Carlton FC will be led by Luke Sayers for an additional year.
Carlton Football Club president Luke Sayers, a former PwC executive, was re-elected for a further year in spite of the ongoing controversy surrounding the tax leak scandal involving his former employer and a string of high-profile resignations from his consulting firm.
Carlton members overwhelmingly supported Mr. Sayers’ reelection on Thursday night at the club’s annual general meeting.
After serving on the Carlton FC board for 12 years, Mr. Sayers expressed his humility at being re-elected.
“I am thankful to the members who have trusted me to continue serving, but we still have a long way to go before we reach our goals,” he remarked. “As a cohesive, extremely stable football team, we are prepared to take on any challenge that inevitably comes our way as we begin 2024.”
Sayers cited stability as his primary justification for running for re-election at the team, which has also extended the contracts of head coach Michael Voss and chief operating officer Brian Cook through the end of 2025.
The team is evaluating its AFL program as well. Craig Mathieson, a board director of Carlton and the nephew of billionaire businessman Bruce Mathieson, resigned from the position in May after a disagreement with Mr. Sayers in the Carlton rooms following a Sydney Swans defeat.
Early in February, Mr. Sayers’ tenure as president of Carlton came under investigation following an interview he gave to The Herald Sun in which he asserted that the PwC scandal had no bearing on his work with the Blues.
PwC was compelled to divest its $1 billion-plus government consulting business after it was revealed by The Australian Financial Review that top executives had made money by using government secrets to help clients avoid tax laws that PwC was involved in designing.
Sayers was the CEO of PwC Australia from 2012 until 2020. He was questioned during the Senate investigation last year and claimed the probe into his behavior was finished and had cleared him of any wrongdoing.
However, the senator from Labor, Deborah O’Neill, who is in charge of the PwC probe, stated that the government was “not done” with Mr. Sayers.
She remarked, “I’m not sure where Mr. Sayers got the idea that there won’t be any conclusions, analyses, or suggestions regarding the CEO who oversaw the egregious misbehavior that the Senate’s investigation has exposed.
“The parliament’s work and the ongoing process of investigation, review, and accountability with Mr. Sayers are not yet done, just as he feels he has unfinished business at Carlton.”
PwC Australia informed a Senate hearing earlier this month that it had launched an internal investigation into Mr. Sayers following the receipt of a complaint alleging a conflict of interest from a PwC employee.
In the past, Mr. Sayers has confided in friends that he thinks the ethics probe is founded on baseless accusations that were made up to damage his reputation.
Despite a difficult start to the season, Carlton placed fifth on the AFL ladder the previous year. Previously, Bruce Mathieson held Mr. Sayers accountable for the team’s subpar play, but he modified his stance once the Blues advanced to their first finals since 2013.
More than 95% of members voted in favor of Mr. Sayers through proxy, according to Carlton sources. He receives no compensation for the part.
