Rhonda Dalgleish says she feels betrayed and helpless over a court decision that means she will continue to live without access to essential services.
The 64-year-old is one of many residents at Couran Cove, an island resort on the Gold Coast’s South Stradbroke Island, where electricity, water, gas and sewerage connections have been cut since 2023 over allegedly unpaid body corporate levies.
Rhonda Dalgleish says she can not afford to move from Couran Cove. (Supplied)
After a years-long legal battle, Queensland’s highest court this month upheld three earlier judgments that a debt of $22 million was owed to different utility providers.
Many residents have been left with no option but to abandon their properties.
“We were all horribly shocked,” Ms Dalgleish said.
“Everybody’s just done. We really don’t know where to turn anymore. No-one is listening and no-one is helping.”
Hundreds of residents were forced to relocate after utilities were disconnected in 2023.
Those who remained have resorted to makeshift arrangements like water tanks, power generators, and barge-transported trucks to pump pits for sewerage.
Ms Dalgleish, a retiree, said it was costing her more than $8,000 every fortnight and becoming unaffordable.
“People are just giving up their properties but some of us don’t have any choice,” she said.
“With the housing crisis … at the moment, where are we supposed to go and live if we have to give our properties up?”
Ms Dalgleish said she was soon coming out of retirement as “I am eating up my superannuation to live”.Â
Body corp debt ruled valid
The island resort was built on private land and the council does not look after its utilities.Â
That means residents pay levies to and rely on body corporates to supply power, water, gas and sewerage to their homes.
Couran Cove Community Body Corporate (CBC) is responsible for the distribution of essential services to its 360 properties through six subsidiary body corporates, which pass them on to the respective units they oversee.
Residents the ‘innocent victims’ as essential services cut
Essential service providers cut off connections and pursued legal action after claiming CBC owed them $22 million in arrears, despite residents saying they had paid their relevant levies.
On March 6, Queensland’s Supreme Court upheld an earlier judgment ordering CBC to settle the dues, and also ruled four of the six subsidiaries — Marine Apartments, Lagoon Lodges, Broadwater Villas, Eco Lodges — needed to pay CBC that sum.
Justice Paul Freeburn noted some residents had not paid their body corporate contributions and those who did had been “forced to pay more than their fair share to compensate for the recalcitrant residents”.
However, he noted the matter of overpayments by some residents was a “side issue” despite being a “legitimate and powerful” one.
Initiated in 2020 by utility providers, the Couran Cove proceedings have snowballed into multiple legal disputes involving each of the body corporate subsidiaries and individuals associated with them.
This month’s court matter dealt with an application by CBC to dismiss three separate summary judgments in 2020, 2021 and 2023 that ruled in favour of the resort’s service providers without CBC having defended itself in a trial.
A summary judgment allows for a case to be ruled in the plaintiff’s favour when the defendants are ruled to have no prospect of succeeding at a trial.
Remaining residents say living at the property has become unsustainable. (ABC News: Heidi Sheehan)
CBC said it had not been able to defend itself due to allegedly being under the “adverse control” of stakeholders Simon Napoli and Lachlan McIntosh at the time, who it said had “sabotaged” its defence, according to court documents.
It also claimed past lawsuits had been lodged based on an invalid 2019 service agreement between CBC and the utility providers after voting irregularities at a body corporate meeting.
In dismissing the appeal, Justice Freeburn noted CBC had significantly delayed filing its application, that upholding it would see the “unravelling” of the legal rights of several parties, and that the company had failed to point to a reasonably arguable defence that was available to it but destroyed by those in control.
The second part of the court case involved CBC applying for a separate summary judgment against the four subsidiaries, which are embroiled in their own lawsuits against CBC after being sued by Bill Karageozis, the receiver appointed to the main body corporate in 2022.
Mr Karageozis had issued contribution notices to the smaller body corps in 2023 requiring payment of their respective outstanding amounts by November 2024, but CBC alleged payments were not made in accordance.
Justice Freeburn allowed CBC’s application, noting the “debt is valid”, which means the subsidiaries remain liable.
Another court hearing will take place to determine final costs.
Council says court decision ‘devastating’
A City of Gold Coast spokesperson said it had offered Couran Cove residents support in the form of bottled water delivery and bin collection services.
Mayor pleads for ongoing electricity, water supply to Gold Coast island residents
Local councillor Shelley Curtis said the court decision was a “devastating outcome” for residents who had “endured very difficult living conditions”.
“No-one would wish these circumstances on any community,” she said.
Queensland Premier David Crisafulli, whose electorate takes in South Stradbroke Island, had actively campaigned for Couran Cove while in opposition.
A spokesperson for Mr Crisafulli said in a statement that he had asked government departments to look at the issue “and work is ongoing”.
Several private disputes relating to the matter are still in progress.