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When the Sydney Theatre Company appointed former Qantas boss Alan Joyce as its chair in March, it probably felt the job would be a walk in the park for him and the baton was being passed to a safe pair of hands.
A long-term chief executive of a leading corporation, and one of the STC’s “angel” donors who have given more than $100,000, what could go wrong?
Alan Joyce has been on leave for almost two months.Credit: Bloomberg
But then Joyce’s year took such a turn for the worse. Scandals over Qatar Airways slots, influence over government and legal action from the competition regulator over selling tickets on cancelled flights forced the boss to bring his departure date forward two months.
Now, Joyce has been missing in action as the STC faces a major meltdown.
A protest staged by three actors in support of Palestinians killed in Gaza led to a subscriber exodus, a cancelled show, and plenty of criticism of the company’s handling of a highly sensitive political issue.
Credit: Illustration: John Shakespeare
On Monday, a third foundation board member quit. Never has the company needed a bigger dose of decisive, experienced leadership.
Maybe someone with some experience managing a crisis.
Perhaps after a year of company scandal and generally tin-eared responses, Joyce has realised he’s not that guy, because he remains nowhere to be seen. He didn’t appear at a Senate inquiry into the Qatar Airways fiasco in September on account of being overseas.
When we asked the STC when he was returning, a spokesperson reiterated that Joyce has been on leave since October 12.
Most recently, he was spotted in Dublin visiting family. And while we get the need for a break after stepping away from one of the biggest jobs in corporate Australia, we reckon if Joyce is serious about the theatre, he ought be on a plane home, or at least dialling in via Zoom.
POST-COLONIAL RIFT
To the normally calm cloisters of Melbourne’s Institute of Postcolonial Studies now, where the peace and quiet at the educational establishment’s North Melbourne campus has been shattered as an internal schism appears to have resulted in a near-death experience for the 27-year-old project.
A group of the institute’s members and “friends” – the most famous of whom would be veteran First Nations activist Gary Foley – has been pushing to take the institute in a more activist direction.
The dissidents planned to move at the upcoming annual general meeting to create more positions on the – currently all-white – board for Aboriginal and people-of-colour “scholar-activists” who have “a lived experience of colonisation”.
“The Institute of Postcolonial Studies is currently led by white settler academics,” the members and friends declared in their call to arms last month.
The matter then took a turn for the seriously weird last week, when the board, led by distinguished ANU social scientist Jon Altman, announced the institute was shutting down – gone, finished, and thanks for the memories.
“IPCS is no longer politically viable nor financially sustainable,” the board told the institute community.
Now there’s a thing you don’t see every day. But when we caught up with Altman on Monday, things had moved along. The professor told us the institute would not be closing after all and that he and his board colleagues had agreed to step down – in a peaceful transfer of power – and allow themselves to be replaced by the rebel forces.
The details remain a bit sketchy, and when we asked the reformist camp what they made of all of this we didn’t hear back. They were probably still processing the situation. We know we were.
PARTY’S OVER
News that our high commissioner to the United Kingdom, Stephen Smith, was canning the annual Australia Day gala over sensitivities around the January 26 holiday was always going to be culture-war catnip.
High Commissioner to the UK Stephen Smith.Credit: Hollie Adams
While the national mood has soured a little back home, Smith’s decision to make it prohibitively expensive for organisers to hold the event on a different date was part of a strategy to end “parties without purpose” at Australia House.
And on that front, the former Labor defence minister has form. In June, CBD reported that Smith also canned Australia House’s much-loved Pride party, which garnered a reputation as diplomatic event of the year during former high commissioner George Brandis’ tenure.
Perhaps Smith was put off the partying after starting his job on January 26 this year, just in time for an Australia Day event sponsored, rather awkwardly, by Sydney-raised billionaire Brexit and Boris Johnson bankroller Michael Hintze.
Either way, while most Aussies living out their “London era” can’t stop telling their friends back home how hard they’re partying, Labor’s man in Britain is determined to have a more sober time.
BIG DRY
The behaviour of former Sky News ranter Chris Smith at the broadcaster’s Christmas bash last year – Smith was stood down after allegedly making lewd comments towards a younger female staff member – has been much discussed in the 12 months since.
So we’re happy to be able to report that Smith, who swore off alcohol in the wake of his sacking, has remained on the wagon, celebrating on Monday a full 365 days sober, telling his followers on the socials that “the BBQs & parties this month have never been better” – unsurprisingly – and thanking the friends and family who helped on the journey.
Now, it jumped right out at us that Smith is still being invited to festive season parties, which will no doubt be tidings of comfort and joy to his former Sky News colleagues. Their bosses have banned seasonal soirees this year after what Smith did last Christmas.
But that’s as mean as we’re prepared to be at this point – maybe it’s the time of year – to a bloke who appears genuine about making badly needed changes and whose efforts might strike a chord with many in the community trying to put substance problems behind them and for whom Christmas can be tough.
But nobody better entertain notions that we’re going soft.
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