Agmates

AWB is fudging the figures claiming that the vote to do away with AWB dual class shareholding is on a knifes edge.

With 15,809 votes submitted from a possible 55,000. The final tally was:

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10346 votes for

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3968 against

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1495 open proxies

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To get the 74.7% total in favor you have to assume that the 1,495 open proxies would all be in favour. This is clearly not the case. If the open proxies fall in the same ratio as the Yes & No votes then the bid falls well short of the 75% threshold at about 72%.

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Interestingly AWB’s cause has been championed by Stephen Mayne.

Mayne (pictured) is an Australian journalist and self-described shareholder activist.

He is also a co founder of the People Power Party. He unsuccessfully stood as a candidate in the Victorian legislative election, 2006.

Mayne also ran as an independent for the seat of Higgins, against incumbent treasurer Peter Costello. He received a primary vote of 1.98 percent (1,615 votes).

Mayne works for crikey.com and he savages the farmers supporting the No vote in his online diatribe today. It must be remembered that Mayne holds just a 120 odd B-Class AWB shares.

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“These four recalcitrants copped an awful shellacking at the meeting [ what Mayne does not mention is that the shellacking was from him - he's a link to a video of his harassing of the 4 dissenting farmer directors] ……

[ Graincorp experience proves Maynes argument is not reality ]

….and proved to be inarticulate advocates supported by a tiny minority of looney supporters [ he is referring to actual wheatgrowers ] from the floor. As a debating exercise it was all one traffic and the recalcitrants [ farmers directors ] were clearly spooked about getting sued [ who could blame them after Maynes outburst ], which almost certainly will happen if the reform program fails and they remain as directors breaching their fiduciary duties to act in the best interests of the company as a whole.

Sadly, agrarian socialism, hairbrained nostalgia and misty eyed agri-politics remains alive and well on some farms if the pathetic contributions from growers such as Jock Munro and Bob Iffla are any guide.”

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To be fair and too his credit Mayne then leaves his farmer bashing to give some actual facts -

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However, the board’s decision to accept a Victorian Farmers Federation proposal to adjourn the A class meeting and effectively extend voting was certainly controversial.

At one level it was changing the goal posts. The proxies suggested that 74.7% [ as we pointed out, this can't be the case, hence note he says suggested not are ] of farmer shares supported the change, which fell fractionally short of the super majority required.

However, given the turnout was only 27% and the support for change was so overwhelming, another two weeks of voting is justified in the circumstances.

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Now back to giving the farmers a final bit of a bash:

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AWB was clearly aware it was a contentious step by the tone of its press release yesterday and the recalcitrants [ read farmers ] are already bleating with the lamentable Bob Iffla quoted in The AFR comparing the situation with Zimbabwe.

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But then he slips back to realism again and makes a couple of insightful observations.

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Whilst at one level, the extension was the equivalent of Jeff Kennett extending voting by two weeks after falling agonisingly short in the 1999 Victorian election, corporate voting in Australia follows the strange path of having the equivalent of the televised leaders debate after 99% of the votes have been cast before the proxy deadline.

This extension means that all voters can now digest the arguments from yesterday’s meeting and make a more fully informed decision.

Based on what we heard yesterday, the reform option really is a no-brainer but the “no” case should at least be given full access to the share register to canvass, plus an ability to appoint scrutineers to look over the shoulder of Computershare as it counts the votes that flow in after this final frenetic round of arm-twisting.

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It is to be assumed that the large wheat growers have already voted. The balance of those to vote will be small to medium wheat growers who will now decide the fate of control of AWB.

Of course the AWB will pull out all stops and throw a mountain of money at trying to influence the growers as they have done up to date. Those activities included -

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• The Notice of Meeting was sent to every A class shareholder and we provided a company call centre number to answer any detailed questions.
• The Managing Director, Gordon Davis, also conducted a national road show of 37 shareholder meetings in all major wheat grower centres to explain the changes and answer any questions in detail.
• Over 2,000 wheat growers attended the meetings - that represents more than 10 per cent of all A class shareholders.
• As part of the information campaign, AWB commissioned research by IPSOS on grower loyalty and issued a number of media releases to ensure widespread coverage in the rural press of the key issues.
• In Western Australia, we also placed advertisements in the rural media quoting grower support for AWB Constitutional reform.
• We did this in WA because it was the only State where a major grains organisation opposed the reforms and we were keen to show that the 2particular grains organisation did not represent all wheat growers on this issue.
• Finally, AWB ran a call campaign by its Grain Marketers and a proxy monitoring company, Radar, to ensure that wheat growers had received the Notice of Meeting and were intending to vote.
• The backing of every farm organization in Australia including - The Grains Council of Australia, The Victorian Farmer Federation, The South Australian Farmers, Agforce, the State farmers federation in Queensland, The WA Grain Group; and The Eastern Wheat Growers.
• Not to mention the backing of - The Australian Shareholders Association, Riskmetrics, Corporate Governance International; and Regnan.
• Not to mention the backing of every mainstream media organization in Australia, Plus internet media companies like Crikey.

The Board is comfortable that this was a comprehensive program at a reasonable cost to B class shareholders to promote the company recommendation supporting Constitutional reform.

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Despite the massive amount of resourses thrown at this by AWB they still could not get 75% A class farmer support.

The majority of the 55,000 A class shareholders are mum and dad investors, and wheat growers, in rural and regional Australia.

Four organizations with bugger all recourses have managed to frustrate the AWB’s move to oust grower control:

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• The WAFarmers Grains Council
• The Wheat Growers Association,
• The Wheat Growers Action Group
• Agmates Rural Media

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What is now clear is that over the next 11 days, independent Australian mum and dad grain growers will now decide if the AWB remains under grower control. Just the way it should be.

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Have your say!

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This entry was posted on Friday, August 22nd, 2008 at 7:10 pm and is filed under Agmates News. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.