Big shake hinders efforts to recoup $1.6b SCF bailout

Downey has said that the heart of the business is in Christchurch. Photo / File photo

Getting back the taxpayers' $1.6 billion bailout of South Canterbury Finance has become a tougher task after the earthquake.

Valuable assets have been damaged, a financial update is late and the sale of at least one big business looks to be hampered.

The statutory manager's report on Allan Hubbard's business is late and the future of the SCF cash-up appears to have worsened. Scales House has been abandoned as receivership HQ since last Tuesday's quake.

A spokesman for statutory managers Grant Thornton said from Christchurch this week that the sixth update on Hubbard's Aorangi Securities and Hubbard Managed Funds was due on Monday but that had changed and the report was delayed.

"It won't be out for another seven days. Things are still chaotic here," he said.

Wayne Jackson, Grant Thornton New Zealand chief executive, said the Christchurch office at 47 Cathedral Square was closed and he did not know about the state of the building.

"We still have no real news on how Grant Thornton House has faired. What we do know is that access to the Christchurch CBD is likely to be delayed for months. Our employees are not currently in the office," he said.

"We are currently working on an off-site office solution out in the northwest suburbs of Christchurch, pending developments of the CBD. Our offices in Auckland and Wellington are also able to assist," he said.

Kerryn Downey, the McGrathNicol partner who is SCF receiver, and all the staff of primary sector and exporting group Scales Corporation were forced out of Scales House at 254 Montreal St.

Downey has returned to his offices at the top of the Auckland Club Tower in Shortland St, even though he said the heart of the SCF business was in Christchurch.

Like Grant Thornton House, Scales is in the confines of the security cordon and a McGrathNicol spokesperson said a shaken Downey had hired two campervans to take staff out of Christchurch.

"He's in better spirits this week. He's brought some of the people from Christchurch to Auckland to have continuity and they are working in the McGrathNicol office. The day after the whole thing, they hired campervans ... and they drove to Dunedin. They worked from there," she said.

Scales' homepage has been down since the quake. The big business owns shipping, pet food, trading, cold storage and transport businesses as well as the country's largest apple exporter Mr Apple New Zealand.

Downey has instructed Goldman Sachs to sell Scales, 79.7 per cent owned by SCF. The other two big assets are Timaru-headquartered Dairy Holdings and Nelson-headquartered Helicopters New Zealand.

Downey has instructed Goldman Sachs on Helicopters but Dairy Holdings' sale is less advanced.