Seven-time Super Bowl winner Tom Brady sent a dart across the Crown Palladium ballroom a week ago, straight into the hands of Carlton coach Michael Voss. Those not mindlessly filming on iPhones clapped like seals. Carlton president Luke Sayers later handed Brady a bunch of Blues guernseys with his name on the back.
Exactly why the NFL’s GOAT was in Australia seems largely unimportant, aside from the fact that it allowed Sayers to delight Blues diehards by getting proximity to actual sporting greatness.
The former CEO of PwC later revealed he’d be requesting an extension as Carlton’s club president, beyond his 12-year director tenure which expires this year. There is a provision in the club’s constitution for a one-year extension, but members should be asking, err, why?
Sayers’ argument, laid out in a Herald Sun interview, revolves around his divine belief there’s unfinished business, Carlton’s fortunes are on the up, and besides, “I’m passionate to serve”.
The AFL club president role is largely a figurehead, but the sought-after jobis Melbourne’s closest thing to a golden ticket. The role opens access to all kinds of special knees-ups with other relevance-hungry egos in corporate Australia.
Sayers jamming his foot in the closing door plays to type. Term limits? Please, that’s for someone else.
You’d think that after the disastrous 2023 that Sayers and his PwC alumni endured, there’d be a pause in brass neckery. Not even close.
In the same interview, Sayers addressed the open wounds over at PwC: “It is still going through a process, but from my personal perspective, I believe that’s completed.”
Spectacular floggings
There you have it. The ex-CEO has removed himself, personally, from the scene. Poof … and Sayers is gone!
To recap: PwC’s disintegration occurred after these pages revealed the accounting giant’s star partner Peter Collins shared confidential government plans within the firm which were used to build and market tax minimisation schemes to US blue-chip companies. PwC CEO Tom Seymourthrew himself overboard, while other PwC partners were made to walk the plank. The country’s professional services firms took spectacular floggings before three parliamentary inquiries.
The Senate’s inquiry was told by the ATO that Sayers had been briefed on the “concerns related to PwC conduct” by then-deputy ATO commissioner Jeremy Hirschhorn in August 2019. In that conversation, Hirschhorn “suggested to [Sayers that he] personally review the internal emails” that had been handed over as part of a probe into the firm’s potential criminal non-compliance around falsely claiming privilege. A separate tranche of emails with the Tax Practitioners Board would go on to form part of the paper trail for some of the most damning revelations about PwC’s conduct in the Sayers era. In a statement and subsequent hearing, Sayers said he did not “personally review” the material, nor did he “recall that being suggested by the ATO”.
The blast radius continues into 2024. PwC partners implicated, sacked and often publicly named are eyeing court. One is suing over retirement payments, another over potential defamation, opening the door to others streaming through. The rebadged PwC advisory firm Scyne tries to rebuild trust to do government work. Meanwhile, the Senate inquiry into consulting has spent the summer working on its final report into the big four and consultants due to drop in March.
Then there are the hundreds of PwC staffers whose professional reputations have been scarred. Spare a thought for the accountants trying to explain away a forever-cursed entry on their LinkedIn profile. Imagine the job interviews: “It says here you worked in tax advisory at PwC in 2015, tell us more about that.”
But for the No.1 at PwC during that time, personally, the episode and inquiry has been “completed”. Sayers has moved on to the next thing, showing little remorse, untethering himself from the mess at his old firm.
Rather than being run out of town, Sayers is leaning all the way in. But he needs others to play along. Will Melbourne’s business scene look the other way? Will Carlton’s members and directors? Luke Sayers bets they will.
During Brady’s address, the former footballer said the “fundamentals of our life and achievement” are going to be the “same from now until the end of time”.
“There are people who think there is a better way of life than less work, less accountability, less work ethic, more excuses.”
Tom, you’re right. He’s in the room with you now.
Source: AFR