Eddie everywheres conflict and is the AGM dead?

18. Eddie Everywhere's McDonald's conflict

By Stephen Mayne

As keen students of Eddie McGuire's vast conflicts of interest over the years, we couldn't help but notice the amazing Media Watch story on Monday night about Ronald McDonald gate-crashing a Hi-5 spot on Channel Nine's Mornings with Kerry-Anne.

We all know that Eddie has been the master of using his many media platforms to plug away and boost his empire over the years, but the latest sequence of events is the first example since he ascended to the Nine throne.

Eddie was announced as Nine's new CEO on 8 February but he's retained the Collingwood presidency, where he remains a rainmaker, if this snippet from The Age on February 27 is to be believed:

Collingwood and the fast-food giant (are) ready to sign off on an amazing three-year sponsorship deal that …will mean (Collingwood coach Mick) Malthouse's face bobs up on ‘Maccas' outlets all over the country. Sensing the talks between the two parties had stalled, (Eddie McGuire) slipped into the Lexus Centre to head up a crucial meeting and by the time he had left, an arrangement was in place...”

The next morning Ronald McDonald gate-crashed the Hi-5 segment, prompting their executive producer Helena Harris manager to tell Media Watch:

We were deeply distressed that Ronald McDonald was put anywhere near Hi-5. Hi-5 has no association with junk food. We do not want to be seen in print or on TV together. We did all we could to prevent the situation... Our creative director was waving at them (Hi 5 cast members) to get away from him.

Now this is a pretty serious allegation that deserves an answer. As CEO of Channel Nine, did Eddie direct that Ronald McDonald get favourable publicity on Channel Nine after agreeing to kick millions into his football club? Given the horrors of multinationals targeting children outlined on Four Corners on Monday night, Hi-5 has every right to be angry, as it damaged their fit and healthy image.


23. Is the corporate AGM dead?

By Stephen Mayne

The Chartered Secretaries Association is hosting what should be an interesting governance symposium in Melbourne and Sydney next month posing the question, "Is the AGM dead?" It seems the 2005 public company AGM season was one of the worst ever with attendances and the standard of debate falling even further.

The CSA have lined up a diverse range of speakers and the two sessions in Melbourne and Sydney will be moderated by Lateline presenter Tony Jones. Most of the participants had a conference call this morning to go through some of the issues and it is fair to say we might get some different perspectives on the day from the likes of Telstra's Phil "my mum has bought her Telstra shares now" Burgess, proxy voting kingmaker Geoff Stapleton from ISS, Katey Lahey from the BCA, John Curry from the Australian Shareholders' Association and yours truly.

My gig is to assess the role of special interest groups at AGMs, particularly the threat of greater union agitation given their reduced power in the new federal industrial relations environment. It is true to say that green groups and unions have played a disproportionately large role at corporate AGMs in the past. For instance, after AMP wrote off $1 billion on GIO, the 2000 AGM saw eight of the 13 general questions come from greenies concerned about land clearing in Queensland.

Similarly, moaning unionists got up numerous times at the 2001 EGM meeting to approve the merger of BHP with Billiton as they were worried the South Africans would bring a much tougher perspective than the old soft-touch industrial approach by The Big Australian.

It's easy to blame weak chairs and and special interest groups but retail shareholders as a group must take a lot of the blame for the declining popularity and relevance of corporate AGMs. Sadly, AGMs, political parties and talkback radio have one thing in common – they attract eccentric, aggressive and sometimes lonely people who are looking for something to do or someone to talk to.

While more aggressive chairing is one solution, other ideas being kicked around include separating the formal and informal parts of the meeting, to allow for more entertainment and lively exchanges.

There's also a push for direct voting which would remove many of the blunders that come from a proxy system which involves lots of manual processes that are often flawed. And why don't we adopt the US position of requiring institutions to disclose how they vote so they are more accountable to the people whose money they are managing?

Another way to further empower and engage retail shareholders would be to publish all the votes based on shares and shareholders. Most retail investors don't bother to vote "because it's stitched up by the institutions in the proxies", but if the size of a shareholding became irrelevant on a second measure, the little players would more readily participate.

If you've got any ideas on how the corporate AGM could be improved, drop us a line to smayne@crikey.com.au. Banning Jack Tilburn would be an obvious start.

Copyright © 2024 The Mayne Report. All rights reserved

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