Harvey Wallbanger

Did you read the extract? - We got to the second stage of a feasibility last time. Don't get me wrong. I hope it happens - but please keep us informed. The members might actually be able to help. There are a lot of us.

Oh dear - I thought we had that side of politics covered? Who does he barrack for?

Extract below from the end of year 2022 Annual report: The Club continued discussions regarding a long-term Training & Administration Facility, participating in second stage feasibility study with the Victorian State Government on a site within the Melbourne & Olympic Parks precinct. Securing an appropriate outcome is a strategic priority of the Club, however it is a long-term project that can only move at the speed determined by the Victorian State Government given our requirement for land and funding. We thank the Victorian State Government and AFL for their continued support as we pursue a long-term home for the Club. You may be thinking about the proposal to build over Jolimont station which got scotched in the time frame you mentioned. The extract above does remind us of the distance between a feasibility study (that one had a second stage!) and construction commencing......and/or nothing happening at all.

So no-one should resign? So no accountability for the CEO who has been there since 2018 and penned a 4-year strategic plan suggesting construction commencement in the MCG precinct in 2023? There may be good reasons why that didn't/hasn't happened, but the members haven't been told? Is that possibility officially dead? - I suspect Yes. Please tell us - or is the MCG precinct Plan B? Any of this home base failure part of the external reviews going on? Perhaps not - because one review is of the Board itself and most of them have been there 3 years or less (so can claim the last plan wasn't theirs). And the other review is of the football department. Guess who isn't specifically being reviewed?

Thank you for standing down Skuit. And Whispering Jack, I am not being paid to post on this site, so please don't send me a bill. 🙂

I hear he wants to but he's not allowed to.

Please explain how those words are not correct? Candidates may not be "giving an interview that is transmitted to the general public by way of the media, including radio, television, blog or vlog"

Making the reasonable assumption that he spent something similar to the Club on legals in this case (and he had a history of donating generously to the Club before the CEO told him those donations were no longer welcome) I reckon the Club starts about $1.4 million behind on the foundations for Caulfield. What a shame - all of that to avoid a Board candidate being interviewed by Gerard Whateley - no other Victorian AFL Club prevents that. Maybe raises a few questions about the personal ambitions of the Board incumbents as they review themselves. Ollie, I don't think this will be forgotten when the financials for this year drop and the Q&A opens at the AGM.

A balanced and capable Board? This is a Board that spent $650,000 "winning" a case which adopted pretty much all of the sensible changes to election rules and processes that were proposed in October last year. And in their triumph, they told members - don't worry we'll chase the bloke to recover costs. What did they get? Zero. Don't think there will be any flashy announcements about that development.

Hopefully a few more may be interested this year DD. The rule changes emerging from the Federal Court case mean all voting members will get a direct notice before the Call for Nominations is made and will also be provided with a timetable of events through to the AGM.

Jimmy Munro last year and Mitch this year - boy we need to firm things up down there.

Pretty clear that Skuit has a high opinion of the Board and the CEO and I, a simple supporter, do not. Hopefully the members will get their chance to express their opinion in respect of the former soon. I wonder what the "external" review of the Board of itself/by itself will conclude?

Gee you don't think much of our poor old voting members do you? That elitist approach you have just outlined has led to how many Court cases recently? - just finished one (how much did that cost?) to make changes to election processes that were obvious, continued just to stop Board candidates being interviewed by Gerard Whateley. And three cases on the go at the moment - one against 4 Board members, a second against 7 Board members and a single one against the current Vice President. Not to mention the worst facilities in the AFL. A Board that has jettisoned two Presidents in three years. I can see the AFL looking over proceedings at Melbourne and saying "everything's just fine!".

The other positive re the Caulfield development is that I understand the AFL are looking at co-locating the umpires there. Presently, they get shunted from venue to venue at the moment and if there is plenty of space at Caulfield (and there is!) that might rationalise the AFL throwing some money that way.

Not a very nice view of the members rpfc. Keep them in the dark - feed them a different type of "bullplop". It's The Melbourne Way of Board construction. Working brilliantly for us at the moment.

She did play.

Apologies for weighing in again FFD but the MFC did not have a Governance page at all until Lawrence first nominated back in 2020.

FFD, none of the other Victorian AFL clubs prohibit public discourse during a Board election in the manner we do. As mentioned elsewhere on DL the judge said Lawrence's position on this campaigning point was "not unreasonable" but it wasn't the judge's prerogative to overrule the Board on that point. You need not worry about disparagement as this was not a material point of disagreement. When we do finally see the Club's Election Rules for this year - still nothing on the website - they will likely contain a convoluted process where a member can ask questions of a candidate but the questions and answers are all to be chanelled through the Company Secretary.

I recall Whateley interviewing both Nankivell and Gowers when the Hawthorn election was on. The world didn't come to an end. I reckon members would welcome it.

It certainly is worth that debate. But where the Club has landed on the campaigning point is that candidates for the MFC Board election later in the year would not be able to be interviewed by Gerard Whateley about their platform for a better Club. A public interview like that would be against the rules.

So you haven't read it either? Your statement is plainly incorrect.

Have you read the judgment Ollie? Didn't think so. Those members that attended (all four days) said they were ashamed of their Club

Jaded - I think you missed the bit "I loved the flag". Let's not compare my love to your love of this club. This is the Training Ground thread.

I'm sorry but I think what I read here is that we can be saved by spin. The reality is we have a poor Board (appalling decision-making), and a poor CEO, and nobody can spin us out of that. We, the members need to change our governance. It can be done. The reviews were going to be "internal", and run by the CEO, right up until the fateful interview by our former President. It was the members that turned it "external", not the spin doctors. Long live the members. You have the power! Because these reviews are not external, they are not independent - clearly just the CEO trying to save his job. Look up (the Board), look down (the Football Department), but don't look in the mirror.

Works OK when everyone is in a hub. And we have to wait for the Bulldogs to quarantine. I loved the flag, but when the situation returns to normal.....