ACSI's 2011 Annual Conference was held at the Sofitel Melbourne On Collins on Thursday 26 May and was entitled 'Reflections and Predictions - Governance in an Uncertain World'. This year's conference reflected and built on what shareholders have accomplished as responsible investors in the past decade and highlighted the lessons learnt and predicted what super funds could do to raise governance standards and pursue new opportunities in an uncertain world.

Ann Byrne, ACS CEO said "the discussion of ideas from change to the governance landscape to the role of directors, mergers and acquisitions and climate change provided participants with much food for thought." During the day, delegates heard from a number of excellent speakers (listed below). Some key highlights on the day included:

• Neville Owen reminding us that ethics and corporate governance are both separate and connected concepts.
• Directors admitting that they need to do better to educate the community on what they do.
• The monitoring of governance issues can in a potential merger and acquisition scenario, assist deals to be better or conversely prevent deals going sour.
• Investing in Asia is fraught with risks and opportunities not dissimilar to other jurisdictions and that it would be a risk to treat Asia as a homogeneous region in terms of our approach to governance; and
• Converting rhetoric and concern for the environment into investment outcomes is a real challenge for super fund investors and poses opportunities to prove returns and improvements to the environment.

Conference speakers

Ali Moore - Presenter, ABC News 24 & Lateline

David Turner - Chairman, Commonwealth Bank of Australia

Dr David Smith - Head, Asia Research, ISS UK

Elizabeth Proust - Chairman, Nestle Australia

Garry Weaven - Chair, Industry Funds Management

Leigh Clifford AO - Chairman, Qantas Airways Ltd

Neil Hamilton - Chairman, Oz Minerals Ltd

The Hon Neville Owen- Retired Judge, Court of Appeal, Supreme Court of Western Australia

Nora Scheinkestel - Director, AMP Limited, Orica Limited, Pacific Brands & Telstra Corporation Limited

Dr Steven Bishop - Executive Director, Value Adviser Associates

Tim Jordan - Analyst, Global Markets Research, Deutsche Bank (presentation not available)

Dr Xinting Jia - Senior Associate, Mercer

For full details of the conference including the program, speaker presentations and photos, please click on the links below:

Conference Program

Annual Conference 2011 Program

Speaker Presentations (please click their name above to view their presentation)

2011 Conference Photos  (click here)