Unhappy Mugge claims he learned about Gallagher role change from the press

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Mugge alleges a catalogue of bad treatment by Gallagher

David Ross and Mark Mugge

Mark Mugge claims he was treated so badly that he learned about his role change from a press article.

Mugge, outlining his defence against a string of allegations that he broke a number of his restrictive covenants, says a number of issues had caused him to be unhappy and eventually seek to leave.

One of the key issues happened shortly after Gallagher completed the deal to buy OAMPS.

At the time, summer 2013, he was Gallagher International chief finance officer and David Ross was Gallagher International chief executive.

Mugge’s defence papers say: “Mr Ross and Mr Mugge had been responsible for overseeing the operations in Australia, but when the acquisition of Oamps was completed, Tom Gallagher and Mr Howell removed those responsibilities from Mr Ross and Mr Mugge without any consultation, save that Mr Howell had previously told Mr Mugge that Mr Ross would lose responsibility for Austrlia but Mr Mugge would keep it.

“Mr Mugge learned about the ultimate decision from articles that were published in the press.”

Mugge’s lawyers say this example shows that Mugge was not ‘responsible for the overall strategy and direction of the business’, and instead, the US was directly in charge of the business.

Another example cited in the defence is the arrival of John Durkin, a friend of Pat Gallagher, as retail boss in the UK. He allegedly arrived without Mr Ross’s permission.

Ross was ‘deeply unhappy’ about it. Mugge says that he understood that Tom and Pat Gallagher came to London in the summer of 2013 in order to dismiss Ross but eventually decided against it.