Activist groups were unimpressed by Woodside’s eye-popping full-year profit result, setting the scene for another fiery gathering of shareholders at the company’s AGM in April.
The Australian oil and gas giant’s underlying profit more than tripled to $7.7bn as energy prices surged in the wake of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. That figure fell about 9% shy of investors’ expectations, while activists labelled its simultaneously released 2022 climate report as a “fail”.
“Woodside’s directors have a tin ear on climate risk and it’s time they were called to account,” the lead analyst at the Australasian Centre for Corporate Responsibility, Alex Hillman, said. Activist investor group Market Forces said it will be urging shareholders to vote against the company’s remuneration report and reject directors standing for re-election at the annual general meeting.
It came as new research showed China last year approved the highest capacity of new coal power plants since 2015, and four times higher than a year earlier.
Top news
NSW election race tightens as Barilaro report released | A pair of polls released Monday suggest the Perrottet government has closed the gap on Labor ahead of election day on 25 March. If Newspoll’s results played out at the polls, both major parties would fall short of the 47 seats needed for majority government. Also in NSW politics, the former deputy premier John Barilaro was found to have “inappropriately interfered” in the selection process for a senior UK trade role.
Claims of ‘illegal’ Queensland watch-house strip searches | A Queensland watch-house whistleblower says he witnessed “illegal” strip searches of children, a girl placed in a cell with adult men, and staff wrapping towels around prisoners’ heads to avoid spit hood protocols, causing them to “feel waterboarded”. In a submission to the state’s youth crime bill, Steven Marshall detailed what he described as the “human rights breaches” that he witnessed at Brisbane Watch House in 2018 and 2019.
Hostage incident in PNG made on ‘spur of moment’ | Australian-based New Zealand archaeologist Prof Bryce Barker was taken hostage in Papua New Guinea in response to an earlier skirmish between the captors and security guards at a logging site. Barker’s group were doing fieldwork in the highlands when they were captured “on the spur of the moment”, according to the governor of Hela province.
Company behind plastic recycling scheme to wind up | Supporting creditors will have to chase their own costs after a court ordered REDcycle be wound up after the discovery of tonnes of warehoused plastic. The scheme, which stopped operating in November, admitted to stockpiling more than 12,000 tonnes of plastic returned to Coles and Woolworths by consumers.
Ex-husband charged with model’s murder | Hong Kong woman Abby Choi’s ex-husband, his father and his brother have been formally charged with murder after more of the model’s remains were found at a remote village. Alex Kwong Kong-chi was arrested at a Hong Kong pier on Saturday, in what police described as an attempt to flee the city by speedboat. The model’s torso and hands are still missing.
Putin says west seeking to ‘dismember’ Russia | Vladimir Putin claimed the US and its Nato allies wanted to turn Russia into a series of weak mini-states in an interview with the state TV channel Rossiya. The Russian president said the western plot had been under way since the collapse of the USSR in his latest attempt to boost support for the war effort in Ukraine.
Full Story
Searching for the first casualty of the war in Ukraine
Daniel Boffey reports on the life and death of Staff Sergeant Denys Tkach, the first soldier to be killed by Russian forces on the day of the invasion, in this 30-minute episode.
What they said …
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“It’s a rapidly evolving threat and for too many years Australia has been off the pace.” – Anthony Albanese
The prime minister addressed a roundtable of cybersecurity experts in Sydney today, announcing a new coordinator for cybersecurity will be appointed within the home affairs portfolio, as part of a broader national strategy to combat the rise in such attacks.
In numbers
The head-caving romp through the multiverse scored wins for best ensemble in a motion picture, best female actor and both supporting actor categories. The former child actor Ke Huy Quan became the first Asian man to win an individual award in any film category.
Before bed read
In the 1980s it was crack cocaine – now New York City is grappling with a drug problem of a different nature. Newly liberalised cannabis laws have set off a cultivation boom that produced 300,000 pounds (about 136,000kg) of weed in its first harvest. But there are far more licensed farms than dispensaries, creating a billion-dollar mountain of unsold product.
Daily word game
Today’s starter word is: ERA. You have five goes to get the longest word including the starter word. Play Wordiply.
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