*Pic: ABC pic of Gina Rinehart and Natalie Joyce at a Barnaby election party …
Gina Rinehart’s son John Hancock has taken aim at federal Agriculture Minister Barnaby Joyce over his involvement in a dispute over a multi-billion dollar family trust.
Yesterday the New South Wales Supreme Court ordered that Gina Rinehart’s daughter Bianca Rinehart be appointed trustee of the funds, currently worth more than $4 billion.
Justice Paul Brereton said Ms Rinehart had demonstrated the ability to robustly assert the rights of the trust over her mother and her company Hancock Prospecting.
In handing down his decision, Justice Brereton said it had become clear throughout the proceedings Mrs Rinehart had “gone to extraordinary lengths” to maintain control directly or indirectly of the trust.
Gina Rinehart’s eldest son, John Hancock, told Radio National Breakfast the pressure extended beyond the family, with Barnaby Joyce sending his sister Hope an email trying to convince her not to proceed.
“Coming from his government email I just think it’s extraordinary, and this character sits three chairs down from our Prime Minister,” Mr Hancock told RN business editor Sheryl Bagwell.
“I think it’s nothing short of dangerous and I would want to see exactly what communications he had prior to sending this email.”
A spokesman for Minister Joyce said the letter to a member of the Rinehart family, sent when he was a Queensland Senator in September, 2011, had encouraged members of the Rinehart family to try to resolve the dispute, to keep it “in house” and out of public view.
