Dream Home battle heads for court

The makers of reality show Dream Home are heading to court in Australia to defend claims they made that Channel Nine's show The Block was a rip-off of the Dream Home format.

The Australian Federal Court hearing in June is the latest in a series of legal tussles over the format of Dream Home, co-owned by Television New Zealand and production company Ninox.

Channel Nine is suing over allegations Ninox made to international television networks licensing The Block that the Australian show was a breach of copyright.

Ninox owner John McEwen said his company had also filed legal action for breach of copyright against the producers of a version of The Block licensed in the United States called The Complex, and the Fox Network, which screened it. That court action was on hold until after the Australian case was resolved.

Dream Home is a high-rating show in which couples renovate run-down homes with materials provided by a sponsor, and the viewers vote for the winner.

Ninox had licensed it to Channel Nine, which made one series and in 2002 came out with The Block.

In the Australian programme, now up to its third season, couples compete to renovate an old apartment which is then auctioned and the winners take a cash prize.

Channel Nine licensed The Block to companies in the US, Britain, South Africa, Denmark and Canada.

Mr McEwen said Ninox had lost millions of dollars in international licensing agreements as a result of what he said was Channel Nine's breach of copyright.

Ninox had earlier sued Universal McCann, Turner Broadcasting and Lowes hardware chain in the US for breaching copyright of Dream Home. The dispute was settled out of court, and the undisclosed sum was split with about 60 per cent going to Ninox and 40 per cent to TVNZ.

The cases have fuelled tension between the production company and TVNZ.

TVNZ has backed away from the dispute, saying its own legal advice was there were not enough similarities between the shows for action against The Block to succeed.

It sought a declaration that Channel Nine had not infringed any copyright over Dream Home and applied to be removed as a party to the court action, claiming the dispute was between Ninox and Channel Nine.

Although the declaration and removal from proceedings were refused, TVNZ was excused from attending the trial.

Mr McEwen said TVNZ was letting the New Zealand creative industry down by not fighting internationally for intellectual property rights. "This is big money for us and TVNZ are doing all they can to stop it succeeding."

He said Ninox could "easily" defend Channel Nine's case.

"We haven't gone into this because we think we're going to lose. We've got enough evidence to show this has been taken from us."