What started as a business dispute over development of low-carbon cropping, progressed to litigation over a $310,000 Callaghan Innovation grant. The High Court dismissed Chris Hook’s complaint that Callaghan was negligent in disbursing a 2020 grant to a business called Cross Slot with subsequent losses for Mr Hook when his side deal with Cross Slot collapsed.
Mr Hook is a fervent campaigner for low carbon agriculture, promoting technologies designed to sow seed directly into untilled soil without a need to first plough and prepare land. He lives variously in New Zealand and the Ukraine.
The High Court was told he joined New Zealand-based Cross Slot with plans to promote its agricultural machinery across Europe and with it the practice of sowing into untilled soil.
Their relationship soured. Cross Slot cancelled the European licence it had granted Mr Hook’s company. He sued.
Callaghan provides funding to commercialise scientific and technology-based innovations.
Mr Hook alleged Callaghan was negligent in approving a $310,000 grant to Cross Slot in August 2020. If the grant had not been made, his joint European project with Cross Slot would not have taken place and he would not have suffered the losses incurred, he said.
Justice La Hood ruled there was no duty of care owed by Callaghan to business people in Mr Hook’s position. Callaghan dealt with Cross Slot. It had no knowledge or interest in any downstream commercial arrangements Cross Slot might enter into.
Even if it were negligent in making a grant to Cross Slot, Callaghan was not liable for any of Cross Slot’s downstream losses, Justice La Hood said.
Mr Hook appeared to have misunderstood how ‘negligence’ is interpreted in a legal sense, Justice La Hood said.
Mr Hook was complaining that Callaghan was ‘negligent’ in the sense that it was ‘incompetent’ in making a grant to Cross Slot, he suggested.
Liability for negligence in a legal sense requires a chain of evidence: proof that a loss suffered was reasonably forseeable and that there is legal closeness, or ‘proximity,’ between the wrongdoer and the person claiming.
There was no proof of any ‘proximity’ between Callaghan and Mr Hook. His negligence claim was struck out.
Hook v. Callaghan Innovation – High Court (9.08.24)
24.189