ABC, The Age, Macquarie, Dr Paul Twomey
July 22, 2008
Here are Stephen Mayne's four stories from the Crikey edition on Friday, 16 June, 2006.
1. Why a stacked board won't change the ABC
By Stephen Mayne
Michelle Grattan is spot on when she accuses the Howard Government of being deliberately provocative in appointing Keith Windschuttle to the ABC board.
It's hard to think of a more inflammatory move, but it will probably make no difference to the ABC because there simply aren't hundreds of right wing warriors prepared to join Aunty and work for a pittance. The likes of Andrew Bolt and Piers Akerman are happy to pocket a quick $600 for sitting on the Insiders couch, but they'd never take up a position hosting a local radio program because the money is woeful, ratings would plunge and they'd struggle to meet Aunty's requirements for balance and fairness.
However, new ABC managing director Mark Scott, a former Liberal Party staffer, will now be under considerable pressure to tackle alleged left wing bias of flagship programs like The 7.30 Report and Lateline, both of which are performing strongly under long-time presenters Kerry O'Brien and Tony Jones.
It's the same issue at Fairfax, where an entirely big-end-of-town board presides over supposedly left leaning broadsheets like The Age and The SMH. Former Fairfax director Margaret Jackson privately complained that the directors sat around moaning about their journalists but she never got to meet any of them. The same applies to the ABC, which partly explains why Michael Kroger quit out of frustration after his first five-year term.
Donald McDonald AC has today been confirmed as chairman for an extra six months until the end of the year, by which time Scott's intentions should be pretty clear. Sadly for the government, he won't adopt a Vlad the Impaler approach like Jonathan Shier.
Ron Brunton and Windschuttle are the two most provocative ABC directors because of their incendiary approach to Indigenous issues. Indeed, Brunton's commentary for the IPA was so controversial that the right wing think tank almost went broke because corporate donations dried up.
Windschuttle wouldn't land a gig with any corporate or not-for-profit, but John Howard is happy to foist him on the nation's most prestigious cultural institution, which speaks volumes about them both.
Meanwhile, the Ku Klux Klan are clearly impressed with the work of fellow ABC director Janet Albrechtsen – they've run one of her columns on the Cronulla riots on their website. Oh dear, the company we keep!
11. The Age winds up its building industry hit
By Stephen Mayne
For the past two weeks, The Age has produced a series of fascinating stories connecting the criminal underworld to Melbourne's tough construction industry and building unions, which concluded today with an editorial that finished:
Somebody has to investigate and, ultimately, to act. Somebody has to do more than turn a blind eye. In 2006, a culture of silence and fear in any industry in Melbourne is more than unacceptable. Quite possibly, it's criminal.Indeed, the Bracks Government has had a pretty terrible week, particularly after the diary of strategist Tom Cargill was leaked and we now have front page stories suggesting some dirt unit has been tracking the children of new opposition leader Ted Baillieu.
While some Liberal MPs are walking around with a new sense of hope, Baillieu has been moving with glacial speed. Sure, we had the junking of Robert Doyle's stupid "half tolls" policy on the Eastlink project, but a well-targeted kindergarten policy was ignored by the television news bulletins this week which instead focused on his $3.8 million share portfolio.
The personnel in Baillieu's office has still not been finalised and moves to get his supporters into Parliament are causing division. For instance, Melbourne City Councillor Peter Clark is contesting the Warrandyte preselection on Sunday week, but his past life working for Primelife and running for council with the big-drinking Fiona Sneddon, Billy's hot-headed daughter, is not impressing some Liberals.
Meanwhile, the Greens are starting to run hard. Bob Brown unveiled their eight Victorian upper house lead candidates last week, sparking this story on Stateline, which featured both Libs and Nats launching Tasmanian-style attacks on the Greens for their "loopy" and "wacky" policies.
Steve Bracks was far more conciliatory towards the Greens at the Press Club, but it sounds like the conservative parties are a bit nervous about Green balance of power in Victoria's reconstituted upper house after the 25 November election.
22. Macquarie Bank's first contested board election
By Stephen Mayne, proud owner of 6 Macquarie Bank shares
Macquarie Bank shares soared $2.07 to $65.30 this morning after the Millionaire Factory told the ASX that I was running for its board. Just joking, the stock was up in line with a stronger market. The notice of meeting for the 20 July AGM was lodged at 5.34pm yesterday and the bank has come out fighting, telling shareholders that "Mr Mayne lacks the experience and skill required of a voting director of the bank".
This is the proposed platform that I requested they distribute to shareholders:
Stephen Mayne, age 37. Bcom (Melb). Stephen Mayne is a Walkley Award-winning business journalist who has worked for a range of newspapers, including The AFR and The Age, where he was banking writer. He is also Australia's leading retail corporate governance campaigner and was the founder of www.crikey.com.au, Australia's best known independent ezine. Stephen is standing on a platform that Macquarie Bank adopt US best practice and implement a blanket ban on staff from taking up shares in floats or capital raisings the bank is managing. If elected, he will resign once this policy is comprehensively implemented.To its credit, Macquarie published this in full. However, they've also provided a counter argument which is three times as long as my pitch and includes the following claims:
- No firm allocation are permitted to staff "unless prior approval is obtained from senior management and the proposed allocation is clearly disclosed in the prospectus".
- Historically, such approval has only been granted in limited circumstances where the issuer of the securities is a Macquarie specialist vehicle and in order to align the interests of the relevant staff and the issuer vehicle.
- Staff may apply for securities offered as part of a general public offer by completing an application form in the same manner as retail investors.
Laurie Cox, Macquarie director and Transurban chairman: 1500 costing $750,000
Alistair Lucas, Laurie's then deputy in Melbourne office: 280 costing $140,000
Richard Shepherd, Macquarie deputy managing director: 400 costing $200,000
Paul Robertson, senior executive: 123 costing
Anthony Kahn, infrastructure guru: 100 costing $50,000
A further six Macquarie executives at the time received allocations of at least 43 stapled securities, which have been an absolute bonanza for all investors having returned more than 800% over the years, including dividends. Macquarie even acknowledged in the notice of meeting that this would be illegal in the US, but claimed that, under the American system, "securities are usually only available from underwriters". As if the semantics of underwriting, lead managing and sponsoring is a material issue.
Macquarie should change its policy but has refused, so investors now have a means of lodging a protest by voting for the outsider. Given I've promised to resign once US best practice is adopted, how could institutions vote against me when they are the very Macquarie clients being dudded by the millionaires scooping up some of the best value share offers? And faced with a vocal critic on their board, surely they'd do anything to secure a quick resignation.
23. Running ICANN: could there be a more fascinating job?
By Stephen Mayne
Despite the Crikey army being invited to attend on Tuesday, it was a disappointing roll up at Melbourne's Hilton Hotel last night for a fabulous Churchill Club talk by Dr Paul Twomey, CEO of ICANN – the US-based organisation which controls the internet.
Besides Rupert Murdoch, it is hard to think of an expat Australian who has a more fascinating or important job. Twomey flies around the world meeting business heavies, technologists and politicians grappling with the extraordinary breadth and revolutionary power of the internet.
He talked about a 15 minute meeting with UN secretary general Kofi Annan and even received a letter from American's most famous smut merchant, Larry Flint, during the recent debate about creating a XXX domain for p*rn.
I asked Twomey whether ICANN was influenced by the US Commerce Department and the Religious Right in rejecting the application and he said that the 200,000 emails he received from concerned Christians did not contribute to the 9-5 vote against.
It was defeated because the applicant was requesting immediate approval and had undertaken to adhere to all relevant laws – something ICANN could not be sure of given it would be accessible in 200-plus countries around the world.
Some of the statistics and stories that Twomey reeled off were just staggering:
- He recently met a man in Seattle who had spent $US110 million buying up domain names just for the purposes of redirecting traffic to create advertising revenue
- $US100 is thought to be the most expensive pay per click advertising deal struck and it's by US plaintiff lawyers circling drugs for cancer and asbestos-related diseases that might lead to litigation
- Toyota will soon release a car with no less than 15 internet protocol connections to track various features
- SPAM will be like the "cold war" – a long struggle and Microsoft's operating system, which Twomey doesn't use, will continue to be vulnerable for many years
- 7 million new .com addresses are registered by ICANN every Monday but less than 1% are confirmed by Friday as registrars assess what is saleable
- Each international flight will soon have its own .aero domain name that will disappear the moment the flight concludes
- Sure, the Chinese might have more eye-balls on the internet but no-one gets anywhere near the Americans when it comes to internet commerce.
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