Images: Samuel Squire

By Samuel Squire

A class action seeking $150 million in compensation for the victims of the 2019 Cudlee Creek bushfire has been filed with the South Australian Supreme Court.

Victorian law firm Maddens Lawyers is overseeing the class action, seeking compensation for up to 1,000 victims of the fire that ripped through the Adelaide Hills region.

James Tilbrook, an Adelaide Hills local, lost almost his entire wine business to the blaze, including his winery shed and 90 percent of his vineyard.

“I do think that there was a lot of damage done,” he said.

“Although the government was incredibly generous – much more so than in previous fires – as far as grants and that sort of thing is concerned, it really didn’t cover all of our losses.

“It didn’t just affect last vintage, but also is affecting this vintage and will likely affect the next. We didn’t get any fruit at all last year.

“We had about 10% of the vineyard unburned, but that 10% was inaccessible because it was surrounded by destroyed trellis. We couldn’t get in and out of that part of the vineyard, so we just didn’t take it.”

Tilbrook said the damage done to his property at the time, including his winery shed and vineyard, was estimated to be around $150,000 in total.

He says that the damage done could be valued at more than what government grant schemes can cover.

“I suppose at the time, I was just really thinking about the actual damage that was done in terms of value,” he said.

“I think it was about $150,000 in damage as far as the winery and all that sort of thing was concerned.”

He says the run on effects of this bushfire have meant his business is having to source external produce to cover the costs of the business, which will likely not make a full recovery for quite some time.

“We’re probably only going to have about a tonne of fruit this year from our vineyard, when we normally have 25 tonnes,” he said.

“We’re having to have most of the wine contract made this year and we’re having to buy in grapes that we would previously have supplied ourselves.

“We just can’t afford to go out and buy grapes when we spent the whole season [trying to recover], only to find we’ve got almost no crop.

“[The total damage] is hard to quantify, but it’s significantly more than the amount the state government and federal government – very generously, I might add – granted to us.”

Speaking to the ABC, Brendan Pendergast, the senior lawyer overseeing the class action against SA Power Networks, said South Australia’s energy distributor knew it was a catastrophic fire danger day with a total fire ban in place.

“And yet we see in the Office of the Technical Regulator’s report that the fault mechanisms were adjusted to normal settings and quite alarmingly the auto-reclose device operated twice so it de-energised the line and then re-energised it after the tree fell on the line and brought it down to the ground,” he said.

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