Telstra Group Limited (TLS) Earnings Call Transcript & Summary

[Presentation] [Audio Gap] And ask questions at today's meeting. If you haven't already done so, you may find it helpful to download the guide and keep it handy. You can also call the numbers shown on your screen if you're having any difficulties. [Operator Instructions] In terms of how we'll deal with shareholder questions, there are 3 key -- 4 key ways. For each question session, we'll deal with online questions first and then move to phone questions. I'll read the online questions to the Chairman as they've been written by shareholders. If we can't answer your questions fully or we can't get through all the questions today, we'll make sure we respond to any unanswered questions after the meeting either directly or through the answers to the frequently asked questions, which we will put up on our AGM website. If you ask a question about an individual customer or a shareholder issue, one of our customer service or share registry staff will be in touch with you after the meeting. Shareholders, the online platform is now open for you to ask any questions or provide comments you may have on today's items of business. And I encourage you to ask your questions as soon as possible. Now with those procedural matters out of the way, I'll hand over to your Chairman, John Mullen.

Thanks a lot, Nic, and a very good morning, ladies and gentlemen. So my name is John Mullen, and it's my pleasure to welcome you this morning to Telstra's 2021 Annual General Meeting. I'd like to start off by thanking you all for your continued support and investment in Telstra at a time when COVID continues to have a profound effect on our lives, on our society and the economy. All of us have been impacted in one way or another. And I do hope that you and all your families are in good health, good spirits and are remaining safe through the challenges of this unprecedented pandemic. We, of course, would have preferred today's meeting to have been in person. But with travel for all of us actually impossible, we think that connecting online is the best solution at a time when few things are normal. With a quorum present, it's my pleasure to formally declare today's meeting open. A Notice of Meeting was distributed earlier, which set out the business and resolutions to be considered today. And I propose to take that notice as read. There are a number of items of business on today's agenda, and all of them are shown on the screen now. Voting on items 3 to 5 will be conducted by poll, and that poll is now open. And the instructions on how to participate in the poll are distributed earlier, and assistance is available at any time should you need it. Joining us then from various locations across Australia and around the world are all of my fellow Board members; your CEO, Andy Penn; our CFO, Vicki Brady; and the senior management team. Current directors Roy Chestnutt and Niek Jan van Damme Are also both standing for reelection today, and you'll hear from them a little later this morning. Also joining us on the line is Andrew Price from our auditors, Ernst & Young. And I'm sure that Andrew will be very happy to answer any questions that you may have on the conduct of the audit or on the auditor's report itself. So I don't think there can be any debate that this has been another tumultuous year, a year of lockdowns, restrictions and great uncertainty. And we're really proud that through all of this, Telstra has remained focused on our employees' and our customers' needs and on supporting our country as we've navigated through challenging and largely uncharted waters. Despite these extraordinary circumstances, we continued to deliver on our ambitious transformation strategy, and the company finished the year in a strong position. So let me look briefly back now on the 2021 financial year. Despite the challenges, we delivered results in line with guidance, and we saw the focus and discipline on T22 pay off in a sustainable way across the business. The year represented a turning point in our financial trajectory. Telstra is again building financial momentum, and we're very pleased to be able to say that we are confident that our underlying business will return to full year growth in fiscal year '22. We have confidence because we see strong performance in our mobiles business, continued discipline on our cost reduction target, green shoots in some of our growth businesses and a diminishing impact from the nbn. Andy will take you through the financials shortly, but we have many achievements to be proud of this year, including the significant progress made on our transformational T22 strategy. Launched just over 3 years ago now, T22 is a strategy to radically simplify and digitize the business; to reduce frustrating customer pain points and the legacy systems and processes that were slowing us down; to introduce new agile ways of working; and to further extend our network leadership, including leading in 5G. We promised a lot, and I'm sure that many investors and market observers were waiting to see how we would go. Well, I really believe that management has done an excellent job, and the transformation of Telstra has truly been an overwhelming success. We have delivered the great majority of what we said we would. And 3 years into what has been one of the largest and most ambitious transformations by a telco globally, Telstra is now a vastly different company. So let me just take you through just how different it is. We have radically simplified our business, including reducing the number of Consumer & Small Business in-market plans from 1,800 to just 20. Our workforce is 1/3 smaller, and we have removed on average more than 4 layers of management. We have delivered cost reductions of $2.3 billion and are on track to deliver our T22 productivity target of $2.7 billion. We have repositioned our investments in Foxtel and Telstra Ventures and improved the performance of our Health business, which is now strategically very well positioned for the future. We have successfully established InfraCo, and we are progressing our corporate restructure. The restructure of Telstra with a new holding company and 4 key subsidiaries, InfraCo Fixed, Amplitel or InfraCo Towers, Telstra Ltd or ServeCo and Telstra International, is the key final step in our T22 commitment to establish a standalone infrastructure business to drive performance and set up optionality post the rollout of the nbn. We're seeking to implement this restructure through a shareholder- and court-approved scheme of arrangement. All steps in the restructure process are progressing well, and we're optimistic of finalizing the restructure before the end of T22 and with the scheme meeting now actually to be early next year. Furthermore, we have monetized over $2 billion of assets, further strengthened our balance sheet. And we have completed the $2.8 billion towers deal, from which we announced an on-market share buyback of up to $1.35 billion. The Amplitel sale price and the multiple, together with the speed at which the sale closed, shows the quality of the InfraCo assets. InfraCo Fixed is over 6x larger than Amplitel on an income and EBITDA basis. And while it is more complex in nature, InfraCo Fixed is a very strategic portfolio. One of the most critical measures of progress for any business, of course, is how customer service is improving. This continues to be the #1 focus for Telstra. During T22, we have reduced the number of calls to our contact centers dramatically. When we started in 2018, we were receiving 35.8 million calls, just under 36 million calls a year. And this year, that is down to 11.5 million, a reduction of more than 2/3. And when Consumer & Small Business customers do need to contact us, they will able -- be able to call us and have their call answered by an Australian contact center service representative or visit a local expert in our Telstra-owned store network. We are on track to have all inbound calls from our Consumer & Small Business customers answered in Australia by June of next year. We have transformed how we serve our customers. More than 70% of Consumer & Small Business service interactions are now delivered digitally, up from just 40% in fiscal year '18. In our Enterprise business, it's a similar story with 28% of customer service interactions delivered digitally, up from just 12% last year. So we've done a lot, but we still have more to do. And while our objective is to provide an exceptional customer experience, the reality is Telstra is simply too big and too complex to ever be 100% perfect in this regard. Telstra handles hundreds of millions of data and mobile connections every day through a complex array of technologies that work exceptionally well and are exceptionally reliable. And yet at this scale, if even a tiny fraction of these go wrong, it still impacts a very large number of people. As Chair, I receive a lot of complaints, and I respond to every complaint personally. So I'm very aware of how upsetting a service failure can be. And it's these types of frustrations and pain points that have driven our determination under T22 to radically simplify and streamline the business and digitize our interactions with customers to the greatest extent possible. So while all customer-related metrics are showing strong improvement, we absolutely recognize and accept that there are still too many failures, and continuing and enhancing these improvements remain a core component of the T25 strategy that you'll hear more about shortly. Another source of organizational pride for us this year has been the way the company has responded to the challenge of COVID. Now through this very difficult period, we have continued to provide a range of support measures for our people, including paid pandemic leave, well-being support and COVID-safe workplaces. In India and the Philippines, where the pandemic has been particularly devastating, we have provided accommodation for workers and assistance with medical expenses and vaccinations. We've also provided $28 million in COVID relief packages for our customers and brought forward $500 million of CapEx from the second half of financial year '21 into the first half to help the nation's economic response. As the pandemic and its impacts have evolved, so did our response. When COVID first hit, we were one of the very first to move our 25,000-plus team members to work from home. We were the first to offer paid pandemic leave, and we kept the more vulnerable members of our frontline teams out of harm's way by moving them into suitable alternative roles. We have also continued to lead in flexible working and have taken the concept to the next level by giving individuals choice as to where, when and how they work. And more recently, we've been doing our best to encourage our people and our customers to get vaccinated to keep ourselves and others safe and to get us on a pathway out of the severe lockdowns that so many of us are facing. The unifying thread in all of our T22 achievements is that there are things we committed to do, and there are things that we've done. As I said earlier, the 2021 financial year was also significant because it marked a turning point in Telstra's financial performance. Each year for the last 4 years, we've had to face the very real challenge of the financial headwinds associated with the transfer of a material part of our business to the nbn. And this meant that each year, we had to start the year with our EBITDA going backwards by up to $800 million at the same time as we were operating in an increasingly competitive market, a market disrupted by new technology and facing significant structural change. The reality is that Telstra has lost over $6 billion of profit in the last decade or so, predominantly from the impact of the nbn, but also the loss of voice revenues, SMS revenues, global roaming and other pressures. And this has had an inevitable impact on earnings, dividends and our share price. There are few precedents in corporate Australia for an impact or a challenge of this magnitude. But with the nbn roll out now complete, you can finally see the company coming out of the shadow of the nbn. Investors will be able to see the strength of our underlying performance and the turning point we have reached. But with T22 now virtually complete, our focus is shifting to what comes next. Last month, we announced our ambitious new T25 strategy. It's a strategy designed to accelerate growth from our core business, to scale our new businesses, to further enhance the customer experience, to capitalize on the establishment of InfraCo and create a more contemporary structure for the future. Well, if T22 was a strategy of necessity, well, T25 is a strategy for growth. And I'd now like to give shareholders a sense for its direction. Like T22, T25 is built around 4 key pillars. The first pillar is to continue to strive for an exceptional customer experience you can count on. To do this, we will make it possible for our customers to interact with us in whatever way suits them, whether it's online, in our stores or through our contact centers; and when they do that, be offered a consistent product range and service experience. We aim to get to a point where for over 90% of interactions with us, customers only need to engage with us once and it's done. And in the background, we will also be using technology, including artificial intelligence and data analytics, to better personalize experiences and to predict issues and resolve them, often before customers even know that they are happening. We also plan to expand our Telstra Plus rewards program into a full sales and marketing channel to rival the best rewards programs in Australia. The aim is to grow it from 3.5 million members to 6 million by FY '25. And for our Enterprise customers, we will create Australia's largest one-stop-service shop for technology and telecommunications, which will offer a range of managed and consulting services, telco products including connectivity, cloud, Internet of Things and cybersecurity as well as the in-house expertise of the Telstra Purple team. The second pillar of T25 is to provide the leading network and technology solutions that deliver the future of communications. Telstra has Australia's biggest and best mobile network, and we will continue to invest in it to further improve coverage, speed, latency, resiliency and domestic core connectivity. Under T25, we will continue to invest in our network leadership in 5G with approximately 95% population coverage by the end of fiscal year '25. We also plan to deliver 100,000 square kilometer increase in our 4G and 5G network footprint, substantially increasing regional coverage. 4G coverage then will be across 100% of our network by FY '24, enabling us to continue to lead in composite coverage, speed and performance for 4G and 5G as we eventually close 3G. This will set us up well for early planning on 6G, which will clearly be on the agenda by the end of T25. The third pillar is to create sustained growth and value for our shareholders. And as I said earlier, we have reached a turning point in our financial trajectory. Under T25, we will continue to build on that financial momentum to deliver growth, particularly through growing mobile services revenue, improving fixed profitability, turning around Enterprise and building profitability in new markets, including health and energy. We will also develop (sic) [ deliver ] a further $500 million of cost reductions between FY '23 and FY '25 on top of the $2.7 billion already committed for T22. At the same time, we will invest for growth, focus on cash conversion and generation ahead of net profit, continue to actively unlock value from the balance sheet, including exploring future monetization opportunities for InfraCo Fixed, and by creating value for shareholders through our capital management framework, which we have updated and simplified. In this regard, we are very aware of the importance of the company's dividend to many shareholders. And with the migration of services to the nbn and the flow-on impact to our business, we were inevitably obliged to cut our dividend back in 2018. However, and as Andy will explain further in his presentation, with the nbn impact now largely behind us and the underlying business expected to return to full year growth in fiscal year '22, we are confident that barring unforeseen events, we will be able to maintain the current level of dividend and seek to grow it over time, subject, of course, to the requirements of our updated capital management framework. The fourth and final pillar of the strategy then is to be the place that people want to work. The companies that will be successful in the future are the companies that can attract, retain, motivate and inspire the most talented people. And we want to be a company that the best people aspire to work at. And we will do that by excelling in new ways of working, including embracing new flexible and hybrid ways of working. We will also continue to create new capabilities in software development, data analytics and artificial intelligence and seek to attract the best talent to fill those leading digital roles. It's a strategy focused firmly on taking customer experience to a whole new level, and it's a strategy that is focused on growth. And ultimately, it's a strategy that leverages the capabilities that we have already built under T22. And just as in the same way T22 would not have been possible without the foundational investments that we announced in 2016, T25, in turn, would not be possible without all that we have accomplished in T22. And it's a real testament to the ambition of the Telstra team that we have delivered a revolutionary T22 strategy, and T25 stands to be just as groundbreaking, if not more so. Let me now turn to the broader role and responsibility that businesses have in our society. Our view is that businesses will only be successful for their shareholders if their customers, employees and communities are also successful. Telstra has tried to play a leading role in this regard, striking a careful balance between delivering profits to shareholders and our responsibility to help those less fortunate in society. We are focused on a number of key fronts. On digital inclusion, too many Australians are still on the wrong side of the so-called digital divide. We continue to help overcome this through specialist programs, products and services that this year helped 1 million customers in vulnerable circumstances to stay connected. As part of T25, we will help build digital skills for 500,000 Australians by FY '25. In regional Australia, we also continue to provide more coverage to more people in regional and remote places. We have invested $3 billion improving our regional mobile network in the 5 years to 30th of June 2020. And this year, we announced significant forward investments to continue this work. This includes $150 million in additional regional investment for fiscal year '22 and an additional $200 million coinvestment fund to improve regional connectivity over the next 4 years. With the $75 million for the towers sale being spent in regional Australia, we are, therefore, investing close to a further $0.5 billion in regional networks. Turning to climate change. We have a very clear and ambitious goal to reduce our absolute emissions by 50% by 2030, to enable renewable energy generation equivalent to 100% of our consumption by 2025 and for our operations to be fully carbon neutral. We've already made great progress in reducing our absolute emissions by 11%, and we're on track to deliver our further ambitious targets. I'd now like to turn to the changes this year in Telstra's Board. Now 2 long-serving directors, Margie Seale and Peter Hearl, have announced their intention to retire from the Board. Margie will be retiring today and Peter on December 31 this year. Margie has reached the end of her third 3-year terms and has served on the Audit and Risk Committee for 9 years and the Nomination Committee for 3 years. Peter joined the Board in 2014 and was appointed Chair of the People and the Remuneration Committee in 2016. He has also served on the Nomination Committee for 3 years. Peter is retiring to focus on his new role as Chairman of the Endeavour Group. Over many years and in many ways, both Margie and Peter have played an enormously important role in helping oversee the transformation of Telstra. And on behalf of the Board, I really thank Margie and Peter for their commitment and substantial contributions to Telstra, and we wish you both very well in the future. A number of investors have recently asked me what our plans are for succession. My response has always been the same. We have a strong, talented Board, and we continue to bring on outstanding individuals to replace those that retire. When the time is right and I step down, there will be no shortage of high-caliber and talented candidates to succeed me as Chairman. Some investors have also asked about Andy's plans now that T22 is largely complete. Andy can and will speak for himself, but I would just say that he continues to do a fantastic job and enjoys not just 100% support of the Board but also the Board's appreciation of thanks for the way that he has managed Telstra through some of the most difficult times of its existence. Andy has also built a very strong team around him with no shortage of talented and capable executives ready to succeed him as well at the appropriate time. So let me conclude by again saying that we really have many achievements to be proud of this year. The many tangible benefits of T22 are now clear, and they underpin our commitment to return the business to underlying growth and to position it for success in the future through T25. It's an exciting strategy to meet an exciting future. There is, therefore, every reason to be very positive about the company's future. The nbn migration process is nearly complete. Our underlying EBITDA has started to grow again, and new opportunities are opening up every day. And finally, before I invite Andy to address you, let me sincerely thank you, our shareholders, for your patience and support during this difficult year. And let me also thank our customers because without them, there would be no Telstra. And finally, again, thanks to every staff member of Telstra. The Board greatly appreciates all that you do, and I believe so, too, do our shareholders. Thank you very much for listening. And now let me introduce our Chief Executive Officer, Andy Penn, and invite him to address the meeting.

Well, thank you very much, Chairman, and good morning, everybody. I'd like to echo the Chairman's comments, and I sincerely trust that you and your families are in good health and remaining safe during the COVID crisis. Whilst COVID means that our AGM is online again this year, sadly, we do appreciate you joining us, and we very much value the opportunity to connect with you, nonetheless. We're also looking forward to hearing about your comments and answering your questions that you may have today. In my presentation, I'm going to cover 4 things. Firstly, I will comment briefly on the progress of our T22 strategy and talk about what comes after T22. Secondly, I will comment on the financial and operating results from FY '21 and provide an overview of our priorities and guidance for FY '22. Thirdly, I will comment on our financial ambitions for our new T25 strategy that the Chairman has already taken you through. And finally, I'm just going to comment on the approach we're taking to ensure that we deliver T25 with the same discipline and tenacity that we demonstrated for T22. So let me start with T22. We launched T22 in June 2018. We knew we had to act boldly to fundamentally transform and radically simplify and digitize Telstra. It's clear in my mind that before T22, we did not respond quickly or significantly enough to the reality of the nbn and on Telstra. We were not focused enough on transforming and improving the core business to mitigate this. We were too dependent and too focused on investments outside of the core. Well, I think we have comprehensively addressed this. Our T22 program has been a clear success. And Telstra today is a much simpler, more agile, more customer-focused and more digitally enabled business than ever before. The Chairman has already touched on some of this, but I really wanted to recap on some of our achievements over the past 3 years to highlight just how much Telstra has changed. As you heard, we've radically simplified our business, and that was incredibly important, reducing Consumer & Small Business in-market plans from more than 1,800 to just 20. We've also removed lock-in contracts, excess data charges and many other fees. And in many respects, we've led the industry in this regard. The number of calls coming into our contact centers from our Consumer & Small Business customers has fallen by more than 2/3. And by the end of this financial year, we expect to answer all of those calls in Australia. We're also well progressed on the arrangements to bring our licensee stores back in-house. We've exceeded our target to recruit new capabilities in new areas such as software engineering, data analytics, cybersecurity and artificial intelligence with more than 1,500 new hires. And that's going to be an incredibly important capability for our T25 strategy. We've removed on average more than 4 layers of management. We've continued to change our ways of working, and we now have 17,000 people working in agile across the business. We've delivered annualized cost reductions of $2.3 billion, and we're on track to deliver our T22 productivity target of $2.7 billion. As you heard from our Chairman, we've repositioned our investment in Foxtel and similarly repositioned our investment in Telstra Ventures. We've also improved the performance of our Health business, which is strategically very well positioned for the future. And we were very pleased to be able to complete 2 important transactions recently to build on this, Medical Director and PowerHealth. We have also successfully established InfraCo. We are well progressed with the corporate restructure, and we continue to focus on opportunities to realize additional value for our shareholders on top of the $2.8 billion tower deal which we completed recently. As you heard from the Chairman, we've taken a strong leadership position on climate change and the environment. And through all of this change, we have seen positive improvements in the way our customers and our employees view us. Our Strategic NPS increased 15 points during the period. And employee engagement, which was already high, increased 4 points. We have remained absolutely disciplined and focused on delivering what we said we would. And 3 years into what has been one of the largest and most ambitious transformation programs for a telecommunications company globally, we're a vastly different company today. Excitingly, and as the Chairman has said, this has enabled us to announce what comes after T22, and we did so last month. T25 is a new strategy: a new strategy to accelerate growth from our core and to scale our new businesses, a new strategy to further enhance customer experience and to respond to the permanent shifts that we are seeing in how people work and live today, a new strategy to capitalize on the establishment of InfraCo and the changes to our company to create a more contemporary structure for the future. If T22 was a strategy of necessity, T25 is a strategy for growth. And when we have delivered it, we will be a vastly different company again. Before I comment more on the financial aspirations for T25, let me provide a summary of our results for FY '21. Total income for the year decreased 11.6% to $23.1 billion on a reported basis. EBITDA on a reported basis decreased 14.2% to $7.6 billion. Underlying EBITDA on a guidance basis, which excludes one-off nbn income and guidance adjustments, decreased 9.7% to $6.7 billion. FY '21 was an inflection point in the financial performance of your company. At our half year results in February, we committed to growing underlying EBITDA half-on-half, and I'm pleased to say we delivered this. Underlying EBITDA increased from $3.3 billion in the first half of the year to $3.4 billion in the second half. Underlying EBITDA included an in-year nbn headwind of $650 million and an estimated $380 million financial impact from COVID. Encouragingly, net profit after tax increased 3.4% to $1.9 billion on a reported basis, and earnings per share was up 2% to $0.156 per share. Free cash flow was up 11.6% to $3.8 billion. And the Board resolved to pay a fully franked dividend of $0.08 per share, bringing the total dividend for the year to $0.16 per share. We also announced, of course, returning $1.35 billion to shareholders over the coming period through an on-market buyback from the proceeds of the towers deal. This will bring total returns to shareholders from activities in FY '21 to $3.25 billion. In terms of the operating highlights for the year, we continue to see strong customer growth in mobiles despite a sharp slowdown in the market due to COVID. We added 101,000 net retail postpaid mobile services, including 67,000 branded and 34,000 from Belong. Our 5G network is now more than twice the size of our next nearest competitor. It covers more than 75% of Australia's population and has more than 1.6 million 5G devices already connected to it and experiencing great network performance. The 1,000 megahertz of 26 gigahertz spectrum that we acquired at auction earlier this year also gives us a tenfold increase in capacity for hot spots. This is very significant as we ramp up the rollout of millimeter wave band technology beyond the 5 major capital cities and as more compatible devices from suppliers become available. Importantly, in our mobiles business, we saw our lead indicator, transacting minimum monthly commitment, or TMMC as we referred to it, increase by more than $3. And our continued focus on building value in mobiles resulted in EBITDA growth in the year of $170 million. In fixed, we lost 69,000 net new retail bundles, including 10,000 additions from Belong. However, while we did have negative net adds, bundle and stand-alone data ARPU, excluding one-offs, in Consumer & Small Business stabilized. We continue to focus on building value in fixed through our focus on price, higher speed tiers, add-ons, improvements to WiFi and our Smart Modem. Indeed, the Smart Modem is now in over 2.3 million homes, and it has been key to keeping customers connected when working and studying from home during this period. Telstra TV is, meanwhile, keeping our customers entertained through the same time with more customers watching Foxtel's Kayo and Binge streaming products. In fact, Foxtel recently reported streaming subscribers up 155% to more than 2 million. Telstra Health also had a great year operationally and strategically. Revenue was up 6% in FY '21, and we are confident Health will see high teens organic revenue growth in FY '22. In customer experience, Episode NPS improved 9 points in the year and 6 points in the last 6 months. Strategic NPS improved 7 points in the year and 2 points in the last 6 months. Customer complaint levels are also now at their lowest level since the beginning of the migration to the nbn. As the Chairman has said, we know that not all aspects of customer experience are where they need to be and that we do have more work to do. Nonetheless, we are confident that the T22 initiatives we have put in place, combined with our decision to have all inbound customer calls in Australia and bring our branded retail stores back in-house, will deliver further improvements for customers. And finally, we've made very strong progress in our productivity program. For the year, total operating expenses were down $1.8 billion or more than 10%, and underlying fixed costs were down $490 million. This means that since FY '16, we have delivered $2.3 billion of cumulative annualized cost reductions, and we're very confident we can deliver our $2.7 billion target by the end of this financial year. So turning now to the guidance for the current financial year, which you can see on this slide, along with the assumptions and conditions which we provide. Our underlying EBITDA for FY '22 guidance implies mid-single-digit growth of around $450 million at the midpoint, and this is despite remaining in-year nbn headwinds of approximately $350 million. It also includes around $50 million of noncash accounting headwind from insourcing our Telstra-branded retail stores and no return of international roaming. Pleasingly, in FY '22, we maintain a strong outlook on free cash flow, supported by a further improvement in working capital. This is despite our expectation that one-off nbn DA EBITDA will reduce by over $550 million. Proceeds from the towers sale, M&A and payments to acquire licensees under our strategy to transition to full ownership of our branded stores are all excluded from our free cash flow guidance. But with that, let me turn back now to T25 and the future. The Chairman has already taken you through the key elements of our T25 strategy, but I wanted to drill down a little deeper into the financial aspects of the strategy and our ambitions for growth that underpin it. Our T25 financial strategy is built on the strong foundations of T22. It's designed to continue to build financial momentum across our portfolio, deliver $0.5 billion of net fixed cost reductions from FY '23 to FY '25 while still investing for growth. It includes a strong focus on converting EBITDA into cash, including through CapEx discipline, working capital improvements and reducing lease depreciation and finance costs. We will also look to unlock value through active portfolio management, as we have done so, and create shareholder value through our capital management framework. Our underlying EBITDA and ROIC ambitions for FY '25 build on the turnaround we have achieved through T22. As you've just heard, our guidance for FY '22 underlying EBITDA is $7 billion to $7.3 billion compared to FY '21 underlying EBITDA of $6.7 million -- $6.7 billion. Our ambition is to achieve $7.5 billion to $8 billion of underlying EBITDA by FY '23 and a mid-single-digit CAGR from FY '21 to FY '25. For underlying ROIC, our ambition is to achieve around 8% by FY '23 and grow this beyond to FY '25. For underlying EPS, our ambition is a high teens CAGR from FY '21 all the way to FY '25. This level of underlying EPS growth provides a platform from which we will maximize our fully franked dividend and seek to grow it over time. Our intention is to return as much cash flow to shareholders via fully franked dividends as can be sustainably supported by earnings and franking whilst also balancing the objective and principles of the capital management framework. We are confident of maintaining a minimum $0.16 per share fully franked dividend, subject to no unexpected material events and the requirements of our capital management framework, although it is important to note our franking balance is relatively low. Finally, for excess cash flow, our ambition is to invest for growth and to return excess cash to shareholders in line with the capital management framework. So in summary, if T22 was a strategy of necessity, T25 is definitely a strategy for growth. And I think you can see that in our financial aspirations. Through T25, we have been bold and clear about these and about our future direction, even though the world we live in has changed dramatically over the last 18 months. I believe that when the future seems the most unclear, as it does today, that is exactly the time when people need a strong sense of direction. And our job as leaders is to provide it to them, even when we're uncertain ourselves. How often -- however, too often, companies hedge their bets and become more conservative. We have seen this over the last 18 months as companies have become more cautious on providing strategic direction and guidance. As I have previously written, I think we've also seen it in relation to the road map out of the lockdowns. I'm seeing a loss of hope and optimism in people because they're concerned about potential ongoing restrictions. Unless we start to talk more courageously about the reality of living with COVID permanently in our society and building our resilience for that, this mistrust will continue. I know in this environment, the temptation is to be cautious, to not say anything until we're absolutely certain, to not take any risks. But people are not naive. They know there are no guarantees, but they do expect to see from their leaders a sense of confidence, a sense of direction, something to reassure them that there is a path forward, and it's our job to deliver it. This is the sentiment that underpinned our T22 strategy that we announced in 2018. And it has seen us simplify, digitize and transform the company. It is also the sentiment that now sits at the heart of our new T25 strategy. And in its implementation, we will be using exactly the same disciplines in governance that we used for T22, the metrics and the milestones, the road maps and the scorecard. And this is why I am confident it will be a success. Why change a winning formula when you don't need to? We're committed to holding ourselves to account and delivering T25, and we're going to be transparent with you about our progress. And we will update our scorecard in every results presentation. But we've also been very candid about the fact that we may not hit every target. There are too many moving parts in a business as complex as Telstra over this period of time to expect that, but we are going to give it our best shot. And if we achieve what we did achieve in T22, which was to hit more than 80% of them, we will be in very good shape. We're also committed to do our bit in supporting the road map to recovery from COVID and looking after the health and well-being of our people and our customers. We have implemented a number of initiatives to support our people with their mental well-being. We have also recently shone a light on how COVID has exacerbated one very serious mental health challenge, and that's loneliness, with more than 25% of Australians experiencing loneliness for the first time during COVID. We've also provided incentives for our people and our customers to be vaccinated. And last week, we opened a vaccination center in Victoria for our people and one member of their family. We've also made it a requirement for all of our people in Victoria and New South Wales to be fully vaccinated before returning to the office and for those in approximately 8,000 roles nationally, which are likely to come into regular contact with customers and colleagues. Telstra is a very large and complex company, and our operations and services touch every Australian. So we take our responsibilities very seriously. Before I close, I'd like to sincerely thank the many dedicated employees who make Telstra the great company that it is. Despite many challenges this year, every day, they remain focused on serving our customers and keeping them connected. And for that, I want to sincerely thank them. I'm proud to work with such a committed group of people. Because of them, Telstra is now in a position where we can build on the strong foundation we have created over the past 3 years and transition from transformation to growth, from T22 to T25, from a strategy we had to do to a strategy we want to do. Thank you. And with that, I will now hand back to the Chairman.

Good. Thanks a lot, Andy. So we will now move to the formal part of the meeting, and the items of business are being shown on your screen. Nic outlined at the start of the meeting how you can ask a question and vote. So just a reminder that if you have any difficulty using the online platform or the phone system, please check our virtual AGM guide on our website or call the help numbers shown at the top of your screen. As I mentioned earlier, voting on items 3 to 5 is being conducted by a poll. We have received proxies from nearly 15,700 shareholders and direct votes from around 9,500 shareholders. We will display the proxy and direct votes recorded for and against every item on your screen when we get to that item. The 4 numbers displayed will include proxies received and available to be voted by the Chairman of the meeting. Ms. [ Emma Jones ] of Link Market Services Limited, Telstra's share registrar, will act as returning officer in relation to the poll. And the results will be available later today. So let me now turn to item 2 on today's agenda, which is to discuss the company's financial statements and reports for the year ended 30th of June 2021. This item provides shareholders with the opportunity to ask questions about our 2021 financial statements and reports as well as the business, operations and management of Telstra generally. You can also ask questions of our auditor. So if you haven't already done so, please submit online any questions that you may have about our 2021 financial results or your company generally or raise your hand on the phone line. While you are doing that, we will address the pre-asked question from a shareholder on the topic we haven't touched on already today.

Thanks, John. We received a question from a shareholder asking why has the dividend reinvestment plan facility being discontinued?

Right. Thanks for that. Look, I think we all understand how important the dividend reinvestment plan is to many of our shareholders, and the decision to suspend it wasn't taken lightly. But simply, if you elect to have your dividends reinvested, then we, in turn, purchase shares on your behalf. And when we purchase shares for the reinvestment program, we need to comply with all those legal restrictions, including, in particular, insider trading laws, which prohibit us from trading in our shares if we have information that is not yet public. Given the status of our proposed restructure and other things, in order for us to manage these obligations, the Board decided that the reinvestment program should not operate for the final dividend of fiscal year '21. But our intention is absolutely to reinstate it as soon as circumstances allow. So I thank all shareholders who took the time to engage with us before the meeting. And Nic, I'll now take any shareholder questions for this item.

Thanks, John. We'll go to the portal first. In relation to this item, we have a question from Mike Robey from the Australian Shareholders' Association. Mike asks, "The digitization of Telstra is, in your own judgment, arguably the most complete of any large telco. We, shareholders, however, find it hard to compare with others. Have you some independent benchmarking data you could share?"

Yes. Thank you for that question. So look, most telcos are doing some sort of digital program, mainly around customer service and, in some cases, agile ways of working, et cetera. But we're very confident that none are anywhere near the broader scope as has been contemplated in Telstra, where we have replaced both our B2B and our B2C or are replacing stack replacements, full agile at scale, ways of working, the radical product simplification you heard a bit more about earlier, our network transformation and the cost takeout all at the same time. And we received a lot of very high-level and sophisticated advice from advisers, including Boston Consulting Group, BCG. And BCG have -- they maintain a database of around 1,400 companies. And they say that we have become, in Telstra, what they term a digital high performer in 3 to 4 years, which is faster than any other company that they have in their database. So there's no scorecard and ranking of these things. But I think by any objective analysis, Telstra has done an exceptional job in digitization. And it's recognized externally and globally.

Thanks, John. We've got a question asked by [ Mischiff ], hopefully, I've pronounced that right, [ Proprietary Limited ] regarding this item. "Can you please change the time of meetings if they're held virtually in the future? 9:30 a.m. on the East Coast is 6:30 a.m. on the West Coast. No one seems to even contemplate Western Australia when setting up these meetings."

Yes. Thank you. Unfortunately, this is a challenge we face every day in Telstra as we're -- we have global Board. So while I understand that Western Australia is a few hours behind, for our European Directors, it's now 1:00 or 2:00 in the morning. And likewise, for our U.S. directors, it's a very different time to here. So it's unfortunately impossible to get a time that suits everybody. So we do our very best to try to get a balance and a compromise that spreads the pain, for want of a better word.

Thanks, John. We have a question from [ Joseph Martin ]. "How much has been spent on upgrading, et cetera, the business systems we have, including consultants' fees? And which consultants were involved?"

Well, I don't think we disclosed the specific consultants that we use or the fees that we spend on consulting. But like all big companies where there's a significant issue or challenge to be overcome, we often turn for a qualified external help. And we have used a number of the major consultancies over time, including McKinsey Group, including Boston Consulting and Bain and others. But we obviously try to maintain as much of the expertise as we can inside, in-house. But where some really talented and high IQ assistance is required, we turn to others to help us.

John, we've got another question from Mike Robey from the ASA in relation to agile. He's asking, "With the restructure of Telstra into separate entities, which presumably sees staff systems moving into separate entities, how does the process of agile at scale work? And how will you measure it?"

Well, I mean, agile at scale is still comprised of a lot of smaller agile teams. It just means that we're doing it across the whole company at the same time, which is a fantastic achievement. I really do believe that the agile program led by Alex Badenoch and others has been one of the most successful in corporate Australia, if not globally. But those teams, they remain those teams. So if -- even if we restructure the company around the InfraCo restructuring that we're going to do, that doesn't change those teams. They may report in a different line or they may have a different organization chart on paper, but their day-to-day activities and the interaction between the teams, which is the function of agile, remains the same. So there's no risk to the company there.

John, another question from Mike Robey from the ASA. "Can you give some background to the rise this year in complaints to the TIO? Telstra's rose by 11%, while the competitors' dropped by up to 50%. Given the simplification of plans, COVID financial support and increased focus on customers, how did this come about?"

Yes. Thank you. We're obviously very, very aware of the challenges that took place earlier in the year. But I would say that the impact was overwhelmingly in the first half when COVID first hit. And we obviously experienced lockdowns both in Australia and in our overseas call centers, which effectively meant that literally overnight, 15,000 or more people couldn't come to work. And that put a huge, huge strain on our systems and our customer service reaction. However, the good news is that the TIO complaints are 33% or 1/3 down from the first quarter to the fourth quarter, and they're now at their lowest point since 2015. So I think we're well on top of it now with the reaction that management took to the COVID crisis.

Thanks, John. Another question from [ Joseph Martin ]. And just a reminder to shareholders, I will read these questions out verbatim. So just be mindful of that, unless there's anything offensive. But there is some language here that does edge a little bit, but I will read this one out verbatim. [ Joseph ] says, "The Chairman mentioned that the T22 vision was to basically get rid of the legacy system, which was slowing the company down. Does he know that it was the legacy customers who kept Telstra going and they should not be treated like c*** by not being contacted to change their plans, et cetera? I've been a legacy customer for over 20 years and have been treated like c***."

Well, I'm sorry to hear that you feel that. Obviously, I don't have any inside information into your particular issue. But we've got staff on hand who've been trying to address whatever has affected you personally. But I can assure you that across the board, in that -- reducing our plans from 1,800 down to 20, it was a very significant communications program, and we've interacted with customers throughout. And the changes have been very well received. Obviously, from time to time, something will have gone wrong with one individual case here or there. And that sounds like that's what's happened to you. So I apologize on behalf of the company. And we will -- if you like to speak offline, we will try to address your issue for you.

Great. Thanks, John. I've got a question from [ Michael Borg ]. "The cloud has been a significant driver of new business for Macquarie Telecom, that's Macquarie Telecom. Their profits and dividends are growing. Has Telstra thought of establishing data centers to drive new business?"

Well, Telstra offers cloud services now, and we have done for many years. And we also operate data centers. Though we may have sold some of the buildings, we still operate data centers. So we're very much in the cloud business.

Thanks, John. We have a question from [ Ian Albert Maxwell ]. "Are there any payments employees or directors being made in the form of shares in the current year? If so, will these be paid in cash instead of shares, given your comments regarding the DRP suspension?"

Firstly, directors do not get paid in shares. Directors are paid in cash only. Management obviously are entitled to shares through the different components of the structure of our employee incentive programs, both restricted shares and performance rights. And those vest at obviously different times, and they're granted at different times. So I can't tell you what is happening in any particular moment in time. But other than that, no, there are no other grants or gifts of shares to any employee or director.

Thanks, John. We have a further question asked by [ Mischiff Proprietary Limited ] in relation to WA. "I guess the answer to the last question about the time of the Annual General Meeting assumes that European directors are more important than West Australian shareholders. If you held it at 5:00 p.m. in the afternoon Eastern Standard Time, that would actually work for everyone, including West Australian shareholders and European shareholders given the time differences."

Yes. Look, I hear the question. We also have New Zealand shareholders. We have shareholders in the United States and Europe. So again, I reiterate, we try to find the best time for the majority. And that will always mean that there'll be a small minority who are disadvantaged, for which I regret. But there's nothing, I think, that realistically can be done differently.

Thanks, John. We've got a question from [ Charmaine Hales ]. "When was the shareholder vote with Telstra moving to the 4 new entities?"

I think if you're referring to when we have an extraordinary general meeting to approve the scheme of arrangement. That will depend on a number of the processes still being resolved, but we anticipate it will be in the first quarter of next calendar year.

John, I've got a question from [ Reginald Holmes ]. "What is Telstra doing about mobile access in areas where there is no signal such as Royal National Park in the Sutherland Shire?"

Well, I think we sort of touched on that a little bit earlier that Telstra has spent over $3 billion on regional Australia over the last 5 or 10 years. We're spending another $500 million now, as you heard from Andy. It's about 3x all of the rest of the industry, and we're covering 1 million kilometers more than our competitors. That's -- I think our coverage is more than the combined area of New South Wales and Victoria added together over and above our competitors. The other thing I would add is that we participate actively in the government's Black Spot Program. And I think we've got close to 1,000 black spot -- 980-odd black spots where we have invested, which is about 75% of the total investment of the industry. So I think we can say with great conviction that we are absolutely the leader in bringing communication to regional Australia.

Thanks, John. So that deals with all of the online questions for item 2, and we're going to turn to the phone lines now. Operator, can I check if there are any phone questions for this item?

Chairman, we have a question from Mike Robey.

Good morning, Mr. Chairman, and thank you very much for your presentation and Mr. Penn's presentation. I have a question with respect to -- first of all, should I say that I am a volunteer monitor for the Australian Shareholders' Association and hold 93 million in proxies for retail shareholders, which I believe makes us the 10th largest shareholder. Mr. Chairman, you hinted in other forums that you will not apply for reelection after your current term. Can you give us some insight into the recruitment process for your replacement, whether, in fact, your stint will actually come about? And in particular, what specific skills are you seeking for the new Chair, particularly in light of T25?

Sure. Thanks for the question. Look, I joined the Board in 2008 and became Chairman in 2016. So I've been here for quite a long time. I'm in now the last tenure. That takes me through to 2 years from today. And at that time, obviously, it will be up to my fellow directors what they do. It will be their decision. But throughout my tenure, I have really worked hard on trying to build an excellent Board, which I think we have, a very diverse group of directors with diverse skills, backgrounds and experience. We are continuing to build that strength and depth of experience. And we will have 2 new directors joining us to succeed both Peter and Margie, who you've heard earlier will be leaving. So I'm very confident that whenever the moment -- appropriate moment comes, the Board will have a very strong lineup of eminently qualified and very capable directors to replace me as and when that time comes.

Chairman, we have a question from [ Peter Starr ].

So I'm representing myself and a number of shareholders who hold Telstra. I've been a shareholder for a little over some 15 years. I want to know, John, first of all, when you do go, you've done a good job and thank you. And I hope that your replacement will be as good as the person you took over from, Ms. Livingstone. My question is in relation -- I understand why we've not done the DRP for this final dividend, and I've heard that we're going to reinstate it as soon as possible. That's a must from the people I represent. And as well as myself, I've always taken DRP. And the other issue is that the splitting up of the group that you're asking us to vote on, are we going to list those so existing Telstra shareholders will get a benefit from that?

So [ Peter ], the restructure won't change anything. There will still be one Telstra, and you will still have your shares in Telstra. It's merely a corporate reorganization underneath a new holding company. So day-to-day, that won't change anything. But will it benefit shareholders? Absolutely. We think it will because it will allow us to then consider in time the further monetization of other InfraCo assets to mirror the success that we had with the towers sale. So it's very much in shareholders' interest. And obviously, when we get to that point, we will explain in great detail exactly what's involved and why we're doing it.

Chairman, there are no further questions on the telephone at this time.

Thanks, operator. So John, that concludes the question session for this item.

Fantastic. Thank you, Nic and shareholders. So we have now finalized our discussion of item 2. Next up is item 3, which is director reelection. As I mentioned earlier, Roy Chestnutt and Niek Jan van Damme are standing for reelection today, and their details are set out in the Notice of Meeting. Items 3A and 3B will be voted on separately. But to assist with the efficient conduct of the meeting, I'll deal with the discussion of Roy and Niek Jan's reelections together. We will now hear from Roy and Niek Jan through a short video addressed to you all. While we do, if you have any questions on their reelection, please submit those online now or raise your hand on the phone line.

Good morning, ladies, gentlemen and fellow shareholders. I am Roy Chestnutt, and I have the honor and privilege of serving on the Telstra Board of Directors for the past 3 years. I have participated in our T22 transformation and greatly look forward to contributing to the next chapter, executing the T25 strategy. Since leaving my role as Chief Strategy Officer and Head of Corporate Development at U.S.-based Verizon over 3.5 years ago, I have built on my over 30 years of experience in the telco industry. In addition to my responsibility on the Telstra Board, I served for 3 years on the Saudi Telecom Board of Directors, performed advisory services for Blackstone Private Equity, VMware and a few other companies all related to today's constantly evolving global telecom industry. I remain connected with the GSMA global telecom industry association, where I served on the Board while at Verizon. These relationships help me stay current with the industry trends and keep me prepared to contribute to the ongoing needs and strategic direction of Telstra. Thank you for your time. And with your support and consent, I look forward to serving Telstra during the next 3-year term.

Good morning, ladies and gentlemen, fellow shareholders. My name is Niek Jan van Damme, and I'm seeking your support for reelection to the Telstra Board for a second term. A lot has happened since I joined the Board 3 years ago. Most notably, Telstra has undergone a major transformation program, T22. Coming from Europe, this transformation has been on a scale I have not seen before, and its execution has been world-class. But there's still some work to be done. The result has seen better employee engagement, increased customer efficacy and improved value to our shareholders. This transformation has made Telstra ready to adapt to the growth challenges in the industry and changing customer demands. For this, our T25 strategy has been developed with input from all Board members. I would be honored to get your support so I can contribute to the execution of this plan over the years to follow. With over 20 years of experience in the telecommunications industry, I dare say that I can provide valuable input on a different perspective. To me, Telstra has continuously shown to also take its role in society very seriously. I was impressed by the lengths taken by the team to support communities devastated by the Black Summer bushfires at the beginning of my term. Over the past 2 years, the pandemic has impacted all of our lives. I'm proud how Telstra has adapted to these challenges, showing the strength of the organization and its management. And more than this, I'm proud of the way Telstra has gone above and beyond to support its employees, its customers and its communities. During this period, modern technology and the power of connectivity have allowed me to continue to support this wonderful organization without any restrictions. So I hope I will soon be able to visit your beautiful country again. Thank you.

Great. Both Roy and Niek Jan are absolutely first-class directors. And the Board, other than obviously Roy and Niek Jan themselves in respect of their own reelection, recommends their reelection. The proxy and direct voting positions for items 3A and B are being shown on your screen now. As I indicated in the Notice of Meeting, I intend to vote all available proxies in favor of the reelection of Roy and Niek Jan. I'll now, therefore, take shareholder questions. Nic, are there any questions?

John, I'll go over to the online portal first. We have a question from [ Joseph Martin ]. "How do new Board directors get selected? Never been asked by the Board if any shareholder wants to be on the Board or nominate anyone."

Okay. Thank you, [ Joseph ]. So firstly, I would say, anybody is entitled to nominate at any time to be a director of Telstra and as and when each AGM comes up. You can send in an application, notify the company secretary that you wish to be considered. So that's open to everyone. How are directors selected? Obviously, with great care. It's a very significant responsibility to be a director of a large company like Telstra. And we are as diligent as we possibly can be in trying to get a broad range of experience. So firstly, you obviously need detailed industry knowledge. It's an extremely technical industry. We need directors with deep domain experience who can understand every last nut and bolt of the issues that management are raising. Then you also need directors strong in areas of governance and financial governance, et cetera, to chair your audit committees and things like that. And then, which I think is increasingly important these days, you need several directors who bring a diverse range of views, opinions and backgrounds. So -- and diversity to me, without getting off topic, and obviously, gender is one, but it's just as important that you have a really diverse Board of thought and background and ways of approaching issues to challenge us. Otherwise, if we all look the same and think the same, then we'll tend to generate the same answer. So we've -- I've always tried to group the Board into those groups: Domain experts, really strong governance and discipline corporate -- around corporate metrics, et cetera, and then some really strong directors to challenge us, take the view of social responsibility to customer, employee and the like. So hopefully, we get a reasonable balance of that. And I think I'm very proud. I think it's the best Board I've worked with in a long time. I think we're in a very strong position.

That is a very good segue, John. We have a question from the ASA who are keen to hear from Bridget Loudon. The ASA supports -- and this is Mike Robey. "The ASA supports the election of the 2 nominated directors to the Board, but would be interested to hear from Ms. Loudon after her first year on the Board of one of the country's most complex businesses. She, as young entrepreneurial woman, has after all broken the mold as well as the glass door to the boardroom." So John, if you're okay, it would be great to hear from Bridget.

Thank you. Thank you, Nic, and thank you, Mr. Robey. Let me start by saying it will be wonderful to actually meet all of my Board colleagues in person one day. One of the reasons why I joined this Board is that Telstra has a really important role to play in the digitization of this country. On top of that, I think the scale of the digitization of the company itself is immense. What I've observed is that it's a Board and a management team that is truly committed to, I think, anticipating and preparing for the future. And that is, as you point out, no small task. And my views are very much encouraged, very welcome. And it is and continues to be a real privilege to be here.

Thanks, Bridget. We're enjoying having you on board and hope to meet you in person one of these days as well rather than via Teams. John, there are no further online questions for item 3, and we'll now go to the phone questions. Operator, are there any phone questions for this item?

Chairman, there are no phone questions at this time.

Okay. Great. Well, John, that concludes the question session for this item.

Great. Thanks, Nic. I would just like to formally add that it's going to be daunting task joining any Board of a large company. And I think Bridget has made an outstanding start and a tremendous contribution to the company. Bridget's already a first-class director, and we're very lucky to have her. So shareholders, we have now finalized our discussion of item 3. So if you haven't already done so, please submit your votes for items 3A and 3B. And I will now then move to items 4 and 5 on today's agenda, which relate to the allocation of equity to the CEO, Andy Penn, under Telstra's fiscal year '21 Executive Variable Remuneration Plan or EVP and the adoption of our 2021 remuneration report. Details of the proposed grants to the CEO under item 4 are set out in the Notice of Meeting. In summary, the number of restricted shares and performance rights to be granted was based on the dollar value of the CEO's individual EVP outcome. That individual EVP outcome for the CEO was determined taking into consideration both Telstra's performance during the 2021 financial year against the specific measures set by the Board as well as his individual performance. The Board, other than Andy Penn, of course, considers the CEO's total remuneration package for the 2021 financial year, including the proposed grants under the fiscal year '21 EVP, to be appropriate in all the circumstances and recommends shareholders vote in favor of items 4A and 4B. Item 5 provides an opportunity for shareholders to comment on and ask questions about our 2021 remuneration report. And while the vote on this item is advisory, the Board takes the outcome of the vote into consideration when reviewing Telstra's remuneration practices and policies. The Board recommends that shareholders vote in favor of item 5, the adoption of our remuneration report. Items 4 and 5 will be voted on separately. But as they both relate to remuneration-related matters, we'll similarly deal with the discussion of the 2 items together to further assist with the efficient conduct of the meeting for the benefit of all shareholders today. So the proxy and direct voting position for items 4 and 5 are being shown now on your screen. As indicated in the Notice of Meeting, I intend to vote all available proxies in favor of the grants to the CEO and the adoption of the rem report. So if you have any questions regarding items 4 or 5, please submit these online now or raise your hand on the phone line. I will be concluding the meeting at the end of this question session. So if you have any final questions you'd like to ask about your company that are relevant to shareholders as a whole, please also ask those now as well. Before moving to take your questions, we'll address 2 issues on the topic of the remuneration, which were raised by shareholders before the meeting.

Thanks, John. We received a few questions from shareholders, as you say, about pay ratios. One shareholder asked, "Does the company have a view on the ratio of highest to lowest salaries?"

Yes. Thank you for that question. The pay ratio issue sounds like a seductively simple concept, but it's actually not because, firstly, you have to define exactly what is executive remuneration when it's part in cash, part in shares, and the share values go up and down. So remuneration can go up or down. Not by anything the company is paid additionally, but simply by the movement of share prices. And remember that 2/3 of Andy's remuneration is variable. And the previous year, his remuneration actually went down by 26%. So while we support transparency, you really need to be cautious as to just throwing around ratios. So they can be very misleading if there isn't a standardized approach, which enables them to be compared on a consistent basis. That said, a straight answer to your question. In the U.S. and the U.K., where that sort of -- that information is actually published, in the U.S., that multiple is about 300x. In the U.K., it's about 190 to 200. There is no data in Australia, where it's not mandatorily reported. But it is far, far lower. And Andy's compensation is no more than around 50x the average national wage, which is at the low end of the scale in Australia. The Board obviously benchmarks all employee remuneration, including the CEO's, against the market to try to make sure that we are paying appropriately and fairly. And we are very comfortable that Telstra's CEO pay ratio is modest when compared to other similar sized Australian companies, let alone global markets like the U.K. and the U.S.A.

Thanks, John. So we've received a shareholder question asking, "Why is it proposed for the CEO to receive such an excessive amount of shares and performance rights when, one, the Telstra share price has hovered around $3 for several years; two, his salary is already more than generous; three, when a customer -- Telstra customer service is outsourced overseas, i.e., the Philippines; and four, in light of the current volatile employment climate when thousands of people in Australia are without work and thus have no income?"

Thank you. Look, I'm very conscious that the issue of executive compensation can be divisive, and it's actually a matter of fundamental philosophy for some people. However, the reality is we live in a world where the search for talent is global and it's very competitive. Having the best management team in place delivers superior performance, and that translates to superior returns for shareholders. And the best managers are simply not going to come and work for Telstra if they can earn far more elsewhere. As a result, the Board has to ensure that we do attract and maintain the best talent we possibly can and that we will reward them competitively but fairly. And both I and the Board think that Andy's remuneration outcome for the last year is entirely appropriate. His remuneration is linked to company performance and is structured to align with long-term shareholder value, as you've seen with the T22 and now T25 strategies. And this year's outcome reflects really strong delivery against that agreed strategy. Andy has done an outstanding job leading our company through the uncharted waters of COVID and supporting our people and customers through these challenging times on top of delivering strong financial performance. So Nic, I think that concludes the prelodged questions, and thank you to our shareholders who submitted those questions. And I'll now take any questions shareholders may have on items 4 and 5 as well as any remaining questions on the earlier items of business. So Nic, are there any further questions?

John, we have no specific questions on item 4 and 5 in the portal. We do have one further general question. So I'll go to that first and then we can check the phone lines. So in relation to the additional question, it's from [ Reginald Holmes ], who's come back again. He says, "I'd like my previous question answered in relation to the fact that Royal National Park is not in regional Australia. It is in Southern Sydney."

Well, I hope I did answer it actually. We have, by far, the most extensive mobile network coverage of any company in Australia, and we are continuing to invest huge sums of money in further improving it every single year. Will there be an odd spot anywhere where mobile coverage isn't perfect? Of course, there will. But we continue to work on closing out those sort of soft spots in the existing network and extending the network further at the same time. So I'm very confident that we're doing more than the rest of the industry put together to address your issue.

Thanks, John. So we're going to now move to the phone lines. Operator, do we have any questions on the phones?

Chairman, we have a question from [ Peter Starr ].

Yes. In relation to -- John, in relation to Andy's performance and bonuses, I guess the issue here for most shareholders, and I guess it's been raised, is that they look at the previous CEO when he departed, and the shares were at $6.60. And that hovered in that $3 thing. Now I understand strategies and everything else. And while nobody grudges the CEO getting performance shares and things like that, I think the real question for shareholders is that they look at how their shares have performed since David Thodey left, Andy Penn assumed the mantle, and yes, in that respect. And the other question on that is that I know that Andy has a lot of -- seems to be in The Australian every second week in either how good he pays and everything. I don't know. Are they paying you anything for that, Andy? I just want to know. You seem to be in The Australian newspaper a lot.

Thanks, [ Peter ]. Well, I mean, firstly, the share price is reflective of more than just management performance. As, I think, we've discussed many, many times, the government's move to create the nbn took away half of Telstra's entire business. It is totally impractical to think that our share price would not be impacted by that impact of $3.5 billion, and that's on top of the close to $3 billion of competitive attrition with voice and SMSs and all the other revenues that the company used to achieve. So I can absolutely assure you, [ Peter ], if Andy and the team haven't done an outstanding job, the shares will be a hell a lot lower than they are today. So that's how the Board judges Andy and his team's performance. We look at the challenges ahead of them, which are created by competition or government fiat or whatever it may be. And the ambitious programs that are set to counter those address those and make the company a better place. And the team have done an extraordinarily good job of doing that, led by Andy. As I say, the share price won't be near where it is now if that hadn't been so successful. As to whether Andy is getting paid, no, I don't. I'm absolutely confident, and he can speak for himself. But I'm obviously confident he is not. As a leading CEO of a critical ASX200 company that is a fundamental part of the nation's infrastructure, he obviously gets asked a lot of questions. And he's very generous with his time in answering those questions from reporters or the media generally, which we also think is very good for Telstra because it gets the message out to the broader community and all the good stuff that's going on in Telstra that they might otherwise not be aware of. So we fully support his engagement with media.

Chairman, there are no further questions on the telephone at this time.

Thanks, John. We do have some further questions coming in through the portal. So we'll go back to the portal now. The first one is from [ Ian Albert Maxwell ]. "How many shares and performance rights have been approved for Mr. Penn since he became CEO?"

Well, I don't have that information. It's published in every annual report. So if you care to go back through the annual reports from that time, you will see what that number is. But I don't, off the top of my head, have the total over quite a few years that Andy has been CEO.

Thanks, John. Another question from Mr. [ Maxwell ]. "Since we have voted on similar resolutions at past general meetings and are likely to do so in the future, could the annual report please report on how many shares and performance rights have been awarded in past years?"

I don't think that's appropriate, but the information is there in each year on exactly what was awarded and granted to and vested to Andy. So any shareholder can track it themselves. And I think if we start publishing even more complicated tables of everything going back 5 or 10 years, the rem report's complicated enough already, and I think it would overcomplicate it even further.

John, we've got a question from Emily Cross. "It's lovely to hear what is paid to directors. But what do you pay the task force scattered in third world countries and young people who work in Telstra shops who represent the face of Telstra to the public?"

Thank you for the question. We pay those people well and appropriately in all areas of the company. And we have a very active HR team that are continually monitoring equality of pay by position, gender diversity ratios, all those sort of things and ensuring, in particular, that overseas employees receive appropriate benefits and terms and conditions for working for Telstra, irrespective of where they work. And we're very proud and comfortable that we have a good remuneration policy right across the whole company, irrespective of level in the company and irrespective of where those people work.

John, I'm going to go back to the phones. We do have another question on the phone. Operator, could you introduce the caller, please?

Chairman, we have a question from [ Peter Starr ].

It's more a question to Andy. Andy, I don't know if your right-hand person, Michael, is -- if they're listening, who is supposed to be heading up customer service and the other things to do with customers and fixing customer complaints. But one thing they could look at is that in areas of Sydney where you say you have 5G, there seems to be still some problems. And maybe somebody can come back to me. You certainly have my number, and so does Michael. And the other issue in relation to that is that when you go into the Telstra app and the point system we have and all those offers and things, the 1-day specials, Michael, sometimes when they're flashed up and you try to order them, you don't have the stock or whatever. It's not a very good look. And the other thing on that is that we should be looking -- if we're encouraging those rewards and things, we need to overhaul and make certain that you're not going to lose your points. You don't lose your points with flybuys anymore because the backlash from the points holder and the same with the Qantas points as well, there's no expiry. So I think that's a thing going forward, Andy and Michael, you need to look at. I think it's a very important thing, and you need to make certain that the deals and things we're getting -- we haven't been able to go to sporting events, concerts or any of that nonsense. So I don't know why we've had it on there. I understand COVID. I'm fully vaccinated, by the way. And we've got to get through this thing. It's terrible. It's been a terrible, terrible thing. We've been locked down here in Sydney for over 100-and-some days. And I know in Melbourne, it hasn't been good either. I hope this is the last AGM where we have to do this technology. It is much better to hold and -- face-to-face meetings. It's only once a year. Would you agree with that?

Yes. Maybe just on that last point, we -- and then hand over to Andy as you addressed the question to him. Of course, we prefer a real AGM. Setting this up virtually is not an easy task, and it, I think, diminishes a large part of the value of the AGM. So we are 100% behind you. But obviously, we are subject to the same impact of COVID as everybody else. Andy, do you want to respond briefly to the question addressed to yourself?

Yes. Of course. Thanks very much, [ Peter ], and thanks for your interest and questions as always. Look, a couple of things. I think on the point around the Telstra Plus program, there isn't any intention to remove the points. But I'd note your comment there. On the availability of offers and specials, there have been ongoing sporting and entertainment events, notwithstanding, obviously, the restrictions imposed by COVID, whether they be in both of them, in Victoria or Queensland. In fact, literally yesterday, we had availability of the tickets for the upcoming Billie Eilish contest -- concert in Sydney. They sold out in 10 minutes. And so it is a case that with specials, invariably, they become very popular. And there are a finite amount of -- whether they're tickets for concerts or whether they're handsets or devices, there are ultimately limited supply. That's what makes them special offers. So unfortunately, we will sell out from time to time. On your point about coverage, we've got coverage to 75% of the population of Australia. Our focus so far has been to get the breadth of that population coverage. Our focus now is to try to start to build in-depth and infield coverage as well, and that will increase the density of that coverage. But if you're -- if you can advise us of any particular location where you feel that you're not getting coverage where you should, then we can certainly have a look at that as well. It's always helpful for us to get that input, and our engineers are constantly looking at the network and making sure we know where we need to continue to build and provide the coverage and the depth of coverage and the density as well. But thanks, [ Peter ], as always, for your active interest.

Thanks, Andy. Thanks, John. Much to my daughter's chagrin, I actually missed out on Billie Eilish yesterday. So that was sad. I didn't realize it had gone in 10 minutes, very popular. Thank you, Andy and John. John, I don't think we have any further questions on the portal or phone line as I can tell at this point in time. So I will close the questions there.

Great. Thanks a lot, Nic, and thank you, shareholders and everyone who has asked a question. So that means we have finished our discussions of items 4 and 5. So please submit your vote for these items now as well. And shareholders, that concludes the formal business of today's meeting. So if you haven't already done so, please submit your votes now. The poll will remain open for a further 10 minutes to enable shareholders to submit their votes, and the results of the poll on items 3 to 5 will be available later today and can be obtained by visiting the ASX or our website. I, therefore, now declare the meeting closed, subject to finalization of the poll. And on behalf of the Board, we thank you, shareholders, for joining us today. Thank you, and all the best.