West Melbourne wholesale fruit and veg stallholders seek lease injunction over site relocation

Prospective tenants at Melbourne’s new $670 million fruit and vegetable wholesale market have sought an injunction on lease signing through the Victorian Supreme Court yesterday.

The Melbourne Market Authority is relocating the Footscray Road market to a new site in Cooper Street, Epping but the tenants are facing rents almost double what they are currently paying.

The 108 traders at the Footscray Road site are under pressure to sign leases at the new site before May 31 or risk losing their allocation when the leases go to national tender in June.

Just two of the traders have already signed.

The tenants, represented by Nunzio Lucarelli QC, accused the Melbourne Market Authority of “unconscionable conduct” under consumer law by pressuring them to sign at much higher rents, The Australian Financial Review reported.

They told Justice Peter Vickery rents will rise from $273 per square metre annually to $478 per square metre annually and tenants who also require warehouse space are being asked to sign leases without knowing the details of the storage space.

“They are being asked to commit to one part of the puzzle without knowing the other part of the puzzle,” Lucarelli reportedly told the court.

He said the MMA are using “pressure or unfair tactics” to “corral” the stallholders into signing the leases.

But the MMA, represented by Michael Wyles SC, said the dispute was not open for the court to decide as the market was implementing government policy.

He said even a short injunction could delay the market opening until 2015.

The case will be decided on Friday.

The new market facility has been fraught with controversy as rents increase and the number of stall holders is reduced.

The Weekly Times Now reported the annual market turnover could fall could fall from $1.6 billion to $600 million.

It reports the market is too small to accommodate all standholders - 480 down to about 216 – with some standholders going from having 20 stands to just one.

Stall sizes will reportedly be reduced from 21 square metres to 17.28 square metres while the aisles are too small to allow trucks inside or let fork-lifts turn around.

But none of the information is official and standholders say they are being left in the dark.