Kyle and Jackie O’s former boss Hamish McLennan gets smoked by angry shareholders
Solve this for us. Hamish “Hammer” McLennanpresident Kyle Sandilands And Jackie O Henderson His former employer received a 90 per cent protest vote against his proposed pay deal for his executive team.
But somehow only 20 percent of shareholders cast a proxy vote against McLennan’s position on the board.
Regular readers of this column will no doubt remember that CBD first broke the news last month about the possibility of voting against KIIS network owner ARN’s executive pay plans. We revealed at the time that influential proxy adviser CGI Glass Lewis had targeted the pay packet of ARN’s chief executive and former Nine salesman. Michael StephensonThat works out to a cool $1.1 million. In comparison, the company’s value is only $81 million.
But even we could not have predicted such a large protest vote. We remember the last time we saw such a large number was in 2018; NAB recorded a massive 88 per cent protest vote against executive pay. This has been branded ‘unprecedented’ Australian Financial Review In that case. So how close did The Hammer come to setting a new record?
The ASX has said it does not track these votes, so there is no official word on whether they are high on investors’ outrage lists. However Stanley SoosurGlass, who oversees Lewis’ operation in the APAC region, said that figure was “right up there with the highest votes against” his firm had ever seen. The highest number of protest votes since 2016 was for Jupiter Mines, which received 93.4 percent of votes against in 2020, according to data provided by Soosur.
“Perpetual’s 88 percent in 2024 is the only recent comparison that comes to mind, and that was considered outstanding,” Soosur told CBD.
“Apart from pay, the Kyle and Jackie O controversy and associated litigation have created a real reputational and commercial risk for the business. With this level of opposition, it is difficult to argue that the vote is entirely about pay; shareholders’ disappointment is reflected in the wider direction of the company in the pay vote.”
So how did the big man secure a few more years in the chairman’s chair, even though he spent Thursday morning being surrounded by shareholders in a towel? (Well, by the seasoned investor David Kingston more than most, former Seven boss Jeff Howard He sat silently and watched.)
He promised to get a bigger role in the game by selling $500,000 worth of shares in the company (there’s no better time than when the shares are in the toilet!) and had the backing of at least two major proxy advisory firms in attendance. Overall, the surrogate secured re-election with nearly 79 percent of the vote.
According to the company’s 2025 annual report, before the AGM McLennan held only 73,000 shares; this was even less than Sandilands and Henderson before the lawsuits against the company.
But more than 20 percent of shareholders were not convinced. Faced with questions, McLennan was asked by shareholder activist Stephen Mayne Whether the company has made any commitments to its largest shareholders to gain their support heading into the meeting. “Is that why he committed to buying $500,000 worth of stock?” Mayne asked.
“No, I haven’t made any specific commitments,” McLennan told investors in response. “I’ve consulted with shareholders and they all want executives and board members to have more shares in the company.”
According to its 2025 annual report, McLennan receives a total annual compensation of $324,674 from the company. So, in other words, he’s determined to buy $500,000 worth of shares to escape the public humiliation of being ousted from the board of one of the market’s most undervalued companies. After all, it pays for itself in the second year. It’s not a bad investment.
By Thursday, as readers may remember, we were preparing for the circus to come to town, with The Hammer as ringmaster. And boy did he deliver.
John Buckley is the CBD columnist for The Sydney Morning Herald and The Age.Connect via email.
