Morning, everybody. Welcome to the Accordant Group Annual Shareholders' Meeting. It's nice to see you all here today, particularly some of the shareholders that I know well from days gone by. For my sins, I'm a skier and, you know, one of the things we say is, "There's no friends on powder days." That means you just have to go out and charge into it and get your fill, as it were. I sort of feel a bit the same as Chair of the meeting today. There's kind of no friends when you've got shareholders not making any money. We are doing our best and persevering through and obviously look forward to some questions from people later on to test us. Formally, on behalf of Jason and the team and the Board, welcome to our shareholders' meeting. I'm told that the notice of meeting has been circulated to everybody and we have a quorum, so I now declare the meeting open. Those of you online, as I look down the barrel of the camera now, I welcome also. Obviously, you all know that it's being held by MUFG. Otherwise, you wouldn't be seeing me. All the documents are nearby your mouse on the screen there. Online, you can start asking questions now. We won't answer those questions until we get to the moment in the meeting when we're asking them. They'll be moderated. If there's anything too difficult, we will scream and probably not answer it. No. We actually will answer everything. I think at times like this, it's important that we give every opportunity. If it takes a while, bear with us. We will waddle our way through it. Online, if you've got any problems with the tech, there's an 0800 number, 0800- 200- 2020. As I said, I'm Simon Bennett. I'm the Chair. With us, we've got Simon Hull, who was founder and still a large shareholder, Jason Cherrington, who will be speaking to you, Nick Simcock, who is up for re-election and will have a talk to you along with Richard Stone, and Bella at the end, who will not be speaking to you, but if you have a tricky technical accounting question, we will put it her way. I thought with today's speech coming up and kind of wondering what might be helpful to the shareholders, I plugged it into ChatGPT, put our results in and what our comms were. Within seconds, I had a 400-word speech to read to you today. I guess the interesting thing about that is how much has changed in 12 months, right? You know, I think for us personally, we'd heard about AI and we'd heard about this stuff, but actually to have it on your phone, mine's Gemini because I'm Apple. Yeah, look, it's incredibly powerful. I decided against that. If I'd done that, I would be redundant. Let me know how I go and maybe there's a future for next year. On a slightly more serious note, it's an interesting intersection really that we're at. It's a question that businesses are facing every day. It's a question that Jason and his team have been asking. The board's encouraged by the thinking and the drive to understand what efficiencies we can gain and how we can better serve our clients by embracing this new technology. As you would understand, we've been super focused this year on taking as much cost out of the business as we can, but without compromising our offer. We've been operating in what could best be described, I think, as an ugly environment: rising unemployment, reduced government spending, reduced private sector spending, and a super weak economy. I think we've navigated it pretty well under the circumstances. With our customers and with candidates, really, we have to continue to make the case for our relevance. Absolutely no doubt, we need to deliver some better earnings to you, our shareholders. We're super mindful of the fact that we're not paying any dividends and our share price has been thrashed. I introduced the board. There's a lot of shareholders at this table and a big one at the end. I can assure you that driving efficiencies, driving revenue, is front of mind at every single meeting. Of course, the biggest cost we have is our people. It's a fine line. We could certainly halve our people costs, but then we will reduce the capacity of our engine by half. We are very thoughtful of how much we reduce without reducing the horsepower for when better times arrive. Notwithstanding all of that, I think our brands and our people and the people that represent the brands are super valuable and super respected in the market. We do great work for our clients. Really, the landscape is not allowing us to prosper how we would like. I think we have the right people. I'm sure we have the right people. We're working hard to deliver a better year ahead than what we delivered last year. I sort of say this, and I guess you could challenge me on it because I'm grateful for the support of the shareholders, but, you know, equally, I guess, you know, what does that mean? Possibly doesn't feel like you have heaps of options as shareholders, but we are, you know, we are grateful for the support and the support of our bank as we navigate what are pretty difficult times. I haven't, I've kept that pretty, pretty brief. I'm not talking about the operating performance. I'll leave that to Jason. As I said earlier, really, really happy to answer questions, as many as you can hit us with towards the end, which I think is probably a good use of time. On then to agenda item two, as we flick the screen over. Look, we want to note the financial statements for year-end 31 March 2025. As stated in the annual report, the directors resolved not to declare a dividend year ending 31 March 2025. That's it from me for the moment. I'll hand over to Jason, and he can give you his report. Thank you, Simon. As I was pulling into the car park this morning, I bumped into one of our key clients who also wants to talk about AI for about five minutes. Quite interesting that, unsurprising, I guess, that it's a topic on everybody's mind. Probably what was more notable in that conversation was the view that our leadership team in Accordant and the teams seem quite upbeat and full of energy. I found that quite surprising, maybe because we know we're in challenging times. I was actually going to start my address today acknowledging the fact that this is a prolonged and frustrating trading cycle for our clients, for our people, and for shareholders, clearly. The way in which we lead through this business is full of energy and positivity. It doesn't mean that we ignore those factors, but we're certainly not dwelling on the economic states and we're finding pathways through. It's the only way for us to lead this business, and it's the way that we'll continue to lead this business. For Accordant, whilst it was obviously a year of challenge in FY 2025, it was also one of recalibration and quiet progress. While the numbers and context in our annual report at a macro level reflect the strain of what is a persistent market instability, at a micro level, I think the annual report actually shows and tells a story of financial discipline, operational grit, and an unwavering determination, maybe once again recognized by the conversation I had this morning from our people that really want to see through what has been one of the toughest environments that we've had to endure for many years. Whilst today, I will summarize our performance for last year as we announced in May, and obviously the context and the financials and the market we will cover, the focus is more around how we're positioning ourselves for financial sustainability, recovery, and ultimately growth once again. Straight into FY 2025 and an overview. We'll start with the headline figures. Revenue came in at $165.2 million. That's down 22% on the prior year. Net loss after tax was $2.9 million. Whilst, yes, that was an improvement from the prior year, you remember a $10 million loss, the reality is it was a nonetheless unremarkable financial result and reflected in our negative operating cash flow performance. Subsequently, and understandably and regrettably, no dividend was declared. Less than ideal, obviously, but reflects our prudent approach until performance is realized from a more certain economic trajectory. Despite these results, we did make meaningful progress in pulling what were available levers to us in an orderly and, I think, timely manner. We reduced operating expenses by $6 million. That's a combination of property consolidation, resizing some of our support teams, and reducing consultant headcount, but without losing key capability or competency or capacity required to manage what is the current demand. I know we spoke a lot last year around not cutting into muscle. Whilst we have had to cut deeper than we originally anticipated, that directive still remains the same. We still retain the capacity and capability to see the upside as we come through this economic cycle. Of equal importance, we maintained a strong banking relationship with ASB. You'll note in the annual report, our facilities extend out to April 2026, and we're currently in the process of extending those agreements further. As you'd expect, the conversations with ASB aren't waiting for a year-end or waiting for a trigger. We have continual conversations. We're aligned. We're aligned in our desire to see net debt reduce, clearly, to more favorable gearing metrics, support working capital for growth, and obviously reduce our interest costs over time. I just want to be clear, this is a really important and active work stream for us. We avoided any delinquent debt last year as our teams focused on winning good quality business. These actions aren't small in impact, but they actually form the foundation for what will be a stronger FY 2026. As we right-sized our operations, we also focused on sectors that we thought had greater strategic value and those with longer-term robustness: infrastructure, health, professional services at the more senior level, and, of course, executive-level recruitment and non-executive-level recruitment. I'll elaborate further on the progress that we've made in both of those areas in a moment. Permanent hiring was subdued across both public and private sector, and probably more notably, our contractor book reduced as clients acted on what is usually the first line of cost control when it comes to reducing costs and headcount reduction. Pleased to say that AWF delivered improved profitability despite a more challenging environment, profitability year on year. That was with greater efficiency and focus on winning, once again, good quality business. Madison built strength in mid-senior recruitments, as I mentioned at last year's AGM. We further launched a greenfield health channel. That work within the health sector has secured Madison a place on two key panels already within the health sector. Health N Z's payroll-only contractor panel, that's a consolidation of suppliers from 20 down to 2, of which Madison are now 1. We also, for the first time in our history, are on Health NZ' s clinical recruitment panel. It is a modest start, but I think this will help us work closer across varying types of roles as Health New Zealand go through their own transformational changes, and we will see the opportunity on the other side. Madison's growth in contingent solutions mirrors our clients' demand for greater flexibility in the medium term as they work through their own resourcing and their own capacity challenges. Last year, I also mentioned Hobson Leavy was seeing more positive signs. You may recall after a slow start to the year, slower Q1 than we anticipated. That momentum has continued across both senior and non-executive search. JacksonStone in Wellington certainly felt the biggest impacts of government spending reductions in permanent and contract hires. I don't think there's any great surprises there. Finally, Absolute IT hardest hit overall nationally, but we still retain key capability. We stayed engaged in the tech sector, and we are positioning still for the rebound that we know is not necessarily an if, but when it will come. That's a quick summary of the prior year. As I said, the results came out in May. I'm sure you've all read the annual report and certainly are well aware of the economy. We don't want to dwell in that. I do expect FY 2026 to be both a year of rebuild and a year of better financial performance than FY 2025. Whilst I say that, I think it's going to be the latter part of FY 2026, and many indicators point to the same. Certainly, I think normal conditions for us and what we are used to seeing so far as performance financially is concerned, you know, is FY 2027. I'm sure you'd be aware, once again, of the many indicators that point to the same. If we look back at March 2025 quarter, unemployment rates reached 5.1%. That's 156,000 people out of work. To put that in context, that's a 53% increase in just two years. When I look at our 22% revenue decline, that's not just a number. That actually reflects a seismic shift in the labor market over that period of time. Unemployment, of course, now reached 5.2%. That's for the June 2025 quarter. I think the jury is out whether or not that is the peak or whether we've got one more potential turn to go. My only comment on the 5.2% is that the labor market contribution number of people in the labor market reduced, which does give a view that maybe that 5.2% is slightly bigger than has been currently reported. Whilst the economy is expected to lift at some stage in FY 2026, the path ahead clearly isn't even. If you look at ANZ's business outlook, it tracks a few months of improvements at the back end of last year in employment intentions, and then it dipped as we came into this fiscal year. That just tells me there's clearly nervousness around when to hire in the economy and once again across all sectors. Whilst much remains unchallenged in the broader labor market, there are still some positives to note. Once again, we're not dwelling on the economic challenges. Moreover, we're actively preparing, as we should, for better conditions. In AWF, we've got positive indicators. We've seen significant increased tender activity and preferred supplier contract awards. This is where rationalization is much more common, and that plays to our national footprint, our expertise in certain disciplines that align to growth in the market, traffic management, infrastructure probably being the most relevant. In white collar, we've seen a noticeable increase in senior appointments as boards prepare for what is anticipated to be a change in momentum and ensuring they've got the right people in the right place to capitalize on it. Our approach in current times remains really clear. We're focusing on high-value roles, but we're also focusing on longer-term contingent workforce solutions that give our client the flexibility that they need. We're aligning with relevant sectors and resilient sectors, and we're working with clients that we know have got good ongoing work in their pipeline. We are not compromising on our health and safety, as you would expect, but we are also leveraging and seeing an opportunity to do this more now, our brands across the whole of our portfolio because we're starting to see clients ask for a complete solution. It's been a long time coming. I think it was probably the thesis of how Accordant Group was going to start to be built, looking at both white and blue collar, and working with clients that had a desire to work with one or two partners nationally that could deliver that through infrastructure capability and a good pricing model. We're seeing more and more of those conversations happening now, and it happens to be more in the starting from the blue collar space, but expanding out. You know, meetings where we're bringing in Hobson Leavy into a conversation. We're bringing Madison into a conversation, Absolute IT, and wrapping it up in good commercial terms. As New Zealand's largest recruitment business, and we still are, our scale gives us exposure to more opportunity than niche or regionally focused agencies. In this environment, our focus is making sure we continue to look for good quality business, securing good quality engagements. We've seen competitors make difficult decisions that have allowed them or have pushed them into a place to drop margins. We know some of those levels are unsustainable. We've chosen not to take that race to the bottom because it's no race at all. Instead, we back our quality of service. Whilst, yes, a cheaper hiring solution may be a short-term fix, it's ultimately the expense we think of securing quality talent. Especially when you think of what's happening in New Zealand now, organizations need exceptional talent to navigate economic recovery, workforce constraints, and rapid technological change. The all-of-government procurement framework has unfortunately moved in favor of appointing multiple subpanels now, moving away from quality measures and more around price, not in all areas, but in some areas. I guess with nearly 20% of New Zealand's workforce in the public sector, the government quite rightly has been seeking savings. However, in a tough labor market, sometimes there's a belief that good talent is more readily available. It's not. It's less available because good talent is locked down and more, you know, less likely to move. Couple that with an organization's reduction in their own internal team's capability and the capacity to recruit, then I think the quality of service provided by a recruitment provider has to be even better and even more reliant. Yes, once again, short-term savings on paper, but I see potential suboptimal outcomes for everyone, unless some of those things change. Maybe a reason why we've seen many smaller recruitment businesses either pull out of New Zealand, you know, or unfortunately financially have to close. We're not in that place so far as our markets are concerned. We're much broader, stronger, and once again, we're not chasing a race to the bottom. At the executive level, Hobson Leavy continues to deliver really solid results. Their top and bottom line growth has been strong so far this year, and we've added two new partners to meet that demand. Our clients are extremely confident in Hobson Leavy's extensive international reach, proving that you don't need to engage an offshore recruitment partner to either repatriate or seek the best global talent available. I think those clients have authentically chosen to buy New Zealand Inc. because it's been proven to be effective time and time again. The irony of offshore tax domiciled businesses doing an international search only to place the local talent is not lost, I think, on any of us. In the blue collar space, AWF once again is benefiting from this supplier consolidation effort. Our reputation for safety, reach, and reliability, I think, has put us in a really strong position. Once again, we're seeing different stakeholders get involved in that process, so not just procurements or price-driven, more about quality outcomes for the entire business. We're proud of AWF's operational excellence, health and safety record, and their efficiency. This year reflects, I think, years of leveraging the organizational structure and investing in technological smarts. With more infrastructure projects advancing to spades in the ground, you'll see some of the quite outstanding numbers of projects that have now got budget assigned in that space. I think we've positioned ourselves really well with clients that we know are going to start to deliver, and we expect daily volumes to grow in that space before Christmas. All whilst delivering really good health and safety outcomes are super important to us and give our clients confidence, you know, at a time when they need it the most. Madison's entry into healthcare, it was a strategic move. I know we've been here before, but we've done it in a slightly different way. Despite sector-wide constraints, we have laid some solid foundations. We've built some operational capability. We've got strong brand awareness, and we're starting to build some really good trusted client relationships. I think over the next 12 months, we will start to focus on sourcing high-demand international talent, expanding our candidate networks, and strengthening our own immigration advisory capability internally. Madison 's volume and temporary work has ticked upwards. We've noticed more demand for support roles, which is surprising as organizations start to creak after months of underinvestment, maybe years of underinvestment and right-sizing. In JacksonStone, we're also seeing a steady increase in contractor numbers during the first quarter of this financial year. Obviously, off a relatively low base, but that's after two years of decline. There are some signals that things are happening. I'll go back to my comments at the start. The path forward is uneven. We find that we move two months. We think that things are moving. Something happens either locally or geopolitically, and everybody's confidence drops. Demand for specialist skill sets across Madison, Absolute IT, and JacksonStone do remain measured at present, but I only have to look at the net migration numbers, primarily younger people, highly qualified, highly talented leaving the country. We know there is going to be an acute talent shortage when the upswing comes. Once again, we're preparing for that accordingly. On the technology front, it wouldn't be once again an AGM if we didn't talk about AI. We've made meaningful progress in our digitization and automation across both white and blue collar. Our next step is now embedding AI assistants and agents into our core operating platforms. This frees up our people to focus on what they do best, which is building relationships and finding the right fits, and allowing the machine to do all that work behind the scenes to allow that to go at a faster pace and more effective pace. The first businesses we'll be rolling this out for are JacksonStone, Absolute IT, and Madison. We will work our way through the remaining two businesses as we go. Human touch required at varying stages of the recruitment process, we know, is a key component to building and sustaining any organizational culture fit. We are investing in areas that we should, but we've not drunk the Kool-Aid on AI. I think that is the right tempered approach for us. I know the absence of a dividend is disappointing. Once again, it reflects our commitment to longer-term sustainability. We are laying the groundwork for recovery, and we're confident that patience is going to be rewarded. It is much longer than we anticipated and certainly than I anticipated last year. I don't think I'm alone in that regard. To the leadership team and the wider Accordant family, some of whom are here today, a lot of them are not here today because they're out on the road hustling as they should. I'm sure you'd be pleased to know. I do thank you for your resilience, your adaptability, and your professionalism. You've weathered one of the toughest years in recent memory, and I think you've done so with integrity. We talk a lot about energy. I talked about it at the start. Energy for us is everything. I applaud the way in which you're showing up with that energy every day to do what you do best. I say thank you to Simon and to the board for what I would describe as your critical colleague approach to all that we do, which is appreciated by myself and my leadership team. I hope I've not sugarcoated the year or our focus or what's currently happening in the economy because it has been one of the toughest markets since the 1990s. Our confidence does remain strong. Our credibility, our service levels have not dropped, nor have our price margins. We feel that all of those things are intact. We do think that we're well positioned to meet New Zealand's workforce needs now and more importantly in the future. I do believe FY 2026 financial will be better, and I think FY 2027 will be stronger still. Thanks for your time. Appreciate it. Very good. Thanks, Jason. I sort of think I picked up one bit when you said the recovery later in 2026. I think it was FY 2026, not so just for the record. Let's now move to the resolutions. These are outlined in the notice of meeting. They're all ordinary resolutions, so simple majority required. Voting is conducted by way of a poll. The results of the vote will be announced via the NZX. If you've already voted, then you don't have to do anything. Jointly, you've got the electronic voting card, as you see on the screen. You need to click Get Voting Card within the platform, punch in your shareholder or proxy number to validate, and then, you know, for, against, or abstain. Again, meeting guide if required. For those of you in the room, you can see people with a briefcase to put the votes in. If you haven't got one, please raise your hand and we will get you on. Without further ado, we'll introduce Nick to the podium to address you. Thank you, Simon. Thank you, Simon. Tēnā koutou katoa, and thank you for the opportunity to speak today. I'm Nick Simcock, and I've had the privilege of serving on the Accordant Board since 2017. I bring some strong sector experience nationally and internationally and a broader government perspective to the Board. I'm seeking your support for re-election because I remain committed to helping navigate this company through what is undoubtedly the most challenging labor market and economic environment we've seen, probably since about 1991. There's no sugarcoating, as Jason would say, and our recent financial performance and share price certainly don't reflect the quality of our people, our brands, or the value that we have or will deliver. The economic headwinds, coupled with the labor market conditions and subdued business confidence, have significantly impacted our sector, but they've not changed my belief in the underlying strength of this business. What gives me confidence is this: we have strong customer relationships, nationally respected brands, and a team led by Jason that continues to show remarkable resilience and professionalism. While external conditions have held us back, they've also sharpened our strategic and operational focus on cash flow discipline, margin protection, talent management, operational efficiencies, and importantly, health and safety. During my time on the Board, I've brought a mix of governance experience, people leadership, and some sector insight. I've actively been involved through this period, staying close to strategy, chairing the Remuneration and Nominations Committee, and working with the Board and Jason to focus on what we can control. Looking ahead, I firmly believe that Accordant is well positioned to rebound strongly when the cycle returns, as it inevitably will. When it does, those companies with a solid foundation and disciplined leadership will perform or will outperform. My focus is ensuring that Accordant is one of those. Thank you for your ongoing support, and I look forward to serving Accordant through this recovery and beyond. Ngā mihi nui. Very good. Thanks, Nick. As of the proxies received, 96.58% are in favor of this resolution. Any questions, we'll address at the end. Now we'll move to reappointment of Richard Stone by Richard.[unintelligible] Thank you, Simon, and good morning to those of you online and those of you here. It's nice to be with you. My name is Richard Stone. I joined the board of Accordant in January 2022. I had previously spent 40 years at the coalface in the industry, the latest role having been as a founder and Chairman of JacksonStone & Partners, now one of the Accordant Group. I think many of the messages I want to convey to you this morning are ones that Nick has reflected, Simon's reflected, Jason has reflected, and some of those of you in this room who've been in the industry. You know, you've been, as I have, you've been through all of the economic ups and downs, share market crashes, GFCs. Nothing has been as enduring as the current economic cycle. I think it speaks enormously of those within the Accordant Group that we have remained the course. Alongside my role in JacksonStone and more lately with Accordant, I've had a number of other roles that have got some pertinence to Accordant. I was President of the Wellington Chamber of Commerce for some years, and I was on the Council of Business New Zealand. Both those roles were fundamentally predicated on working alongside and assisting businesses being profitable and enduring. I think the things that strike me in this business are the enduring nature of many of the strong client relationships and candidate relationships. I think those are the things that are going to give us the strength that when the market improves, we will have an opportunity to capitalize. I don't think any of us had anticipated the prolonged impact of COVID or reduced government spending or increased unemployment or of negative business sentiment. I think the impact of that has clearly been significant on you as shareholders and on the group. The one thing that gives me optimism is the resilience, the adaptability, and the commitment of the team. I would welcome your support in continuing to be able to work with everybody to ensure that we get back to the financial results that will please you as shareholders, and I hope I have the opportunity to do so. Thank you. Great. Thanks, Richard. Richard also said 96.58% in favor so far of the proxies received. Again, questions at the end. I didn't ask you to vote for or against Nick, but I hope you saw that on the screen or see that on your page. Also with Richard, vote for, against, or abstain. The next one, we're up to auditors' fees resolution. We had an ARC meeting yesterday. It's kind of a mad resolution because we're resolving to fix them. We're asking you to let us fix the fees, but we haven't actually yet decided whether we'll use the same accountants, but we probably will because they did a pretty good job. They did drop our price. We ask you to vote to allow us to authorize the directors to fix the auditors' fees and expenses. Slightly more support for this at 96.66% at the moment. Vote for, against, or abstain. Agenda item five is an update. It's a bit of a sad one really because the scheme is on foot, but we haven't been using it because with the downward gap-facing share price, it's not that helpful. A number of our team are in the scheme and it continues to operate. We are looking forward to them benefiting from some dividends again in the future. On to agenda item six. We will have the room first. Jason, how many questions have you got online, if any? None. Yeah, cool. That's good. You're scratching, Ross, or is that a question? Yeah, okay. Let's go to the floor. If you could just tell us first your name and confirm that you're a shareholder before you ask the question, please. Yes, is that right? I got the mic right? Yeah, you're doing well. My name's David Tennison. I've been a shareholder for nine years, would you believe? Wow. I came into it. My share broker approached me and said, "Hey, look at these guys. I like what you're doing." I still do, which is why I'm still a shareholder. This is actually my first Accordant AGM. I thought it was important to come up because it's been a difficult time. I think there will be others in my position as well. I counted up the capital I've put into the company because I bought into the company more than once. I figured out that 85% of it has disappeared, which I'm not happy about. I wanted to make the point that I haven't come here to whinge because I realize we're in a difficult position and I want to focus on how we're getting out of it, not how we own there, if you like. My main comment on the situation is I think the management's been handling it well in the very difficult times. The one thing that's missing is that I do believe the company is short of capital given the earnings. I realize it's a difficult position because the market capitalization is somewhere under $10 million, I believe. The net debt of the company is, what, getting on towards mid-20s, $28 million or something. It's a difficult situation to be in. I have the strong feeling that this company does need more capital put into it. I actually approached the Chief Financial Officer a couple of months ago. I gave him a call and said, "I've got these shares and I'm amazingly nice to be in the top 46 shareholders. That's not nothing." I said to him, "I'm prepared to put in rather more money than the shares are worth to make sure the company keeps going." My main reason for coming here is I wanted not to talk. I wanted to listen to what other shareholders wanted to say because I believe the company does have a good future. A lot of the problems would be solved if there was a bit more capital in the company. I realize the difficulties I've pointed out with the capitalization and the amount of debt you've got. I sort of wanted to appeal to other shareholders speaking after me as to whether they still support the company and whether they're in a position to actually put more capital into it. That's really my plea, I suppose. I think I might leave it at that. Okay. I appreciate the comment, and I'll see if we can find some other shareholders that might answer that question along with asking a question maybe. Particularly, I'd be interested in Simon Hull's position because although I've got quite a few shares, he's got rather more than I have. Any sort of capital raising would obviously be very contingent on his support. I'd be very interested in that. Are you directly asking Simon Hull to answer that question? Perhaps he might want to think about it. Perhaps I might want to hear from the other shareholders first. I'll see if we can hit him at the end. I mean, it's interesting that you raised it eight years ago and that your share broker told you to get into Accordant. You're actually in a situation now with all the, you know, in this, no disrespect to Shareholders' Association, more probably to the regulator, but unfortunately, no shareholders are able to recommend Accordant anymore. You know, that is the world that we live in. It's quite a change that people can't. It's pretty tough. Sure, we're not performing well, but it's pretty hard to get retail support of this part of the market, unfortunately. Yeah, thanks, Alan. I mean, and it's totally unrelated, but I thought that maybe it was you came to listen to hear what we're going to do. One of the things that's probably not that well understood is the fact that our services aren't actually used proportionately to the amount of hiring that's being done. We act alongside and for lots of direct employers in the place. At different stages of the cycle, they choose to use us more or less. That means that, let's say for, you know, choosing somebody, MUFG, that we're sitting in the room here now, look, they've just, they've probably got deep pockets. Maybe they will use us regardless. If you're a 100-person business or a 200-person business and you are trying to save money and there's a good amount of unemployment, there's a bunch of tools that you can use to do your recruitment. We go, are we going to ring Madison or the like? Yeah, maybe not. We get this, as the economy really gets hard and there's more unemployment, then, A, the client thinks a bit more about spending some money to get the right talent. They kind of think that it's a bit easier. Recruitment becomes amazingly transactional. Businesses can't do that forever, because the people, the talent, don't want to go and then work for them. I can tell you, as a parent with children in the workforce, the amount of CVs that they might put out to direct to employers who have got these people just sitting in, you know, keyboard jockeys, whacking ads up and not responding to people, or, you know, so the candidate gets a pretty crappy service. That transactional part is a function of this where we are in the economy. Of course, when people think it's important enough, they engage us. That's why we do well at Hobson Leavy because, guess what, you don't want to get to, you know, do a rough job on a CEO or a CFO because it's kind of one of the most important things that a board might do during the year, employ those people. I just thought it was worth noting that point that we're not, you know, we actually crash much harder in this sector than actually just the general economy because it's kind of an unfortunate negative leverage effect of people doing this transactional recruitment themselves. There are a bunch of tools that allow people to do that direct. So, are there any other questions? I just wanted to say, although my capital of 85% has disappeared, I'm fairly sure that the capability of our staff is not depleted by 85%. We've got good people, and some of them are here today. The tipping point of what I wanted to say was that I'd rather keep our people and do that with having a bit more capital rather than just use the idea of shedding staff to get the cost down because we're a company of intangible assets, if you want to look at it that way. The best intangible assets we've got are our people. Every employee that walks out the door, I think of that as some of the intangible assets disappearing. I'm hoping you'll be able to keep the intangible asset base at a good level. Yeah. I mean, one of the things that's helpful to us is we don't need to buy a lot of assets in this business. You're right. If we've got good people, if we hold them, then we're doing well. If we don't spend any capital next year, there's no downside for us. We're not a capital-intensive business. Debt, of course, is a relative thing. At a better stage of the cycle, when our earnings are better, the banks are trying to encourage us. They're giving us IMs of businesses for sale that we should buy. At this stage of the cycle, they're puckering somewhat, and they're saying, "Gee, we wanted you to have all that money, but we want some of it back now, possibly." It is just a relative thing. If you get your earnings right and you don't need the capital, then you, I'm not going to say sail through, but you get to that place again. We have, I mean, I sort of touched on that share scheme tongue tied. It's tough, right? This is the tough thing. There's a board. We see management. We see the leadership team. We observe closely what we're doing in the market, what the reputation is, and we care deeply that we're doing a decent job. The hardest job we have is to keep our people motivated and doing a decent job, remaining relevant for our clients, do some more business. To Jason's point around the energy, this is super important. It is not fun to come to work when you're not doing as much business. A lot of our people have incentivisation around, you know, that they earn more for the business and they get a bunch more themselves. It is a difficult time and a question. We are really focused on that. Although I gave you a very short speech, we care deeply about any restructure downwards, which is going to remove some billing people from the place. You may not have picked up Jason's talking about kind of more administrative functions and our people are not having got necessarily the level of support they have. We've just got to make sure they've got better tools so that they can still deliver well for our clients without necessarily somebody sitting in the desk next to them doing a bunch of admin. Alan, thank you. I was interested in David's view of the capital requirements. What he's saying effectively is, we're going to, if the capital is needed, it's going to be used up in expenses. I don't think that as a shareholders' association and knowing lots of small portfolio shareholders, that they would agree with that. It's a matter of downsizing, but taking the care that you obviously do over the assets that you're using and the staff that you're employing. We'd say, keep going on that. At some critical point, we'd be reluctant to put more money in if it's going to be used as expenses. Yeah, I mean, I think that we've got to make sure we don't have red ink. We've got to be cash positive. I temper my comments around debt's a relative thing as long as we're paying down debt or not burning cash in operations. That's what we're super focused on. Our approach, it's not rocket science, but we're looking forward. It's not super. Look, what if it's, you know, here's a number we're looking at, here's our cost base, here's our margin. What if it's three or four chunks or whatever the metric is below what we expect? We are regularly, not daily or weekly, not quite monthly, but we are continually looking at the next three months and thinking, gee, is this the right fit? We desperately want to not remove headcount, but we are thinking, gee, we don't want red ink here. That's the way we are assessing it. I agree, we certainly don't want capital to pay some people that don't bring us any money. By the same token, the debt does cost us some interest, which is cash as well. Thanks, Mr. Chairman. I guess the question I was brought along, and I'm still very interested in, I don't know if any of you have read the website, a Refresh X, but they have done intensive research on disruption and the way disruption occurs in society and in business. The outlook, don't read it just before you go to sleep. It doesn't look particularly inspiring for service companies, mainly because they see AI intruding, if you like, on the whole process of business. I know that you're thinking of this. I don't think we're about to see service businesses staffed by machines that are trundling and staggering around and doing a hands-on sort of job. That's not what AI is about. It's really much more about taking a bit of the operation and, shall we say, making that at least as good as a staff member behind a telephone or a staff member could achieve on the street. I wondered if you could drill down a little bit on the way in which some of your processes might, in fact, be fine-tuned in that way. In some ways, I'm the wrong person to answer that question, but I'm going to have a crack at it because I think I'll give you a more layman's answer than actually what is the correct answer from Jason. We've got a few people in the room that have been on the talks, one who founded Madison. Some of this, some of the stuff one used to do, kind of precedes my time in recruitment. If you're looking for jobs, you'd be thinking, "Oh, gee, I wonder who's recruiting." You might look at something in the paper that Fred had bought, a new yard or had picked up a contract or, gee, we see Health New Zealand or their predecessor are doing a bunch of stuff. We're like, "Oh, right, it's right on my notebook, gee, I better follow up such and such." Who knows anybody in that recruitment team? You'd look at your diary and you'd go through and think, "Oh, Bob Smith. Yeah, we know him and his cousin works here." We'd ring Bob and he'd get us in touch with that person. Then we'd find a person that was actually doing the hiring and then we'd pick up the job and we'd do it. Likewise with candidates, we'd think, "Oh, gee, didn't that Aunt Mary's son went to university and he did accounting and he worked for Pete Marrick at the day and so and his cousin such and such." We'd do that way. We'd trawl and sort of find the candidate. That stuff's all changed to CRMs, right? We have integration with LinkedIn. We can see if somebody makes a post about, you know, makes some sort of post about some fabulous thing they do and they change their profile and they put an update of their profile on LinkedIn, guess what? They're looking for a job, you know. That was kind of the next iteration. The stuff that people do online when they're moving house, they look at, you'll see on Facebook, they make some sort of reference to the beach in Taranaki. You think, "Oh, gee, oh, that Freddie, blind Freddie is moving to Taranaki. Gee, we're looking for some people we might see blind Freddie." That's kind of, you know, that's we're in that place. What Jason's talking about now that the team are looking at is we've got a massive amount of data. How many people have got in CRM, Jason? Hundreds of thousands and tens of thousands. The AI is using all of their data and going, trawling through these bot, or whatever they do, and says, "Oh, gee, we know a whole lot of stuff and we placed this person and now they've obviously moved and we see this out on LinkedIn and we see this other stuff." We get real opportunities, real people that are there at ONE@Work now. We get decent information on the clients, what have they done differently and what's going on so that we make sure we get the opportunity rather than somebody else. It's that sort of stuff. In terms of the transactional, there's a whole lot of process steps when you recruit somebody, like a whole lot of probity and stuff, and you have to go to MOJ and make sure that they hadn't beaten somebody up or they've got a driver's license or they've got a ticket. All of these things need to happen through the process. From the minute we go to the client and we say, "Oh, gee, can I pick up that job as a forklift operator?" there's a whole lot of steps and tick boxes and a lot of this stuff can be automated. All you actually have to do is make sure, "Oh, cool, we've really seen these people that have got, and that have put in their CVs. We've actually done some sort of sleuth check." When they're in the system, we've done a formal check on them. Actually, there's not a whole lot of work other than see the person and make sure they're decent human and are a human, and then talk to your clients. You get rid of all of that fluff. The reality is, I think, again, I won't pick on you again when I start. Once upon a time, this whole lot of the admin sort of stuff, recruitment companies did quite manually, but we're really, really good at it and really, really fast at it. That was kind of an advantage. We got some tools that our clients didn't have. Then they got the tools. We're just trying to get further down the line from our clients and get better information, do better stuff. I'm going to talk about the transactional nature of that recruitment that our clients do. We aren't those people. We will call you back and we will treat you well. That's why we'll develop good candidate pools, which makes us win when we need contractors, temps, and yada yada. Anyway, I know nothing more about recruitment than I've told you. I'm not going to answer any more recruitment questions. Is that okay, Alan? Yeah, sure. There must be some things that you're going to be doing in the next year that are really part of the AI movement, and yet they're not employing robots. I thought it was a really good explanation, actually. Just to put a bit more color on it, we've been doing some of this automation stuff for actually, I've been ahead of the game for a long time. One of our CRM platforms, which is a global platform, so the provider, a global provider, has already told us that in little old New Zealand, we're way ahead of most of the other players in the market because we started this a long, long time ago. The technology is now catching up with our thought process around how do we speed up automation. I think when you go to the furthest point and you start to talk about agentic agents, which is where our AI really sort of ends, this is work being done behind the scenes without you having to inform and write code and tell it. It is just doing almost like an assistant constantly. They're doing work for you. That is where we will end up within our organization where a lot of those administration tasks, we won't request it. It'll happen. When a job lands, work is happening straight away behind the scenes when then a consultant comes on board to pick up that piece so we can start working on it. They're already ahead of the game. It's that that we would do. What it won't do, it won't resolve fit, which is so important for organizations. What it won't do is accelerate the current, I guess, state within New Zealand, which is, we weren't fast on cyber and we're not fast on AI either because we're not quite sure and we don't quite believe it. The handbrakes for us won't be what we do internally. We'll speed up and we will use those tools. Once again, we're ahead of the game now. Also, our clients have got to feel comfortable around some of those tools as it starts to integrate into their own systems. That's probably a bigger problem, I think, for New Zealand than Accordant. I think Accordant will continue to lead in that regard. We already do. We're told internationally that we already do. We're quite comfortable that we'll get there. Once again, we're not going to appoint a CEO off the back of an AI agent and drop them into or a board member. I mean, you can imagine appointing a board member without having that fit conversation. That's not 90% of the job. Those things will help us, but it won't be making that appointment. That human touch is going to remain for, I think, a very long time. Hopefully, that helps. Kind of a mad world as well because for these, you know, talk about the kids, right, and know the roles that they apply for. Of course, if they are writing a cover letter or putting their CV together, they're using AI to do that. PWC downstairs here, they are getting 60 applicants for a Senior Associate, blah, blah, blah, whatever, techs up the wazoo, whatever it is. They're getting all these things exactly the same because they're all getting exactly the profile. They put the ad in as well. They just get this beautiful script. Everybody looks unbelievable. They are better off than getting nothing, well, not much. They have to adapt as well. Pretty funny. Just going to cover one more point, I think, just to give you an idea of what we've done. In AWF, you know, we would get tens of thousands of applicants asking to, you know, apply for a role. Tens of thousands, literally every week of applicants. 60%, maybe 70% of those applicants were offshore. They weren't able to work in New Zealand. They didn't have the credentials, you know, and the ability or visas to be able to work here. That was a lot of manual work for us to go through to try and get, especially when we're trying to fill roles, to get through those people. That is all now done by a chatbot. By the time our people get there, we have filtered out a big percentage of those that actually, it's not a waste of time because they want to come here, but they can't. We filter out that. We're actually only dealing with people that truly can be placed into a role. That is huge. We've been doing that now for two years. Of course, back in the day, they had to walk in the door to get a job. That was really easy. Yeah, I mean, the sort of the question of, are there any other questions? Just, yeah. Hi, my name is LG Chan. I'm a recent shareholder. Regarding the presentation, I've been thinking, do you have companies in India, Philippines regarding outsourcing and try to get the best top guys from, for example, IIT of India and so on? The next one is, is the question separate from the regarding the resolution one and two, or is it, or should I ask separately? You can ask them as many as you just. Okay. If that's okay, it's regarding Mr. Richard Stone's speech. At the moment, the unemployment rate is about 5% and at GFC time, that was about 7% in New Zealand. I can't remember exactly; in the early 1990s, it was probably quite bad too. I'm not too sure why you say now it's worse than those times. In terms of what parameter or any reason why that's the, you know. I'm going to answer the first question first, which is the answer to that is no, we're not using any outsourcing offshore. I'll leave it to you, Richard. You can. Can you hear me okay? I just said people online need to be by my side. I think my comment was in the context of a series of events that are happening at the moment. I don't think I was referring to unemployment as the defining issue, but that it has been the impact of COVID, and it's been the impact of geopolitical issues, and it's been the impact of immigration settings, and it's been the impact of unemployment. It's just a raft of characteristics together that have made this, I think, the most challenging time that certainly I've experienced. Is there statistical evidence about what you claim? You are saying that those events contribute to such a result, but is it really? I don't have the statistical evidence. I have just a perception as somebody who's been. What is your perception? My perception is being of somebody who's been at the coalface continuously for 40 years. Okay. How accurate is your perception compared to the reality? My perception is reality. Oh, that's for you, right? Just for you, sir. Okay. I'm sure there are good HR people who can figure out, you know, to have a judgment on this kind of comment. If I say such a thing in a job interview, I know what will probably happen, you know, but I'm not too sure what type of double standard will there be. Thank you. Right. Anybody else? Mr. Flowers? Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Two or three comments. The first shareholder speech talked about capital and more capital. Has this been considered by the board? Do you think we need new capital? That's my first question. He asked whether shareholders were happy to put new capital, but I don't know whether this is something that's been discussed by the board. My other comment is I come along to AGMs really to hear about the future. I must say the CEO this time did not dwell too much on the past, more on the future, which is good to hear. Although I must say, looking at last year's figures, which were very, very bad, really, to quote to say that last year was better than the year before is incorrect. I know there was a loss of $10 million, but there was an $11 million goodwill write-off. From a cash point of view, there's a difference of about $3.9 million between the two years, which is quite serious. This is obviously why the other gentlemen talked about needing more capital. Thank you. I got wrote down too. I'm trying to think. It's quite a clear question I've written down. Do we need more capital? Yeah, we do discuss that. We do discuss it and the options around that. Look, I sometimes might have a glass of lemonade with Simon Hull and we talk about it. I mean, we talk a lot more about how we make sure the business is fit and ready for the future. You know we wouldn't, I'm a shareholder. I've lost a, you know, my values have been eroded. I don't feel good about that. I don't feel good about those in the room where the value has been eroded. I think that one has to be sure that, you know, for the reason for the capital, are we just doing it as the banks all feel a bit better? Maybe that's a good reason. Or do we need to invest? I don't think that we need capital to continue to run the business. I do accept that based on, well, the reality is, I mean, anybody will know if you, like whatever covenant regime you have in place, if you don't make money, you're outside your covenants, right? That's the case for heaps of businesses at the moment. Does that mean they've all got too much debt or does it just mean that based on the, you know, the rules that you agree to with the banks, you know, maybe not fit for this environment? I don't know. I can explicitly answer yes, we are thinking about whether we need some capital. I know that the rights issues or some sort of capital raise is not good for everybody because not everybody wants to necessarily, although some will and not everybody will. I think that in my discussions with Simon Hull, he is very mindful of the shareholders in the room that might have a smaller amount of money and those that may not participate as much as he's thinking about himself and whether he will participate. I take very much the same view. I don't know that I, I don't know that I need to add much more. Simon, is there anything I'd have said that you would like to add to or? There's probably nothing more to be said at the moment other than, you know, it's obviously something we think about and consider. Yeah. On the second point, one of the things I know I've been accused of many times is probably talking too fast. Let the record show, Your Honor, when I talked through it, I did specifically say a net loss improvement. I think what I said was net loss after tax was $2.9 million. Whilst it was a net loss improvement, it was actually an unremarkable financial result, which was reflected in our negative operating cash flow. I think that was the point that you were making. Yeah, 100% agree. Very good. Any other questions from the floor? Have we got anything online? That's cool. Yes. Oh, just one behind you first. I was just wondering why Richard and Bella have no shares. Is there a reason for that? Thank you. Richard? No, I don't discount the... Thank you, Neil. Yeah. Bella I'll talk to my advisor, my husband, who's actually got the money. I am an independent. We have got one more here. It's going to be the same question, but I asked before whether... Just probably add an answer that you've talked around. I asked before whether Simon Hull was supportive of what his thoughts were about capital raising things. He's been a bit vague about it. I just wondered if he'd be very clear about what his position of the capital position of the company is, what he got to say about it. Okay, I can say for him, I'm going to ask him that he's very supportive of the board recommendations. You know, we don't even, we haven't got a proposal for him, but is there anything? No, there's nothing more to be said other than we consider what those options might be and capital raising options going forward. I guess what I'm asking is, are you definitely in or out in the sense that are you? I'm not sure. You're not sure, but there is a possibility that if a capital raising was contemplated, you would support it. There is a possibility. Okay, fair enough. Thank you. You've got to say it's pretty tricky stuff because we wouldn't do a capital raise. We'd want to make sure that we, some of the largest shareholders, were going to participate. We would sound out the largest shareholders, which is not to discriminate against the smaller shareholders, but we just had better access. Certainly the way things would go if we were thinking about a capital raise. Whether I needed an NDA or not, I would be talking to some of the people in the room here, no question. I'm happy to put you on that list actually as well. Okay, look, thanks for joining us here today. I hope that that was helpful for you. I can certainly say that we are very committed to the business. It's much harder to run a business in these times than in good times. It's harder to keep your people motivated. It's harder to get the wheels to turn. I think internally, it's nice for some of the team to be here, the team are working super hard to deliver for you. Having our senior people all there, we haven't had staff turn. We've been still adding good people in the areas that we need them. We are driving this business hard. We know we're not delivering the results, but we're grateful for your support. We're grateful for the hard work of the team. We're doing everything we can to give you a better result. I thank you very much. I declare the meeting closed.