Greens pay-up, Tim Costello and empowering shareholders

16. Greens pay up for national fundraiser

By Stephen Mayne

Here's an interesting advertisement that appeared in the Fundraising Institute news service:

National Fundraiser Wanted

AUSTRALIAN GREENS – $80K

The Australian Greens political party are offering an outstanding, high-profile opportunity for the right fundraiser with a strong track-record looking for a new challenge. The fundraiser will develop and implement a national fundraising strategy targeting wealthy individuals and small companies, for the benefit of our 2007 Federal election campaign.

We are looking for demonstrated success in the following:

⁊ Significant fundraising campaigns
⁊ Large fundraising events
⁊ Working with community-based organisations
⁊ Developing and managing budgets
⁊ Outstanding people and networking skills
⁊ Articulate, well-presented, comfortable in “business settings” with high-net worth individuals
⁊ High-level negotiation skills
⁊ High levels of energy and tenacity
⁊ Commitment to Green principles or progressive politics

After a three-month probationary period, continued employment will be strictly contingent on reaching agreed fundraising targets.
Salary: $80,000 pa plus 9% super. Location negotiable. Enquiries and applications: nationalofficer@greens.org.au

The Greens are very proud of their record in refusing corporate donations and are the only party that openly criticises them through their Democracy4sale website. But now some corporate donations will be accepted. What constitutes "small'?

Spending almost $100,000 on a full-time fundraiser who is on a strict performance contract based on the amount of dollars raised from wealthy types and "small" companies is a significant change in tack. Tax deductibility of donations up to $1500 and non-disclosure for $10,000 cheques will certainly make it a lot easier from next month.

Don't you also love how "business settings" is in quotes. Let's face it, the Greens almost seem to be going corporate – although they would characterise it as just further professionalising their growing political machine. Even the Liberals don't pay their chief fundraiser because Rupert Murdoch's brother-in-law, John Calvert-Jones is only the honorary Treasurer of the party.


17. Tim Costello, gambling, the Press Club and tainted money

By Stephen Mayne

Victoria's most prominent anti-gambling campaigner, World Vision CEO Tim Costello, has accepted a speaking gig at the Melbourne Press Club on 2 May which is primarily a public push for more foreign aid spending in his brother's budget the following week.

However, Rev Costello might not be aware that the Melbourne Press Club boasts pokies giant Tattersall's as its major sponsor – something which doesn't look good for Victoria's media establishment in an election year as the Bracks Government gets closer to making some momentous decisions on the long-term structure and regulation of the state's poker machine duopoly.

Costello is well-versed on the question of tainted money after the controversy that erupted when World Vision initially rejected a $500,000 tsunami donation from the NSW Registered Clubs. Trevor Cook, a director of the spinning outfit which arm twists for the Registered Clubs, presented a typical response on his blog in January 2005:

I wonder what the hundreds of thousands of homeless in the tsunami-ravaged regions of southern Asia would think? And what about the tens of thousands of clubs' members who will see Rev Costello's rejection as a slap in the face to their way of life?

Clubs NSW has since donated the money to CARE Australia, who apparently don't put self-righteousness ahead of the plight of millions. And yours truly's plan to donate to World Vision has been scrapped. My family's money will go to CARE.

Naturally, these were only Trev's "personal views" and had nothing to do with Jackson Wells Morris, who finally helped the Registered Clubs prevail when the Iemma government backed down on their proposed pokies tax slug last month.

The political and media tentacles of the insidious gaming industry is an interesting question. The Labor Party is up to its neck in the industry and even runs a few hundreds machines in its own venues, such as the Canberra Labor Club.

The NSW media has long been heavily infiltrated by the industry. News Ltd needs the pokies to subsidise its disastrous NRL investment, John Laws has pocketed hundreds of thousands from the Penrith Panthers over the years and Alan Jones is great mates with Stargames boss John Messara, which probably explains his personal advocacy for the aborted $800 million Oasis development.

In Victoria, veteran 3AW Morning host and political powerbroker Neil Mitchell rarely gets stuck into the pokies which is not surprising given that he was the President of the Press Club when Tattersall's was first landed as a $40,000 a year chief sponsor of the Quill Awards. Mitchell even banned Tim Costello for a number of years.

The Herald Sun has taken quite a tough stand in recent months, probably reflecting Rupert Murdoch's personal belief that $3 billion lost on the pokies each year is $3 billion not available to buy his local tabloid or subscribe to Foxtel. However, Herald Sun deputy editor John Trevorrow happily sits on the Press Club committee as it takes Tatt's tainted cash.

Maybe it's time for the Press Club committee to develop a bit of moral fortitude and sever all links with the pokies giant. If not, committee members and Quill winners who receive cheques from Tatt's could be considered a little compromised as the political temperature rises around gaming.


24. How to empower small shareholders

By Stephen Mayne, revitalised shareholder activist

Imagine if our political leaders had their televised campaign debates after 99% of those voting had already cast their ballot. That's what happens at public company AGMs, which largely explains why they have become a complete non-event. A better system would encourage more institutions to speak and vote at AGMs after listening to the debate, rather than voting by proxy when the polls close 48 hours before the meeting.

One solution might be keeping proxy or direct voting open until the day after the AGM so that investors can react to the AGM presentations and debate, or even just soak up the press coverage and market reactions before finally casting a ballot.

This would keep directors on their toes at the AGM and eliminate the “dead rubber” effect where the whole event is a foregone conclusion and boards know the result before the public debate even begins. It would be a brave chairman who announced a profit downgrade at an AGM when he was also facing election and the polls remained opened for another day.

Similarly, the Americans have moved to full public disclosure of institutional voting and we should do the same to get some more fund manager accountability. This is particularly important given the growth of super and the reluctance of fund managers to either attend AGMs or explain their voting behaviour.

Retail shareholders feel powerless in the face of huge proxy voting numbers by unnamed institutions. If they were at least named we could then take up any grievances about voting decisions directly with the fund. The Teamsters Union once picketed Boston-based Fidelity after it became apparent the world's biggest fund manager had a conflict at Tyco and supported an Enron director's re-election to the board of Lochheed Martin. The union also led the successful US campaign for disclosure of voting as this excellent article explains.

The other easy way to empower small shareholders and revitalise AGMs would be to disclose voting results both on shares held and shareholders who vote. This is required for schemes of arrangement so why not extend it to all resolutions.

Of course, it is unfair to give my $1000 worth of shares in BHP-Billiton the same voting power as AMP's $2 billion, but disclosing the figures on an advisory basis would at least make public the voting sentiment of smaller shareholders.

The 2001 vote on BHP's merger with Billiton is a classic example. It was supported by about 80% of the BHP shares voted but a clear majority of shareholders voted against the deal, although this still hasn't been disclosed publicly. The registry companies such as Computershare keep all these figures anyway, so what harm would come from making them public?

John Howard is proud of turning Australia into the world's greatest shareholding nation, so it's about time he stopped treating us like mushrooms and gave us more power and accountability mechanisms. At the moment, the field is massively tilted in favour of big institutions and big companies – which are run by the same inter-locking club of directors.

Copyright © 2022 The Mayne Report. All rights reserved

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