Clowning around: climate activists disrupt ANZ meeting

ANZ chief executive Shayne Elliott has defended the bank’s climate change commitments, as shareholders spoke out and protesters disrupted its annual meeting in Brisbane.

Mr Elliott said ANZ was “absolutely committed to net zero,” in respect to greenhouse gas emissions.

“It absolutely influences the decisions that we make every single day – who we bank, what we bank, where we will lend, where will not lend, who will deal with, how we behave,” he told the meeting on Thursday.

“It impacts all of those things every single day – and it’s maybe not the most important thing that we’re doing, it’s certainly one of the most important things we’re doing as as a company.”

Ms Elliott said he and his team spent a huge amount of time to ensure  ANZ was lending responsibly and was enabling the transition to net zero carbon emissions.

ANZ chief executive Shayne Elliott says the bank is “absolutely committed to net zero” emissions. (Darren England/AAP PHOTOS)

But the nearly four-and-a-half-hour meeting at the Brisbane Convention and Exhibition Centre was disrupted early by protesters who dressed as clowns and performed circus routines when chairman Paul O’Sullivan began to address the bank’s climate commitments.

Mr O’Sullivan said ANZ had been transparent that it had relatively large oil and gas exposures and believed it could have the most positive impact by working with its customers to reduce their emissions.

“Our approach is to back their plans in seeking to provide more finance for less emissions, not to cut and run from these customers,” he said.

A number of shareholders pushed back against that argument.

“ANZ’s competitors are increasingly ruling out finance to expansionary coal, oil and gas projects and infrastructure projects that are critical to unlocking them,” said shareholder Lesley Hughes.

“ANZ does not do this and is a clear laggard in the space. It’s now 2023, and this bank still hasn’t ruled out direct finance to new oil and gas fields.”

Mr O’Sullivan said ANZ had examined a number of scenarios and concluded that for Australia to move on from coal, it would need to rely on gas for some of its energy needs.

“We can’t get there in one step,” he said, referring to the transition to renewable energy. “We have to migrate towards it.”

Serena Joyner, chief executive of Bushfire Survivors for Climate Action, told Mr O’Sullivan “with the greatest of respect” that his argument that ANZ could help transition its customers away from fossil fuels had been referred to as the “drug dealer’s defence”.

Send in the clowns. Anti-fossil fuel protesters have disrupted the ANZ annual meeting. (Darren England/AAP PHOTOS)

“The problem is every expansion of fossil fuel projects makes our homes less safe, our communities less safe,” she said.

“Increasingly, we’re going  be seeing communities in this country that are considering having to actually leave their homes, their towns that they can no longer live in.

“We’re on the frontline of climate change, along with our Pacific neighbours.”

Mr O’Sullivan argued that ANZ’s responsible lending was resulting in fossil fuel companies having to justify how they were going to reduce emissions.

Separately, Mr Elliott agreed to travel to the Tiwi Islands to meet with Indigenous peoples there who are upset with Santos’ $5.8 billion Barossa gas project in the Timor Sea, which ANZ and Australia’s other major banks have helped finance.