An independent expert reporting under Clause 8303 of Chapter 5 of Schedule 8 to the Corporations Law is required to address the best interests of the members who are party to and bound to give up rights under the scheme, not the interests of the other party. Providing a draft report to the company for factual verification does not compromise the expert's independence. Where shareholders have been provided with competing expert reports and have overwhelmingly voted in favour of a scheme, the court will respect their commercial judgment and will not refuse approval merely because one expert expressed a contrary view.
The full text is available to signed-in members, including the 13 later cases that cite this judgment.
3 of the 13 citing cases carry a classified treatment. How each court treated it is available to signed-in members.