Dear ,

The need for events like the Sir Thomas McIlwraith Lecture could not have been better demonstrated than by this news report on AIP member Keith de Lacy in The Australian:

Mr DeLacy, an experienced director who has chaired companies such as Macarthur Coal and Cubbie Station, took aim at Labor’s rhetoric.

“This is the most anti-business policy I’ve ever seen federal Labor put to an election,” the Goss government treasurer from 1989 to 1996 told The Australian.

“And it’s not just the policy. It’s the language. The way it splits out the top end of town leaves business in no doubt that they are the enemy.”

Business is not something to be feared, it is something to be embraced. When companies are given a tax cut it is not "the big end of town" that is getting the cut, but "employers", and the collections of individuals called "companies" which hold our national wealth and will fund our retirements. And what they will do with that cut is either reinvest it in growing their businesses and investments, or pay it out in higher dividends.

Either way, the 99% wins. Without business there is no growth, and no employment.

This year our lecturer is local tech entrepreneur Bevan Slattery.

Bevan is not one of "them", he is one of "us". He graduated from North Rockhampton High School in 1988, and I bet any decrease in the tax his companies pay will be ploughed back into his businesses.

In 1998 he founded iseek which is a cloud, data centre and connectivity provider. In 2002 he co-founded PIPE Networks (since sold to TPG for $373m). He is also the founder of SubPartners (undersea cables) and Superloop.

Come and show your support for what entrepreneurialism can do for progress, you and the country.

Tables are available at a competitive price.

Date: Thursday June 9, 2016. 12:00 to 2:00pm.
Venue: The Brisbane Club, 241 Adelaide St, Brisbane QLD 4000
Cost: $140 single ticket ($126 AIP members); $1,260 table of ten)
To book click here.

Kind regards,

Graham Young
Executive Director
Australian Institute for Progress