A mining company that was embroiled in a high-profile corruption inquiry has asked the Supreme Court to overturn recommendations which led the state government to tear up its lucrative Hunter Valley coal licence.
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Listed mining company NuCoal told Justice Stephen Rothman on Monday that its reputation had been injured by an Independent Commission Against Corruption report last December which found its Doyles Creek exploration licence was "so tainted by corruption" that it should be cancelled.
Counsel for NuCoal, Neil Williams, SC, argued that the ICAC did not give "meaningful consideration" to submissions by the company in support of keeping its licence and did not give adequate reasons for its recommendations.
If the company wins the case, the recommendations would be overturned but the legislation tearing up the licence would not be affected. NuCoal is also taking action in the High Court to have those laws struck down in a bid to reclaim its licence.
Counsel for the ICAC, Geoffrey Watson, SC, said the commission had engaged with NuCoal's submissions.
He added there was "no utility" in the relief sought by the company from the Supreme Court because "what they're really doing is seeking to undermine the parliament's action".
But Mr Williams said the company wanted to vindicate its reputation.
The ICAC did not make any corruption findings against NuCoal. However, the commission found in a report in August last year that former Labor mining minister Ian Macdonald acted corruptly in 2008 by granting the exploration licence to Doyles Creek Mining, a company then chaired by his "mate" and former union boss John Maitland.
NuCoal acquired all the shares in Doyles Creek Mining in 2010, and its major asset was the exploration licence.
In recommending that the licence should be torn up, the ICAC said NuCoal was not in the position of an innocent buyer who acquired the licence with no knowledge of improper conduct by the seller.
Businessmen Andrew Poole and Mike Chester, who were installed on the board of NuCoal when the company acquired Doyles Creek Mining, were found by the ICAC to have acted corruptly over the grant of the licence to Doyles Creek.
The commission had suggested that any law to cancel the licence should also "compensate any innocent person" affected by that action, but then Premier Barry O'Farrell said no compensation would be awarded.
NuCoal Chairman Gordon Galt said on Monday: "We welcome the opportunity to have an independent legal review of the process that led to ICAC's December 2013 report by a properly constituted court. We await the court's judgment."
