Medicinal cannabis outfit Vitura Health is having more smoke blown in its face by disgruntled shareholders wanting a boardroom spill at the upcoming annual meeting. Given the cast of characters involved, one can only wonder what these guys are puffing on.
Former chief medical officer Dr Benjamin Jansen is putting himself up as a director nearly one year after abruptly departing the company over accusations of a “repeated pattern of inappropriate behaviour, lack of judgment and poor performance”.
Jansen’s appointment would be made alongside the return of former chair Shane Tanner and two other individuals of unknown necessity, Nathan Hight and Mariota Smutz.
One problem for Jansen is that he’s already been censured by the board over his loose practices with prescribing cannabis, and since leaving Vitura that observation seems to have been backed up by the Australian Health Practitioner Regulation Agency. It ruled in March that Jansen’s Queensland practice should submit to “bimonthly audits”, patient record inspections, and that he undergo a “program of education” to refresh himself on “prescribing principles and practice”.
Strange, too, that the inaugural chair (Tanner) is now also ready to come back to Vitura, only 18 months after resigning to “pursue a number of private investments”.
This would be the same Tanner who’s been chairman of Paragon Care for more than a decade, its share price currently at a historic low of 17c if one excludes the black swan dip to 10c during the pandemic).
Notable, too, is the almost two years that Tanner spent as a non-executive director with the Steve Bracks-chaired Victory Offices, ending that in February 2021, the company being placed into voluntary administration the following year.
Not that anyone should infer that Tanner was responsible for that outcome, just that he’s not exactly some Messianic turnaround expert.
And, of course, Rhythm Biosciences, the medical diagnostics play. It was chaired by Tanner from the time of its float, in 2017, when it traded around 28c, until his departure in October 2019, by which time the shares had more than halved.
At that point Tanner was replaced by Otto Buttula, the share price soon after rocketing to a heady $2 in 2021 before pulling back to the tens of cents during the inflation-sobering months of 2023, where they remain.
Jansen’s challenge draws its power from his wife, Elizabeth, through her trusteeship of the Stanford Investment Trust, which holds more than 5 per cent of Vitura.
This is the same Elizabeth who led a skirmish against the board ahead of last year’s AGM to try to shoehorn Jansen back into his old job, only to back away from that demand at the 11th hour.
Still, it didn’t stop Jansen turning up to Rialto Towers in Melbourne for the AGM, even if he didn’t set foot in the venue. Instead he was spotted at a coffee shop across the street with his wife and another fellow, apparently texting questions to an individual inside trying to grill executives – one of the few deigning to pose difficult questions to the board.
Maybe Jansen will try it on himself this year, on November 28?
Jansen told Margin Call he had shareholder support for his nomination, and so did the others seeking election to the board.
“In the forthcoming years, steadfast governance will be imperative as we navigate the ever-evolving landscape of Australia’s medicinal cannabis industry, all in pursuit of delivering maximum value to our stakeholders and shareholders. No further comments are warranted at this juncture,” he said.
Spell check
The Australian Shareholders Association put out a fatwa against the executive pay structures of wagering giant Tabcorp last year, urging investors to vote against the company’s remuneration report at the AGM. It didn’t work out.
Some 98 per cent of shareholders voted in favour of the report, suggesting that maybe no one’s listening to the ASA on this issue, or cares what it thinks, or that it might have a little credibility problem in this space. A peek at the summary of its voting intentions for Tabcorp’s upcoming October 25 AGM, replete with silly spelling errors, suggests a possibility for why it’s not being taken seriously.
Look, typos happen. Margin Call is never quite a picture of perfection each day. But when the ASA flubs the name of Tabcorp director David Gallop no less than eight times, amusingly dubbing him “David Gallup”, that does look a little untidy. He’s only one of the most accomplished sporting figures in the country.
Similarly, referring to The Lottery Corporation as “The Lotteries Corporation” (from which Tabcorp demerged last year) is not exactly a hanging offence, but it does speak to some crummy attention to detail.
If it’s the small details the ASA can’t nail down, how reliably should one perceive its more complex analysis?
Call to arms
Desperate times for the No campaign, apparently. They’re crying poor over a substantial injection of corporate loot that their adversaries over on Team Yes seem to be enjoying. It was all made clear in a woe betide email to Liberal Party members on Friday from federal director Andrew Hirst. He warned that the Yes camp was a “juggernaut” backed by “big unions, corporations and celebrities”. This may be true, but it’s also true that Clive Palmer is planning to spend in the order of $2m on advertising in favour of the No position within days of October 14.
But that’s unlikely to include television ads, and it would seem TV is the battleground being run upon so eagerly on both sides. Thus the very simple message from Hirst to the membership: “To push back and win this referendum, we need you,” he wrote. “Can you help us reach a wider audience on television?” He said a previous round of fundraising had put ads on the radio, but not the small screen.
As for the ad he’s talking about, it was included in the body of his email for anyone to watch.
An unquestionably low-budget affair, it looks suspiciously like it was shot on an iPhone. There’s Jacinta Nampijinpa Price standing on the hill in front of parliament making a 30 second case to vote against the Voice. And that’s it, really. Not even so much as a cutaway or some tense music.
And clearly no one cared that the mise-en-scene was interrupted by some light traffic, or a bloke moseying on by in the background.
More Coverage
Champion of the battlers has his expenses queried
Allan Fels built a reputation for crusading on behalf of the little guy. So why is he in a stoush with NSW Treasury over his taxpayer-funded expenses?
Tink turns opaque on finance transparency
Kylea Tink’s passion for trying to extract and publish every last detail of campaign financing from rival political parties seems to run out of steam when it comes to her own donation receipts.