4 questions lodged at 2025 Oceania Healthcare hybrid AGM

Q1. New Zealand is becoming a governance backwater as it continues to resist mandating annual voting on remuneration reports, which is standard in many countries. Will the chair undertake to consult with major shareholders and lead a board discussion on the issue of whether you will voluntarily put up a remuneration report resolution for an advisory vote at next year's AGM? What does board re-election candidate Rob Hamilton think about this proposal? This is the law in Australia and we are dual listed on the ASX, so why don't we step up and respect shareholders by adopting Australian market practice?

Answer: The chair Elizabeth Coutts made the mistake of reading out the online questions herself and never got to this one.

Q2. Australia is currently in the midst of an unprecedented deluge of takeovers that has contributed to listed entities on the ASX dropping in 27 of the past 28 months for a net reduction of 216 or 9.4% to 2,078 on May 31 2025. There were a record 29 major takeovers above $200m completed in calendar 2024. Shares in comparable Australian companies like Regis Healthcare have soared since last year's bipartisan aged care reforms. Are they the most likely bidder if we were to be taken over and if an offer did come from offshore, do we envisage there would be any potential competition or government concerns about foreign ownership that would prevent such a deal from completing? Do we have any history with Regis Healthcare and should New Zealand adopt the Australian reforms?

Answer: The chair Elizabeth Coutts made the mistake of reading out the online questions herself and when she finally got to this one, there was a long pause, bad question censorship and then a non-answer on the Regis component. She said there was no takeover action in hand. Watch video of how this unfolded via Twitter, including the interesting comments at the end by the Australian CEO criticising last year's Bipartisan Australian aged care reforms for being too institutionally focused, at the expense of personalised care.

Q3. When is New Zealand going to get rid of this pointless annual requirement to set the audit fees? If we vote this down, what happens? Do the auditors have to work for free or do previous authorisations cover their pay? Also, when did we last tender the external audit and when will we next tender the external audit?

Answer: The chair Elizabeth Coutts ignored, or wasn't told about my 4 online written questions during formal business and then, after a long pause, claimed there was only 1 online, which she then failed to read out in full, only citing the audit tender component. She said EY had replaced PwC after a competitive tender in 2023. Watch video of how this unfolded via Twitter.

Q4. Thank you for offering shareholders a hybrid AGM today via the excellent Computershare platform. Could you please publish a full archive of the webcast on your website for the benefit of shareholders unable to watch it live and also disclose how many shareholders voted in the final poll results lodged with the ASX, not just the shares data which is dominated by the big shareholders. Computershare has this data and many ASX listed companies now do this to encourage retail shareholder participation and draw attention to the very low voter participation rate.


Answer: Not asked by chair Elizabeth Coutts who made the mistake of reading out the online questions herself. It's too much to juggle.

Copyright © 2025 The Mayne Report. All rights reserved

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