Jobkeeper vs dividend - APE tops list, page-2

JobKeeper kept the wolf from the door for thousands of APE (and many, many more Australia-wide in many industries and sectors). APE says it saved '2000 jobs'.

One may criticise some aspects of its design but it was put together with great haste given the urgent need to ensure Australians were 'looked after' given the unprecedented nature of this virus and its adverse effect on investment and employment.

Are you suggesting government ought have quickly developed a loans scheme instead? That would have been difficult in the short timeframe. Delays would have been disastrous for staff who'd already been terminated.

As for Labor's Andrew Leigh's comments, he's a know-it-all and doesn't want to acknowledge that by number, small retail shareholders in almost all Australian-listed companies vastly outnumber the 'billionaires' he tries to obtain headlines about. Labor hates Australians who buy equities directly as it would prefer its union 'maates' in industry superannuation funds controlled all funds inflow, not retail investors' private holdings directly or in SMSFs.

Would Mr Leigh prefer that no one in Australia invested in existing or new businesses, or took over foreign-based companies as BGA did with Japanese-owned Lion Dairy and Drinks? If Labor had been in government, it might have let that dairy company from mainland communist China take LD&D over, but under the Federal Liberals and Nationals, the mainland Chinese outfit was proscribed from becoming the owner. Well done, Scomo and Josh Frydenberg!

If JobKeeper hadn't been available, the consequences for many families who relied upon an income from APE would have been even more serious.

APE reduced its April 2020 final dividend from 22.5 to 11.25 cents 'due to the uncertainty of the duration and impact of the COVID-19 coronavirus pandemic', to quote from its 2019 annual report.

APE did not pay an interim dividend in October 2020 as might normally be expected, so shareholders went without what for many is their regular, hoped for and expected income.

I agree it's a vexed question but when the Coalition Government established JobKeeper, there was no intention that any company would be forced to pay it back. A few have chosen to. Many have not.

APE launched a more vigorous defence than my comments above, so look up media in recent weeks to see this.

The ABC hates the Liberal Party and free enterprise, yet hypocritically, I bet London to a brick some of its hard Left commentators and employees have shares in many Australian or overseas companies. All have superannuation with industry and retail funds consistently investing in equities.

No wonder the ABC caters to a smaller and smaller section of the Australian population every year! Turning it into a subscription service would see just how many 'valued' its left wing rubbish that's so predictable.