Pub billionaire’s Endeavour sails into Captain Cook storm

by Callum Foote | Dec 23, 2022 | Business, Latest Posts

Captain Cook Hotel. Image: Captain Cook Hotel Facebook.

Court documents reveal that pubs and pokies baron Bruce Mathieson’s Endeavour Group may have underpaid $700,000 in stamp duty when buying the Captain Cook Hotel in Sydney, make that The Captain, recently renamed. Callum Foote reports.

The Captain Cook Hotel, just a hop skip and jump from the Sydney Cricket Ground and the new Alliance Stadium in Paddington, was purchased by BLM Group, directed by billionaire Bruce Mathieson and Ross Blair-Holt the chief executive of the Bruce Mathieson group earlier this month for a reported $13.5 million.

However, documents revealed in Supreme court proceedings brought against a part owner of the hotel Benjamin Horne and his related entities show that the actual sale price may have been as low as $1.95 million with the OSR receiving $91,430.00 for stamp duty on $1.95m.

The property was bought by FHT Nominees for $10.5m in July 2021, an investment syndicate then headed by Ben Horne a Lawyer and Director of Aqua Law based in Sydney and Peter Scott, a Director at Sydney chartered accounting firm Talbots acting as a trustee for the Captain Cook Propriety Unit Trust.

Earlier this month, FHT Nominees sold the hotel and its associated businesses to a company associated with pokies and hotel billionaire Bruce Mathieson for a reported total of $13.5 million.

Ben Horne is also a former director of FHT Nominees

Criminal proceedings

Ben Horne is a defendant in Supreme Court proceedings brought forward by his former business partner Stuart Crabb who alleges that Horne stole Crabb’s company BBARC Pty Ltd out from under him.

BBARC owned units in a trust that had housed the Captain Cook Hotel in Paddington since 2021. The case is being heard in the NSW Supreme Court and is expected to resume on the second of February 2023.

Court drama

When Crabb learnt that the Hotel was due to be auctioned on December 5, an urgent injunction was filed by his lawyers on December 1 seeking an order to have funds placed into the courts trust account from the sale proceeds.

Then, in a surprise move, the Judge ordered that Horne was required to produce evidence on that Sunday at 2pm. This evidence was to include copies of all sale contracts related to the sale to Mathieson’s company.

Horne provided the court with an affidavit that claimed that the hotel alongside its related businesses were sold to Mathieson’s BLM Group for $13.5 million, $9.45 million of which was for the property itself. However, the vendor for the Hotel that was stated on the contract was not FHT Nominees Pty Ltd but rather Billericay Nominees Pty Ltd, A company for which Ben Horne is the Sole Director.

Horne’s other company Aqua Law was the conveyancer for the Vendor again related to Horne.

There were doubts surrounding this evidence, however, Mathieson’s lawyers produced the corresponding contracts to the court which supported Horne’s affidavit.

Despite this, the judge then ordered Horne to supply copies of the PEXA Settlement statements of the transaction. PEXA, an online property settlement platform shows the actual settled amount paid between the parties and to pay $100,000.00 into the courts trust account pending the outcome of the dispute.

These settlement statements contradicted the evidence of Horne and the contracts that Mathieson’s lawyer Jon Martin volunteered, revealing that the hotel was sold for $1.95 million not $9.45 million per the lawyer’s evidence.

If this is the case, it represents a stamp duty shortfall of almost $700,000 on behalf of companies controlled by the pokies baron. Mathieson was unavailable for comment, as were his public relations people.

Mathieson’s pubs and pokies empire a family affair

Bruce Mathieson’s pokies and hotel empire, worth $2.2 billion according to the AFR’s 2022 Rich List, includes a 15% share in Endeavour Group.

Endeavour Group, of which Mathieson is the CEO, controls the ALH Group, the largest hotel operator in the country, operating more than 350 venues. The business is a family affair, Mathieson Senior having been replaced as a director of Endeavour and ALH by his son Bruce Mathieson Jr.

One of Mathieson’s daughters, Deborah Mathieson-Tomsic and her husband Dave Tomsic own Black Rhino Group which owns more than 1100 poker machine licences throughout Victoria in two dozen different venues.

Mathieson’s other daughter, Jodi Grollo and her husband Dianni Grollo own the Pubco Group which own and operate 10 licensed venues across Melbourne Metro and Regional Victoria along with 467 pokies machines.

The Mathieson family own 45% of Victoria’s poker machine entitlements.

Mathieson has been contacted to comment on whether the contracts his lawyers were mistaken in presenting the $13.5 million figure to the court, as have Ben Horne’s lawyers. Neither were available to comment on the shortfall. MWM also has a call in to the NSW OSR.