Will those precious little flowers at Fairfax never learn? Gina Reinhart's billions are the only things standing between The Age and oblivion. No one else is going to put money into a stock that is falling like a rock. All she wants is a say in how the SMH and The Age are run. Is that unreasonable? I don't think so. The so called 'Editorial Charter,' is a ruse perpetrated in 1988 to deter somebody else the staff didn't like, namely the late Robert Maxwell a.k.a the Bouncing Czech, from taking over the company.
Anyone who knows anything about newspapers will tell you The Age is a very poor paper. It's layout is shocking, with all those crazy spills jumping all over the place with no logic at all. Laying out a tabloid like the Herald Sun, which from a technical point of view is a far superior paper, is much harder. Circulation figures show the Herald Sun is holding up quite well, while The Age continues to plummet. Why? It's a crap paper.
I am quite confident Gina Reinhart doesn't really care about surefire money losers like The Age's booklet on the best 100 coffee shops, which no one outside of the inner city gives a stuff about. What she does want is a say in how views and news are presented. She's not likely to rush into the newsroom at deadline time yelling 'Hold the front page!' after a particularly stimulating dinner party, as Frank Packer is said to have done more than once at Sydney's Daily Telegraph. As for Rupert Murdoch not having a say in producing what is, after all, his product, the idea is laughable. Proprietors like printers. They don't rabbit on about editorial independence. They may be greedy and foul mouthed, but give them enough money and they would print Mein Kampf. Journalists were once poorly educated craftsmen who learnt on the job. The idea that journalism is a calling for highly principled literateurs is a modern invention
I have not always been so critical of The Age. During the Khemlani loans affair and in the months leading up to John Kerr's dismissal of the Whitlam government, I paid to have The Age air freighted from Melbourne to Perth -- now you just log on. It was an expensive undertaking, but The Age was breaking just about every important story in Australia. For that we had to thank two men -- Ranald Macdonald, scion of the founding Syme family, and editor Graham Perkin. Ranald Macdonald was known as 'Australia's most successful failure'. He did the money from his Age stake cold when he invested in several fitness centres which went bust. One industry figure said 'he should have been cleaning the toilets, not making speeches.' But he went on to carve out a highly successful career as a journalism educator in the US. Ranald Macdonald wasn't much of a businessman, but he was very, very earnest, which always goes down well in America. Graham Perkin died young of cancer, a great loss to journalism.
The Age, the SMH and rest of the Fairfax group have to relearn an old lesson -- 'today's front page splash, tomorrow's fish and chip wrapper.' No matter whether it's The Age, the Ford Falcon or any other crap product, no matter how mightily you boost it, if the customers won't buy it, you're out of business. Which is where Fairfax is going to be without Gina Rinehart.
Tuesday 26 June 2012
Is it worth banking on the Wales?
I have banked with every major bank in Australia, but the one I have banked with longest is Westpac. As people over the age of 55 will recall, it was once called the Bank of New South Wales. It advertised itself as 'First Bank in Australia' and so on. It was Australia's biggest bank and also had Australia's biggest merchant bank, Partnership Pacific. Like its little brother Tricontinental, which sent the venerable State Bank of Victoria to the wall, Partnership Pacific almost wiped out Westpac.
Westpac relied on men like Bob White, who started as a clerk at 16, to rise through the ranks and lead the bank. Bob White was succeeded by Stuart Fowler. Due to a combination of bad judgment and bad luck, under Stuart Fowler, Westpac almost went belly up. Westpac recruited Robert Joss from Wells Fargo to rescue the bank, which he duly achieved. Joss is now regarded as one of the world's pre-eminent finance educators.
What I liked about Westpac was its 'can do' attitude. Arriving in Melbourne from Perth, I had a job but knew no-one. I wanted to buy a house. I had a substantial deposit. I went to one Westpac branch and asked for a loan. The manager said he was in a bad mood and told me to piss off. I went to another Westpac branch and the female accountant said 'We don't lend to West Australians, unless they're footballers.' I went to another Westpac branch in Collins Street, Melbourne's financial heartland, and the manager said 'Well, we're in the business of lending money, how much do you want?' And it was all done in a couple of days.
My latest contact with Westpac was when I applied for a Mastercard with a small limit. It was all fine until they wanted a payslip. I am a freelance writer. I do not have payslips. If I got a payslip, I think I'd swoon with delight and think I'd gone to heaven. I might add I have liquid funds far in excess of the limit I requested.
The next night the ANZ rang me up and offered me an increase in my limit on my existing Visa for an almost identical amount. No paperwork, all I had to do was say 'yes' within 24 hours. ANZ is far and away the best Australian bank in China. Due to its alliance with the Construction Bank, you can draw on your Australian ANZ account in almost any town in China. The Construction Bank is one of China's 'Big Four' banks.
Hasn't Westpac heard that these days a great many contractors and self employed people, the most dynamic section of the economy, don't get 'payslips'? And that perhaps Melbourne people still remember how Westpac (a Sydney bank) took over the Bank of Melbourne (formerly the beloved RESI before it floated), killed it off -- and has now revived something called the Bank of Melbourne, having previously written off billions in goodwill?
It will take a lot to convince me before I bank on the Wales in more than a token fashion.
Westpac relied on men like Bob White, who started as a clerk at 16, to rise through the ranks and lead the bank. Bob White was succeeded by Stuart Fowler. Due to a combination of bad judgment and bad luck, under Stuart Fowler, Westpac almost went belly up. Westpac recruited Robert Joss from Wells Fargo to rescue the bank, which he duly achieved. Joss is now regarded as one of the world's pre-eminent finance educators.
What I liked about Westpac was its 'can do' attitude. Arriving in Melbourne from Perth, I had a job but knew no-one. I wanted to buy a house. I had a substantial deposit. I went to one Westpac branch and asked for a loan. The manager said he was in a bad mood and told me to piss off. I went to another Westpac branch and the female accountant said 'We don't lend to West Australians, unless they're footballers.' I went to another Westpac branch in Collins Street, Melbourne's financial heartland, and the manager said 'Well, we're in the business of lending money, how much do you want?' And it was all done in a couple of days.
My latest contact with Westpac was when I applied for a Mastercard with a small limit. It was all fine until they wanted a payslip. I am a freelance writer. I do not have payslips. If I got a payslip, I think I'd swoon with delight and think I'd gone to heaven. I might add I have liquid funds far in excess of the limit I requested.
The next night the ANZ rang me up and offered me an increase in my limit on my existing Visa for an almost identical amount. No paperwork, all I had to do was say 'yes' within 24 hours. ANZ is far and away the best Australian bank in China. Due to its alliance with the Construction Bank, you can draw on your Australian ANZ account in almost any town in China. The Construction Bank is one of China's 'Big Four' banks.
Hasn't Westpac heard that these days a great many contractors and self employed people, the most dynamic section of the economy, don't get 'payslips'? And that perhaps Melbourne people still remember how Westpac (a Sydney bank) took over the Bank of Melbourne (formerly the beloved RESI before it floated), killed it off -- and has now revived something called the Bank of Melbourne, having previously written off billions in goodwill?
It will take a lot to convince me before I bank on the Wales in more than a token fashion.
Thursday 21 June 2012
Vote Bill Shorten last
I live in the federal electorate of Maribyrong. In the old days, it was a semi-rural seat that switched back and forth between the conservatives and Labor. Moss Cass, noteworthy for being Minister for the Media at the fag end of the Whitlam regime, took the seat in the late 1960s and it's never looked in danger since.
Which is a bad thing. Maribyrnong was held by Bob Sercombe, one of the serial under achievers of Australian politics, from 1996 to 2007. The factions gave Sercombe the bum's rush and inserted Bill Shorten as member. This simply confirms that the factions select the member for Maribyrnong, not the voters. It's now the sort of seat where, as they say, you could put up Billy the blacksmith and he would win. You could probably say if the voters are that dumb, they get the member they deserve
I will declare my interest. Bill Shorten was an Australian Workers Union (AWU) official who exploited the Beaconsfield mine disaster to the hilt, using the private jet of Dick Pratt, a man who like to have a bet each way, to traipse around Australia. Bill never did anything as common as to perform manual labour. It's said the hardest day's work he ever did was collecting dues from the fruit pickers. I, on the other hand, was a paid up member of the AWU when I was a plant operator and trades assistant on the Panawonica iron ore mine in the Pilbara. I don't believe Bill comes from a background of wealth and privilege. He did go to Xavier, Melbourne's top Catholic boys school, but as with many boys, paying the fees meant their families had to make economies.
Bill is a master manipulator. If the HSU's Kathy Jackson is to be believed, he is quite capable of crudely putting on pressure to get his way, but that shouldn't amaze anyone with experience of union and ALP politics. What I object to is that Bill hasn't actually achieved anything in the Parliament. His financial services reforms have a long way to go before they are law. Bill floated for a few days a joint ticket with Kevin Rudd for the Prime Ministership, but it sank like a lead balloon. Where's his legislative record?
I have met Bill Shorten. In my opinion, he has the personality of a piece of wet blotting paper. The frightening thing is that he is likely to be Prime Minister one day. The way to stop him is to vote Bill Shorten last.
Which is a bad thing. Maribyrnong was held by Bob Sercombe, one of the serial under achievers of Australian politics, from 1996 to 2007. The factions gave Sercombe the bum's rush and inserted Bill Shorten as member. This simply confirms that the factions select the member for Maribyrnong, not the voters. It's now the sort of seat where, as they say, you could put up Billy the blacksmith and he would win. You could probably say if the voters are that dumb, they get the member they deserve
I will declare my interest. Bill Shorten was an Australian Workers Union (AWU) official who exploited the Beaconsfield mine disaster to the hilt, using the private jet of Dick Pratt, a man who like to have a bet each way, to traipse around Australia. Bill never did anything as common as to perform manual labour. It's said the hardest day's work he ever did was collecting dues from the fruit pickers. I, on the other hand, was a paid up member of the AWU when I was a plant operator and trades assistant on the Panawonica iron ore mine in the Pilbara. I don't believe Bill comes from a background of wealth and privilege. He did go to Xavier, Melbourne's top Catholic boys school, but as with many boys, paying the fees meant their families had to make economies.
Bill is a master manipulator. If the HSU's Kathy Jackson is to be believed, he is quite capable of crudely putting on pressure to get his way, but that shouldn't amaze anyone with experience of union and ALP politics. What I object to is that Bill hasn't actually achieved anything in the Parliament. His financial services reforms have a long way to go before they are law. Bill floated for a few days a joint ticket with Kevin Rudd for the Prime Ministership, but it sank like a lead balloon. Where's his legislative record?
I have met Bill Shorten. In my opinion, he has the personality of a piece of wet blotting paper. The frightening thing is that he is likely to be Prime Minister one day. The way to stop him is to vote Bill Shorten last.
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