Trackcorp Adrenalin Pty Ltd has brought on the court action following a three-year contract dispute with over rights to run an event at Mount Panorama.

Trackcorp held a five-year contract to run Drive Bathurst and Sprint Bathurst on the Mount from 2007-2011 but could not come to terms with council on a five-year option.

Drive Bathurst was a two-day event that gaveamateur drivers the chance to drive hot laps of the Mount under expert guidance; while Sprint Bathurst was three days of timed events around the iconic circuit.

Trackcorp Adrenalin CEO David Jellins told the Western Advocate the events had grown in popularity and an independent Western Research Institute report estimated the events were worth around $1.5 million a year to the local economy.

But this week’s court action will explore whether council acted in a deceptive and misleading manner during its failed negotiations over activating the five-year option.

Trackcorp is claiming damages of more than $4 million, claiming council breached its contractual obligations and failed to act in good faith.

“It is expected that the evidence will traverse why Trackcorp – who paid hundreds of thousands of dollars per year to BRC to utilise the Mount Panorama circuit, and whose event is estimated to have generated some $7.5 million for the local Bathurst economy (over five years) – was not granted the option it had exercised to run its event for a further five years through to 2016,” Mr Jellins said in a statement.

“BRC will also be asked to explain why it turned its back on a guaranteed annual six-figure sum from Trackcorp and chose instead to leave the circuit idle, generating no income for either BRC’s ratepayers or the local economy.”

Council’s general manager David Sherley confirmed the hearing would start in the Supreme Court today after more than three years of negotiation and mediation had failed to settle the dispute.

Council will be represented by a barrister and Queen’s Counsel, and legal fees for the case will run into the hundreds of thousands of dollars.

Mr Sherley would not elaborate on council’s defence strategy but said the legal team believed they had a good case.

The Trackcorp hearing comes just a fortnight after the Land and Environment Court handed down a damning finding of council’s handling of a dispute between two neighbours over a new pool.

The legal fees for that case are also believed to have topped $100,000 but Mr Sherley denied ratepayers had reason to be concerned.

“Given the wide-ranging nature of the court matters that council has been involved in recently, I don’t see that there should be any concern,” Mr Sherley said.