part of the respondents to give any undertaking at all. Having reached the conclusion that the evidence is in need of supplementation, it is undesirable to embark on a discussion of the wider issues raised in the respective submissions of counsel.
[12] In accordance with the approach I foreshadowed at the hearing, I have concluded that the application should be adjourned rather than dismissed. Since the adjourned application will probably be heard on amplified material it is unnecessary for the matter to be heard by me on the next occasion it is before the court. Because on one view of the matter there may be a need for expedition in having the application resolved the application should be adjourned to no later than the next available chamber day in Cairns, with costs reserved.
1. Without prejudice to the right of a party to seek an earlier hearing, the application is adjourned to the next available chamber day in Cairns;
Oilgrowers Management Ltd
Essential Asset Management Ltd & Ors [2003] QSC 269
The application was adjourned to the next available chamber day in Cairns, without prejudice to a party's right to seek an earlier hearing. Costs were reserved. The Court did not decide the substantive injunction application.