Stephen Robertson

Partner

Email: sjr@nicholsons.com.au

Qualifications

• Bachelor of Arts (English – Communication), University of Queensland, 1992
• Bachelor of Laws, University of Queensland, 1996
• Graduate Certificate in Management, University of Southern Queensland, 2002
• Solicitor, Supreme Court of Queensland and High Court of Australia, 1996

Areas of Practice

• Commercial law – all aspects of acquisitions and divestments, commercial agreements, structuring, and associated legal risk issues and revenue issues
• Property law – acquisitions, divestments, duty and GST, and other issues
• Revenue law – advice on GST and duty aspects of transactions
• Banking and Finance – negotiating senior debt and non-recourse debt (for borrowers) and other advisory work
• Charity and Not-for-Profit law – assisting not-for-profit entities with structuring and with their particular needs

Relevant Experience

Commercial

• acquisition and divestment of commercial enterprises in a wide variety of industries, including negotiation, documentation and all aspects of transactions, including transactions with national and international parties
• advising on business structure, issues faced by businesses, and solutions for those issues
• commercial agreements of various types including agreements for exploitation of intellectual property
• investigating and reporting to commercial, aged care, voluntary, and educational enterprises on structural issues and legal risk exposure

Property

• negotiating, on several occasions, for the acquisition and divestment of high-value commercial, industrial and retail property
• advising and negotiating for landlord and tenant in relation to all aspects of commercial, industrial and retail leasing; analysis of commercial and retail leasing in the context of due diligence for acquisitions and divestments

Revenue

• analysis of complex GST issues (in conjunction with specialist consultants) in the context of major property and commercial transactions
• duty advice, submissions, applications for exemption and objections

Banking and Finance

• documenting senior debt and non-recourse debt (for borrowers)
• advising special purpose lending institution about lending issues and security documentation for commercial and community projects
• negotiating for defaulting commercial borrowers with the lender, and for the lender with the borrower, and drawing complex terms of settlement to resolve existing facilities and to resolve disputes and claims

Charity and Not-for-profit

• advising a major religious denomination about internal structuring issues, disciplinary procedures, and relationships between their internal elements
• structuring of not-for-profit entities according to their particular needs including advising about tax concession and DGR status, and capital and recurring grants

Memberships

• Member, Queensland Law Society
• Associate Member, The Tax Institute