Under fascism, corporate bosses know what’s expected of them

Posted on 24 January, 2023 by C.L.

They’re saying it isn’t your country – its theirs: Telstra, NAB, REA CEOs to work on Australia Day.

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13 Responses to Under fascism, corporate bosses know what’s expected of them

C.L. says:

24 January, 2023 at 8:11 pm

Telstra CEO Vicki Brady, NAB CEO Ross McEwan and REA Group CEO Owen Wilson will be working on Australia Day as companies across the country allow staff to opt out of taking the public holiday on January 26 and instead take a day in lieu at another time.

Ms Brady is the highest profile corporate leader to date to explain her decision to work on the controversial public holiday, saying on Tuesday that January 26 was “a painful reminder of discrimination and exclusion” for many Indigenous Australians.

Companies allowing staff to swap Australia Day for a different day off day include Medibank, Channel 10, Transurban, REA, Telstra, Woodside Energy and Canva. The big four consulting firms also let staff take the public holiday when they wish, as do most top-tier corporate law firms.

It comes as a survey by Roy Morgan finds that nearly two-thirds of Australians say January 26 should retain the title of ‘Australia Day’, while one-third called for it to be renamed ‘Invasion Day’.

“I’ll be choosing to work and will take a different day of leave with my family, because that feels right for me,” Ms Brady posted on LinkedIn.

“For many First Nations peoples, Australia Day … marks a turning point that saw lives lost, culture devalued, and connections between people and places destroyed.”

She said that she understood that “for many people the day is also a chance to spend time with friends and family and celebrate the many things we can be proud of as a community” and that “the choice you make about how you spend Australia Day is a personal one”.

REA changed its workplace policy about Australia Day this year to allow staff to take a day off on a different date instead, and Mr Wilson is one of “a number of team members choosing to work on Thursday”.

Like Ms Brady, he said it was ultimately a choice for individuals.

“How we think about and celebrate our national day is deeply personal for all of us as Australians … We are encouraging our team to do what they feel is right for them.”

NAB is requiring staff to take the day off – though a spokesman said it was “considering alternative arrangements [for] future years” given the “distress” the date causes – but Mr McEwan will be working regardless.

“While Thursday is a national public holiday, there are a number of commitments Mr McEwan will be working on as NAB CEO,” the spokesman said.

The Australian Financial Review understands that while staff will at the four banks will observe Australia Day as a regular public holiday, CEOs will likely do some work. CBA boss Matt Comyn is understood to have only just returned from his annual leave, while Westpac’s Peter King works every day.

ANZ CEO Shayne Elliott said he would be working from home on January 26.

“I will be available like any other day and checking emails etc. ‘Work day’ is a bit out of date in today’s world for many and particularly post-COVID when work and home have blended even more,” he said.

Tech CEOs work through

Several start-up CEOs also planned to work on Thursday. “Celebrating the hurt, pain and suffering that others feel or were subjected too isn’t something that I want to do, so I’ll be working like any other day and finding a different time to celebrate what I love about Australia and reflect on where I’d like it to get to,” CEO of pet food company Scratch, Mike Halligan, said.

Founder and CEO of lab-grown meat company Vow Food, George Peppou, also planned to work on Australia Day and take next Monday off instead.

“This date has been, rightfully, a sensitive issue to the indigenous community,” he said.

There did not seem to be “any ties to historical significance of that date”, he continued, and said all staff were given the option to swap January 26 for a different day off.

CEO of event rental site Gecko, Ben Kennedy, said he would be working on Thursday as “it fits into [his] values and what feels right” to him.

“I went to school with many indigenous people and to many it’s a day of mourning, so I want to show support to them in any way I can,” he said.

Galileo VC founder Hugh Stephens was also working, saying this was “mostly because [he does] not believe it should be a holiday” but also because of the heavy workloads of start-up bosses.

Taking the day off

Several companies such as Woolworths, Coles, Toll and Atlassian do not allow staff to change their days off.

TPG Telecom executive Vanessa Hicks said that while the company did not have a formal policy around January 26, it was “implementing a trial with an employee work group to help inform what we may do from a policy perspective”.

“We are focused on creating a diverse and inclusive workplace,” she said, “where everyone feels they belong, and their voice is valued.”

Ms Hicks said many TPG workers already had to work on the public holiday to “directly support our customers” and that “others can raise requests to work the day with their leaders”.

Optus said it had a “flexible approach” and that “a number of our people will be working as their role requires it, or they might choose to do so.”

“We respectfully acknowledge that this day means different things to the members of our community,” a spokesman said.

Airlines Qantas and Virgin Australia will operate on January 26 the same as most days, with office and frontline staff coming in on shift to ensure flight services continue as smoothly as possible.

Virgin added that it worked collaboratively with Indigenous people through its reconciliation plan and would consider a public holiday swap program if put forward in the future.

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Hannah Wootton and Lucas Baird in the Financial Review
Lee says:

24 January, 2023 at 8:35 pm

Telstra CEO Vicki Brady, NAB CEO Ross McEwan and REA Group CEO Owen Wilson will be working on Australia Day as companies across the country allow staff to opt out of taking the public holiday on January 26 and instead take a day in lieu at another time.

If they had any principles they would not take another day off in lieu.
dover_beach says:

24 January, 2023 at 8:39 pm

I’d be quiet supportive of a government fining an enterprise that treats a public holiday as another workday. I think $10,000 per employee sounds about right.
C.L. says:

24 January, 2023 at 9:18 pm

One thing you can’t say about the so-called woke left is that they’re involved in a conspiracy. Twenty years of left-wing soft violence (occasionally physical violence), cancellation, calumny, threats, boycotts etc means that CEOs voluntarily get out in front of even the culture campaigns that are still in their infancy.
dover_beach says:

24 January, 2023 at 10:40 pm

People underestimate the hegemony that leftist politics now enjoys so it shouldn’t be surprising that corporates are taking a lead in these campaigns.
Eyrie says:

25 January, 2023 at 6:35 am

I’d be quiet supportive of a government fining an enterprise that treats a public holiday as another workday. I think $10,000 per employee sounds about right.

You are fining the shareholders who have no control. A PERSONAL fine on the CEO is about right.
Buccaneer says:

25 January, 2023 at 6:42 am

Shareholders won’t get rid of the chaff if they don’t feel some pain.
Twostix says:

25 January, 2023 at 8:47 am

Wokism is a shibboleth and defining value of the executive class, and, increasingly the striver professional class who seek to emulate them, in 2023. It’s a cope to imply they’re doing it because they have to by some almost mythical force floating around called “the left”. They are that force.

They want to abolish the old Australia, its holidays, myths, traditions and culture, its Christianity and the white super majority via mass third world immigration.

Nobody forced a bunch of Aus corps this year to announce they would allow the millions of third world employees they imported to begin to boycott Easter and Christmas public holidays by allowing them to swap those days off with their own religion’s celebrations That was all the executive class’s own idea. The left didn’t order a bunch of corps to all together last year ram heathen Diwali down the throat of their employees complete with religious instruction , and then a couple of months later literally boycott and soft ban, the word “Christmas” in the SLT, awkwardly replacing it with holiday season, thank you parties, end of year celebrations, etc.
struth says:

25 January, 2023 at 8:50 am

Ah, the real perspective you gain on these issues being an inner city office worker.
Wyndham Dix says:

25 January, 2023 at 9:52 am

“I’ll be choosing to work and will take a different day of leave with my family, because that feels right for me,” Ms Brady posted on LinkedIn.

“…because that feels right for me.” From the mouth of one enabled by unilateral affirmative action laws, one who has never had to fight to defend the freedoms and values of Australia for which many young men laid down their lives in two world wars.

The Divine ordering in Genesis 3:16b, 1 Corinthians 11:3 and Ephesians 5:22-23 is today unknown to the vast majority and a faded memory to many who might once have had some acquaintance with it.

Our Maker will have the final say. He did not intend men to be house-husbands, of which it seems Ms Brady’s is one.
Christine says:

25 January, 2023 at 10:14 am

Lee is right
Any person with integrity would say “No” to a day off in lieu.
Nelson_Kidd-Players says:

25 January, 2023 at 9:07 pm

Funny hearing talk-back radiopeoples talking about how we need to resolve this issue while listening to a tiny minority, as the majority quietly prepare to celebrate the day.
Nelson_Kidd-Players says:

26 January, 2023 at 8:52 pm

Lysterfield Lake park this afternoon: the most multicultural bunch of family barbecues you’ll ever see and every conceivable parking spot filled. Zero protests.