Media
GAME ON: Brawl over Fairfax board could tear ailing company apart
Left-wing newspaper publisher Fairfax Media is embroiled in an internal crisis of epic proportions. This morning, its chairman Ron Walker announced his intention to stay on as chairman until late 2010. This afternoon, the biggest shareholder, heavily indebted Marinya Media owned by the blue blood Fairfax family said they would be voting against Walker at the company’s AGM later this year.
Their agenda, to appoint John B. Fairfax as company chairman, despite the company’s abysmal performance since his company Rural Press merged with Fairfax.
Walker had been hoping to position someone else, possibly Roger Corbett or basically anyone other than John B.
Instead Walker now faces a serious challenge in terms of getting re-elected to the board in November and must now be contemplating whether he can assemble the numbers.
The blue blood small ‘l’ liberal family of Aussie nobility – the Fairfaxes – don’t have the only say on the issue but with nearly ten per cent of the vote, that’s a very good start in terms of knocking off the new money Melbourne ex-property developer and alleged spiv.
Indeed nasty things were once much alleged about the Ron in the left-wing press like The Age until he became company chairman. Ever since then, it’s been a kinder, gentler, more reverential approach for the former Liberal party fundraiser, Melbourne Lord Mayor and one-time part-owner of Crown Casino.
Walker’s generosity to the community is now the focus of The Age’s coverage of the company chairman.
Perhaps motivated by The Age hound being let off the leash in Walker’s yard of controversies, our sources say that Walker – a multi-millionaire whose fortune vastly exceeds the heavily hocked John B. Fairfax – is now seriously considering a mega-campaign to stay on the board to represent all the shareholders and not just the interests of one blue blood shareholder who is in a serious debt crisis.
Such a campaign would involve a political style blitzkreig communicating to small and large shareholders, with direct-mail, telephone canvassing and possibly radio advertising to make the argument for re-election. The last notable campaign of this kind was the failed effort of discredited Melbourne fashion identity, Solomon Lew who was booted off the board of then retail giant Coles Myer after facing multiple allegations of corporate wrongdoing.
So now the race is on. Melbourne vs Sydney. New money vs old. And while they fiddle with who gets to sit around the board table, Rome burns. The once mighty powerhouse mastheads Sydney Morning Herald and The Age are clearly terminal, enduring a savage reduction in real sales (excluding giveaways that are essentially a fraud on the circulation measurement system).
Once we might have considered this tussle important. But the truth is that the board of this sick organisation is irrelevant, much like the ABC board. It doesn’t really matter which token right-wingers get appointed, they can’t really change anything. Only democratic elections of the ABC board might cause some real change, kind of like a student newspaper election, except for the whole country. Wouldn’t that be a joy for all?
We’re not going to get that, but a fully public spectacular scrap over the Fairfax board is not a bad consolation prize.
Discussion
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Sadly The Age is having a slow death. You can feel the tension and uncertainty when you speak to reporters and staff there. Newsagents say no one answers the phones when they ring. Computor modeling predict that the last newspaper to be home delivered in the world will occur in 2042. I think The Age and the news’s The Australia will be long gone before them
The Age’s ‘without fear or favour’ mojo is a sham. The Earth Watch expose on Media Watch proved that. Not that we needed any convincing. They also have a few Libs dressed up in Green clothing.