Tit-for-tat letter bombing as CBH and Badger debate continues

WA growers have found themselves in the middle of a messy tit-for-tat letter dispute penned by CBH directors with vastly different views and recollections of the same events. Pingrup farmer and CBH director Trevor Badger penned two letters to farmers last week, the first of which was posted on the CBH website on April 21. Two days later, he distributed a second letter to growers via post — a much longer, eight-page letter with more depth and claims about CBH’s financial position and leadership. Both versions aimed to poke holes in the CBH board’s most recent bid to have him removed as a director through an online voting system. CBH shocked members on April 8 with news it would hold an online, special general meeting on May 15. The board has suggested members vote for a resolution proposing Mr Badger be stood down after 14 years. Mr Badger’s letters were written after CBH came clean over the details behind attempts to oust him from his position, after alleging he materially breached board confidentiality. CBH alleges Mr Badger disclosed the identity of a woman at the centre of a whistleblower report about inappropriate comments made by former chairman Wally Newman in 2018, which were fully investigated at the time but leaked during the recent director election campaign. Initially, CBH said it would not release details about Mr Badger’s alleged breaches, but this prompted unrest among CBH’s 3800 members. In laying out the breach findings, CBH said details of the investigation into Mr Newman’s behaviour had been provided to all CBH directors on a strictly confidential basis, and its directors had the duty to protect the identity of the woman. But Mr Badger was found by the governance committee to have deliberately disclosed the name of the woman to a CBH grower member. A grower member made a formal complaint to CBH, which gave rise to the breach process in respect of Mr Badger. On Sunday, three days after Mr Badger’s second letter was distributed to growers, CBH chairman Simon Stead shot back, emailing a letter to growers through CBH’s corporate communications channel saying while “CBH has no intention of engaging in ongoing public debate on the resolution”, it was “incumbent ... to correct the material inaccuracies and misrepresentations contained in Trevor’s letter”. Mr Badger’s first letter can be found on the CBH website.