Kennett, Eddie McGuire, Macquarie and News Corp

16. Jeff Kennett's understanding of accountability

By Stephen Mayne

Following my announcement to stand as a candidate in this year's Victorian state election, AAP produced this report yesterday, which was also picked up in The Australian's Strewth column. The key quotes were:

In Brisbane to launch a new initiative, on behalf of depression awareness organisation Beyondblue, Mr Kennett sarcastically welcomed Mr Mayne's move.

"The beaut thing about Australian public life is we encourage everyone to stand," Mr Kennett said."And often, it would be a good thing if certain people would be elected because then they would have to be accountable for what they say and do." Crikey has often been criticised for publishing controversial information left alone by other media outlets, with politicians and big business particularly targeted.

Hang on a minute. This is a guy who abused parliamentary privilege on numerous occasions in defaming people and, when he did get sued, was indemnified by the Victorian taxpayer on up to 12 occasions. He allegedly profited to the tune of $400,000 from a tax free defamation settlement with the Packer family and then, when he chased another $400,000 payday from The Australian but lost, the Murdoch interests didn't enforce the costs order. If anyone needs a history lesson on all this, check out the 18,766-word treatise on jeffed.com.

By way of contrast, I was personally sued three times and ended up losing the house. There were none of the indemnities, privilege or counter-party cost waivers that our Jeffrey enjoyed.

Sure, there is no Press Council or Broadcasting Authority for ezines, but there is no shortage of accountability at Crikey. Maybe Jeffrey is referring to the challenges of actually being elected rather than sparring from the outside.

He's welcome to look at my performance record at the local kindergarten, where the program is expanding in 2007 and demand is strong such that there are no vacancies.





18. Is it time to dump Eddie McGuire?

By Stephen Mayne

Is this another celebrated case of the curse of Crikey? Wind the clock back to August 2002 when Good Weekend produced a tough cover story on yours truly, written by a certain Garry Linnell. Eddie McGuire, who has known Linnell for 20 years on the Melbourne sports circuit, was quoted as follows:

I wouldn't even cross the street to give him a backhander – or a writ for that matter – because I don't want to give him the oxygen he craves. His reputation is of having no credibility and of having dudded every person who's tried to lend him a hand.

Lo and behold, Eddie's bungled shafting of Mark Llewellyn has now become the second biggest oxygen generator in the 2,324-day life of Crikey – trailing only behind Christian Kerr's famous Democrat leaks of 2002 which precipitated the resignation of then leader Natasha Stott Despoja and effectively destroyed the party electorally.

Linnell has clearly accepted the ultimate hospital pass in replacing Llewellyn and driving the removal of 100 news and current affairs staff at Nine while learning about the television industry for the first time. It seems Eddie was so insecure that he felt the need to surround himself with Melbourne sporting mates.

It's clear now that Eddie and his deputy and long time manager, Jeffrey Browne, are a laughing-stock at Nine. James Packer should install someone over the top of them both and halve their pay.

Sure, they are gun managers of people. But they are being played out of position. PBL has made a terrible mistake and a return to Melbourne, Who Wants to be a Millionaire and The Footy Show is surely on the cards to end what is the biggest crisis Nine has faced in decades.

I'm so concerned about the damage being wreaked that yesterday 37 of my 67 PBL shares were sold at $17.43 a pop, still leaving enough to gain entry to what will be a cracking AGM come October.





25. News Corp jumps aboard the Macquarie global express

By Stephen Mayne, candidate for the News Corp and Macquarie Bank boards

Rupert Murdoch is famous for building his global empire with a blizzard of foreign acquisitions since 1970, but over the past 12 months he's been surpassed by Macquarie Bank, which now controls more foreign assets than the Sun King.

Macquarie Bank and News Corp have never collaborated in their empire building and in fact have been brawling in the NSW Supreme Court for more than a year over Michael West's coverage in The Australian over the Millionaire Factory's dealings with the Beaconsfield goldmine.

However, it appears that a truce may be on the horizon and the two groups are now even doing deals together, if you can believe The Australian's business lead today which began as follows:

News Corporation is understood to have joined Macquarie Bank's $US7 billion ($9.6 billion) bid for the Hong Kong telecoms and media assets of Richard Li's PCCW. Sources in Hong Kong told The Australian yesterday that News Corp had taken a "modest" stake in the Macquarie Bank consortium, possibly of around 10 to 20%.

With Rupert Murdoch remaining in Australia for the rest of the week, don't be surprised if the defamation matter is tidied up as well.

So what are the connections between Macquarie and Rupert? Well, Macquarie Communications Infrastructure Group chairman Gerry Moriarty had plenty of dealings with News Corp over Foxtel when he was at Telstra. Similarly, Ted Pretty is in the same boat and he's now a consultant to Macquarie. The PCCW assets up for grabs are the same ones that cost Telstra shareholders almost $2 billion.

Michael Pascoe reported last week that Macquarie may be backing the wrong faction on the Chinese mainland, but Rupert has strong Chinese connections and could well be wheeled out to help smooth the way. However, the Murdoch family's relations with Richard Li have been troubled in the past, as this Business Week story from 2000 explains. It sounds like a heady cocktail indeed.

Copyright © 2022 The Mayne Report. All rights reserved

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