HMAS Choules is expected to reach Hastings at 11pm tonight after leaving Mallacoota today.
Updated
Big four accounting firm KPMG has cancelled its annual jolly for chief executives and other corporate bigwigs, a couta boat race usually held at Sorrento, on Victoria’s Mornington Peninsula, because of the bushfires.
The race usually attracts a who’s who of corporate Australia, who are ladled into couta boats – a type of sailboat historically used for fishing around the peninsula – for a race from Sorrento down to the Port Phillip Heads and back before breaking for lunch, usually compered by Eddie McGuire.
Past attendees at the event include defenestrated Westpac chairman Lindsay Maxsted, former Australia Post boss Ahmed Fahour, treasurer Josh Frydenberg and former treasurer and Future Fund chairman Peter Costello.
“Out of respect for bushfire affected communities – and given the current catastrophic bushfire situation across eastern Australia – with the expectation of worsening weather conditions tomorrow and over the weekend, KPMG has taken the decision to cancel its annual Couta Boat race,” a spokeswoman said.
It is not clear whether the event, which has come to symbolise corporate Australia’s insulation from the real world, will return next year.
The race attracted controversy – and the hashtag #yachtbanter – in 2017 when executives used the occasion to call for cuts to penalty rates, while in 2015 McGuire drew gasps from lunchers by saying that “you’ve got to love Australia, when all the Muslims are delivering the postage and parcels” in reference to Fahour.
KPMG’s spokeswoman said clients and crew would instead get a “scaled-back lunch” and it would be making a donation to bushfire support.
Updated
