Read between the lines - It's never been a problem before... BPL...

Read between the lines - It's never been a problem before... BPL have requested that the land owners deny COB access to the site.

Does BPL believe it's not financially liable for the drilling? If so, then why are they denying access?
IMO, it's because their strategy is to be the biggest pain in the ar5e possible so COB pays them to go away....

The most ridiculous part about this is COB is long past paying out BPL, and the way BPL is behaving further diminishes its chances of a favourable outcome in the dispute.

On top of this, 2 of the disputes are massive time wasters.
- One of the disputes is against BPL's own signed public release (that one shouldn't take long)
- The dispute over royalty calculations is not part of the JV, so not sure what they are thinking there. Again, BPL has made a number of public releases already regarding the royalty, so if there is something they know the market doesn't, they're obligated to put it out there.

BPL is hanging it's hat on the JV manager issue and liability/risk of drilling, which appear to be related.
Their case is not strong IMO, but we can wait for the binding decision to find out.