Andrew Bragg to host Richard White speech at Shepherd Oration; NSW gaming minister silent on Star questions
Normally a forum for the most tedious sort of business speech, Andrew Bragg’s Shepherd Oration might just be about to get an injection of glamour from the inner-Sydney influencer set, courtesy of a headline appearance by man-of-the-moment Rick Leblanc.
That’s WiseTech billionaire Richard White to his business associates.
With impeccable timing, Bragg sent a reminder to the business community to book their tickets on Wednesday, just as the corporate crowd were hunting through their inboxes for the latest allegations in the saga of White’s disastrous relationship with Linda Rogan.
Bragg, a NSW senator, established the oration in 2019 as an homage to straitlaced business doyen Tony Shepherd, and as a forum for Australia’s corporate bosses to “enter the arena of policy formation”.
Most of the previous speeches have been firmly aimed at the “dull but worthy” market. Most speakers have managed the first part.
In retrospect, the forum’s previous highlight might well have been Qantas boss Alan Joyce lecturing the crowd on competition policy in 2020, arguing that Rex’s entry into the capital city market meant the ACCC could pack its bags and leave the industry alone. Policy genius.
Last year outgoing Business Council boss Jennifer Westacott stunned the crowd with the revelation that Australians really just want a centrist government.
But the addition of White to the roster offers the tantalising prospect of better fare. Or at least a more fashionably dressed audience, if any of the Surry Hills fashion set attend in the hope of an intimate retelling of the sordid saga with Rogan.
Sadly, Bragg’s invitation included neither the planned topic of White’s speech, nor a venue – you’ll have to stump up to find out on the night.
If you miss Bragg’s big night, though, you could still lash out $300 to catch him speaking at a Forbes event in November alongside microphone mogul Peter Freedman, on the topic of how the results of the US election will affect the business outlook. If Trump can survive Stormy Daniels’ revelations …
Serbian sayonara
After 20 years, is Rio Tinto hinting its Serbian excursion is finally coming to a painful end?
Amid ongoing mass protests against Rio’s Jadar lithium project, exacerbated by another heated election, there’s little sense that Rio will ever find its way clear to develop the giant deposit, on which it has spent a packet.
The deal for Arcadium Lithium suggests the company now has an entry point to the battery making metal. Rio boss Jakob Stausholm wasn’t admitting defeat on Wednesday, though, saying the company was “respectful” of the heated political debate, but would still like to develop Jadar.
But Rio’s team inside Serbia sent out a slightly more pointed message this week, on Monday posting a press release confirming its talks with Arcadium. That is on a website that has, until now, been used almost solely for public statements decrying misinformation circulating in Serbia about the project.
Even if Stausholm isn’t quite ready to concede defeat in public, his local team is sending strong hints that the mining giant is preparing to pack up its bat and ball and clear out.
Mind you, there are plenty of Rio stalwarts who still believed the company jinxed itself from the start in Serbia. After discovering a new type of mineral containing lithium and borate in 2004, Rio team sent samples to the British Museum for analysis. The British Museum boffins then dubbed the find Kryptonite, because it bore a curious resemblance to the description of a metal of the same name in the movie Superman Returns.
Kryptonite, of course, is the fictional substance that saps the power of the Man of Steel.
Weirdly enough, Rio has since stopped using that particular name for the mineral.
I know nothing
It’s amazing how quickly new governments revert to the Sergeant Shultz routine when faced with questions they’d really not rather deal with.
The latest entry in the ledger is NSW gaming minister David Harris, who apparently knows nothing, nothing, about the state’s top casino cop’s unusual side hustle.
As a reminder, when not lecturing his constituents about probity and the highest standards, NSW Independent Casino Commissioner Phillip Crawford oversees a little-known litigation lender of last resort, Juel Loans. Juel charges interest rates pushing 20 per cent on loans to fund family law or will disputes. Crawford is chairman of the lender and sits on Juel’s legal review panel.
There’s no suggestion of any wrongdoing on Crawford’s part, but it’s not a great look.
But, in answers to a series of questions in the NSW parliament, Harris said he wasn’t aware about Crawford’s side gig until he read about it in this newspaper, and it wasn’t his role to get involved.
“The NSW government expects the NICC to manage conflicts as appropriate,” was Harris’s terse written reply to the question.
Questions about who inside the government knew what and when about Crawford’s decision to reboot Adam Bell’s inquiry into Star casino were also met with a dead bat from Harris. As, too, were those about the timing of the release of the Bell inquiry, delivered to the NICC on July 31 but made public on August 30, the morning Star was set to release its financial accounts. Star was forced to suspend its shares for a month, and went tumbling in the aftermath.
All of these questions were a matter for the NICC, Harris said.
But one question caught Margin Call’s eye. The minister was asked if he was aware of any relationship between Crawford and Bell, the high-ranking SC picked to oversee two inquiries into Star. And whether Crawford “accepted any hospitality from any companies or entities associated with Mr Bell?”.
Harris gave another short reply. “The government is not aware of any relationship between Mr Crawford and Mr Bell that requires disclosure, or raises concerns in relation to the NICC’s engagement of Mr Bell to conduct inquiries.”
Crawford has been mulling over his penalties for Star after asking the casino to show cause in September. Even with former Crown boss Steve McCann recently appointed to the $2.5m a year CEO job, it’s the bankers that are calling the shots on Star.
Rytenskild eyes his old Tabcorp job
First Adam Rytenskild was dumped as Tabcorp CEO, now he’s won a Fair Work Commission case against it, so could he be plotting a return to the position since filled by Gillon McLachlan?
MinRes in game of cat and mouse
The Legal Practice Board of Western Australia is looking into MinRes and its lawyers’ conduct, which is interesting timing as its company secretary has just been made legal counsel to the board.