( CNN ) -- An Australian judge ruled Tuesday that the band Men at Work must pay 5 percent of royalities from their 1980s hit `` Down Under '' for plagiarizing a popular nursery rhyme about a Kookaburra written in 1932 . In February , Federal Court judge Peter Jacobsen found that the flute riff in `` Down Under '' did mimic the Kookaburra song . `` I would emphasise that the findings I have made do not amount to a finding that the flute riff is a substantial part of Down Under or that it is the 'hook ' of that song , '' he said at the time . `` Down Under '' was composed and performed by Men at Work founding member Colin Hay in 1978 . Greg Ham added the flute riff after he joined the band in mid-1979 . According to court documents , Ham added the riff to the song to inject some `` Australian flavor . '' He admitted he had heard the song while growing up in the country in the late 1950s and was `` pretty sure '' that Kookaburra was in his school 's song book . The song was written in 1932 by teacher Marion Sinclair , and Australian music group Larrikin Publishing bought the copyright to it in 1990 after Sinclair 's death in 1988 . It was n't until a quiz show in 2007 that Larrikin Managing Director Norman Lurie became aware of the songs ' similarities and the potential for a law suit . Jacobsen found that Ham deliberately included the bars from Kookaburra into the flute line , but accepted that Colin Hay did n't realize it was from the nursery rhyme until early in the last decade . Larrikin had sought 40 to 60 percent of the royalties earned by `` Down Under '' in Australia since May 20 , 2002 , the limit imposed under Australian law . The ruling says it would make sense for the ruling to apply to future royalty payments . `` I consider the figures put forward by Larrikin to be excessive , overreaching and unrealistic , '' Jacobsen said in Tuesday 's ruling . `` It 's just really a pity that Marion Sinclair , the lady who wrote it , did n't participate in income from the song when the song was at its height in the early 80s , '' Larrikin 's lawyer Adam Simpson said in February . At the time , Simpson said the company did not plan to sue overseas for royalties earned by the song outside Australia . `` To be honest , such things are theoretically possible but we 're keeping it simple , '' he said . Experts say the amount of damages payable will be limited by the judge 's finding that riff did not amount to the `` hook '' of the song . `` There 's a lot more to 'Down Under ' than that flute melody . It 's not the main melody and not the main hook and I suppose that in the end will mean that it will be a minor share of the royalties that this publisher can claim now , '' said Daniel Mullensiefen , co-director of the masters program in Music , Mind and Brain at Goldsmiths University in London . The shorter , more popular version of `` Down Under '' was released in 1981 in Australia on the band 's hugely successful `` Business as Usual '' album . By January 1983 , the single had topped the music charts in Australia , the U.S. , Britain , Canada and several European countries . CNN 's Hilary Whiteman contributed to this report .
Nursery rhyme riff worth 5 percent of ` ` Down Under '' No . ` ` ' '' is a popular nursery rhyme in Australia . Australian music group acquired rights to it in 1980 . ` ` Down Under '' reached No . 1 in Australia , the U.S. , UK and Canada .