Suncorp Group Aktie

Good morning, everyone, and welcome to Suncorp's 2026 Annual General Meeting. My first as your Chairman. It's a pleasure to be here with you in Brisbane and to welcome those joining us online. I would particularly like to acknowledge our many retail shareholders, including those here in Queensland who have supported Suncorp over many years. Your loyalty and engagement are important to your Board, and we value the opportunity to talk with you directly today.

As Chairman of the meeting, I'm informed we have 275 shareholders, proxy holders and other attendees participating today, both here in Brisbane and online. As a quorum is clearly present, I declare the meeting open. Before I proceed, could I please ask everyone here in Brisbane to ensure your mobile phone is on silent mode.

Please join me now in welcoming Refiti Tovi, who will deliver a welcome to country. Refiti is a proud Turrbal woman. And the niece of the late Turrbal elder [ Songwoman Marucci Buranda ], raised in culture and guided by her elders, she has learned traditional law and protocol. With over a decade of experience in early childhood education, refute is deeply passionate about empowering the next generation and strengthening her community through truth telling advocacy and cultural connection. Refiti is here with us today to deliver the welcome to country on behalf of the Turrbal people of Brisbane. Please join your Board in making her welcome.

Thank you. Before I start my welcome to country blessing this morning, I will acknowledge the First Nations and nonfreshnass in the room and online, and I will pay my respects to all Elders, past and present. [Foreign Language]. Hello, and I come with good spirit and good energy. My name is Songwoman Refiti after how total dissent from the layers we got on today, me engine, also known as Brisbane, the place of the blue waterlily. And I am here today to continue my cultural responsibility as a proud Songwoman as I'm able to bless the room and connect to you with country. Yes, songwomen do hold our history, but we also hold blessing songs and song lines itself, and I am here today to connect with you all. And I'm so proud to be here and audit today that I'm able to since blessing song that creates beautiful and good energy into your space and taking away that bad you do because we want that right.

Yes. But yes, I usually close my eyes when I do think this totable blessing. So you're welcome to close your eyes with me, you don't have to do as well. The choice is really yours. We're now seeing this total blessing song, and this 1 was taught to me by my cousin, Barimba. And yes, it was taught to her mother, the late [ Annie Marie Barimba ], and thanks to Mani, I want to be here today because of her, I can.

I will now seeing this song.

[Presentation]

Let's take a deep breath in and thank you for your time, and thank you for your presence. Stay well. Thank you.

Thank you, again, Refiti, for that beautiful song, and you'll be glad that I won't be singing for you today. But we really appreciate Refiti being with us here. I'd also like to acknowledge the traditional custodians of the land on which we are gathered here in Brisbane and pay my respects to their elders, past and present.

I'd now like to introduce Belinda Speirs, our Chief Executive, People, Legal and Corporate Services to cover the meeting procedures we'll be using today.

Thank you, Chairman, and good morning, everyone. For those shareholders and proxy holders are participating with us at the physical AGM venue in Brisbane and wish to vote, please make sure you can access the vote plus app using the pin on your green attendance card or that you have a yellow paper voting card. In the unlikely event of an emergency, please follow the directions provided by the Intercontinental staff. For those shareholders and proxy holders who are joining us online and wish to vote or ask a question. You may be familiar with the platform from our previous AGMs. You also have the opportunity to ask your questions and comments via the questions and comments phone line that is available during the meeting. To help with the smooth running of the AGM, we invite shareholders and proxy holders who are participating online to submit your comments and questions now.

Further details about how to ask questions and make comments using the platform or the phone line are contained in the online AGM guide. You can access the guide through a link at the bottom of the screen or on your website. If you encounter any technical issues with the platform at any time during the meeting, please contact the share registry's online AGM support team at 1 (800) 990-363. This phone number will remain visible on your screen throughout the meeting. In the unlikely event that technical issues prevent the AGM from proceeding as planned, Suncorp will make announcements via the ASX in the Suncorp website.

I would now like to briefly cover the meeting procedures that the Chairman will follow today. Firstly, this is a meeting of Suncorp shareholders. As set out in the notice of meeting, only shareholders or proxy holders are entitled to vote on the resolutions ask questions or make comments. The Chairman will allow a reasonable opportunity to address questions and comments as each item of business is considered. Please ensure your question or comment is relevant to an item of business and to shareholders as a whole. And please be respectful at all times.

If there are a large number of shareholders who wish to ask questions, the Chairman may consider introducing a question limit to ensure that all interested shareholders have an opportunity to speak. While there are similar questions, the Chairman will and to acknowledge those have asked the question. However, the Chairman will provide a single response in order to streamline today's proceedings. If you have a matter that you'd like to raise as a customer, and you are participating here in Brisbane, members of our customer advocate team will be able to assist you in the foyer.

Representatives from ANZ are also available in the foyer for any of you who have a customer matter relating to Suncorp Bank. If you are participating online, please contact our customer relations team using the contact details on the last page of the notice of meeting. Any customer-related questions specific to an individual will be referred to our customer relations team for response and will not be addressed during the AGM.

Share Registry and Suncorp representatives are also available on the for to assist with any shareholder-related questions that do not relate to the business of today's meeting. If you are voting today and need to leave the AGM early, please remember to submit your voting card before you leave.

I'll now hand you back to your Chairman.

Thank you, Belinda, and thank you to those who've already voted or pre-submitted questions relating to the business to be covered at today's meeting. I would now like to introduce your Board of Directors who are all here today in Brisbane. In addition to their significant Board experience, each director brings a mix of financial services and other relevant business experience and expertise that enables your Board to be effective in governing Suncorp.

From your right, David Whiteing, David brings more than to the Board more than 30 years' experience leading innovative technology programs in a range of sectors, including professional and financial services. He is a member of the Audit and Risk Committees.

Silvia Falzon. Sylvia chairs the Board, People and Remuneration Committee and is a member of the Risk Committee. She brings to Suncorp valuable experience in a range of customer-facing and regulated industries including financial services, health care, retail and aged care.

Lindsay Tanner. Lindsay has worked at the highest levels of government and business for almost 4 decades and is a recognized authority on corporate governance, economics and finance. He is a member of the Risk Committee and also serves on our New Zealand subsidiary boards.

Sally Herman. Sally is currently a member of the Board, People and Remuneration Committee. She has strong expertise in running retail banking and insurance products. setting strategy for financial services businesses and working with customers, shareholders, regulators and government.

Simon Machell. Simon has deep strategic and operational knowledge of the insurance industry and brings to Suncorp an international perspective on current industry trends in insurance. together with the insights into risks and opportunities associated with emerging technologies and new business models. He is currently a member of the Board Risk and People and Remuneration Committees. Sally and Simon are both retiring as directors at the end of today's AGM. I will recognize their respective contributions to your Board during my address shortly.

Steve Johnson, Steve continues to capably lead Suncorp since his appointment as CEO and Managing Director in 2019. I'll invite Steve to address you later during the meeting. Ian Hammond, Ian chairs the Board Audit Committee and is a member of the Risk Committee. He brings to Suncorp extensive knowledge of the financial services industry as well as expertise in financial reporting and risk management.

Jillian Brown. Jillian is based in Queensland. She has developed broad skills and experience in financial services, law, infrastructure, investments and finance over her 40-year career. Jillian is a member of the Board Audit Committee.

Elmer Funke Kupper. Elmer chairs the Board Risk Committee and is currently a member of the Audit Committee. He has significant financial services experience as well as experience in navigating demanding regulatory sectors and transforming business models through the adoption of technology and digital services. He has served as CEO of 2 ASX-listed companies. Elmer is seeking reelection today.

Yen Saw. Yen was appointed as a director by your Board in June this year and is based in Singapore. She brings to the Board more than 30 years experience in governance and executive leadership across the Asia Pacific region, spanning a range of sectors. Jen will seek your support to continue as a director through the usual election process later during the meeting, and I will speak more about her then.

Also here with your Board is Belinda Spiers, who you heard from earlier. Belinda will moderate the online questions from shareholders and proxy holders during today's meeting. In addition to Belinda, all other members of Suncorp's executive leadership team are also here with us today.

Jeremy Robson, our Chief Financial Officer.

Lisa Harrison. Lisa was recently appointed our Chief Executive, Commercial and personal injury insurance. And before that, she was our Chief Executive of Consumer Insurance.

Jimmy Higgins is CEO of Suncorp New Zealand.

Michael Miller, Michael recently became Chief Executive Consumer Insurance and was previously our Chief Executive Commercial and personally injury insurance.

Michelle Bain, Michel was recently appointed Chief Risk Officer. Before that, she was Executive General Manager, CTP Insurance and Advocacy.

Adam Bennett, our Chief Information Officer; Bridget Messer, Bridget was recently appointed to the new role of Chief Executive customer, brand and advocacy and was previously our Chief Risk Officer. In addition, Bernadette Nori, Suncorp's customer advocate is here with us.

Before I invite Steve to speak, I'll begin today's proceedings with my address. 2026 has been a significant year for Suncorp, having marked just over 2 years as a stand-alone transtasman general insurer following the sale of the bank in 2024. Suncorp is a more focused customer-centric and sustainable business. This was a core strategic objective in our decision to sell the bank as we set out to simplify the business to realize value for all stakeholders. It was made in recognition of an increasingly challenging operating environment for both banking and insurance. And at a time when the value of insurance and the continued need for investment in the sector has never been greater.

The passing of time has only reinforced the strategic rationale of this decision. Importantly, for shareholders, the strength of being a focused insurer is reflected in the underlying performance and resilience of your company, and it continues to be growing of growing significance in an external environment that is only becoming more complex and challenging. Climate change and extreme weather continue to test the community -- our communities and the insurance industry.

At the same time, cost of living pressures remain a very real challenge for many households. While technology and the rapid adoption of artificial intelligence, cyber risk, and heightened geopolitical uncertainty are reshaping the expectations placed on large organizations like ours. These are all very live topics that have remained front and center for your Board this year. Across Australia and New Zealand, Suncorp supported customers through 18 declared natural hazard events, resulting in more than 120,000 claims.

The cost of these natural hazards was around $2 billion and forms part of the $10 billion Suncorp paid overall in claims this year. These numbers demonstrate the scale and importance of the role Suncorp plays in people's lives, particularly when the unexpected happens. This was again brought to life having -- for me, having spent time with a number of customers across Southeast Queensland who were impacted by the destructive hailstorm events that struck in October and November last year. While I've been in the insurance industry for almost 40 years, these moments continue to reinforce to me not only the important protection our products provide, but the immense value our people provide being there for our customers, both in the immediate aftermath and right through until their claim is finalized.

It was also great to visit Suncorp's Townsville hub earlier this year. This hub forms an important part of our investment in disaster management and jobs in regional Queensland. These claims numbers also reinforce why a strong and sustainable private insurance sector matters. Insurance helps households, businesses and communities recover from disruption. It supports confidence and economic activity, and it requires companies like Suncorp to remain financially disciplined, operationally resilient and focused on customer and shareholder outcomes over the longer term.

Suncorp's 2026 performance demonstrates our ability to do just this. We have delivered strong results while supporting customers and communities and investing in our future. Turning to our financial performance. Suncorp reported a net profit after tax of $1.03 billion and cash earnings of $1.04 billion for the financial year, with underlying margins of 11.8% at the top end of our target range. This was achieved despite natural hazard costs exceeding our allowance for the year by $254 million. Importantly, we further enhance the resilience of the business this year with the purchase of our multiyear aggregate reinsurance cover, which took effect from the first of July. This cover will significantly reduce earnings volatility through periods of elevated natural hazards over the coming 5 years.

Our strong capital position enabled the Board to determine a fully franked final ordinary dividend of $0.52 per share bringing the total fully franked ordinary dividends for financial year '26 to $0.69 per share. This represents a payout ratio of 70.5% of cash earnings at the midpoint of our target payout ratio. Pleasingly, we were also able to declare a fully franked special dividend of $0.10 per share, which was paid alongside the final dividend earlier this week. In addition, we announced our intention to buy back up to $250 million of Suncorp shares through an on-market buyback in financial year '27. This follows the successful completion of a $400 million on-market share buyback in financial year '26.

Notably, this means we have returned more than $4.8 billion of total capital to shareholders over the last 3 years. And there are 238 million fewer shares on issue today than there were 6 years ago, improving the earnings per share and delivering for our shareholders. These outcomes reflect our disciplined approach to capital management. and our ongoing commitment to return capital to shareholders in excess of business needs as appropriate.

Suncorp remains focused on long-term shareholder value creation rather than short-term share price movements. While Suncorp's total shareholder return was down 7.6% in financial year '26 over the 5 years to the end of June 2026, Suncorp's total shareholder return was 124.8% versus the ASX 200 performance of 46.2% and remains positive calendar year-to-date.

I'll now touch briefly on board renewal, which has remained a priority this year as we continue to seek the right mix of experience, skills and diversity to oversee the execution of Suncorp's strategy and navigate the evolving external environment. As I mentioned earlier, at the conclusion of today's AGM, Sally Herman and Simon Machell will retire from the Board after serving for 11 and 9 years, respectively. On behalf of the Board of Directors and of shareholders, I want to thank Sally and Simon for their very significant contribution to Suncorp and wish them both well for the future. With Sally and Simon's departures, we are pleased to welcome 2 new nonexecutive directors to the Board.

Yes Saw, who I introduced earlier, joined Suncorp's Board in June, and brings extensive international experience across insurance, reinsurance, financial services and consulting, together with strong credentials in technology-led transformation. Her skills are highly relevant to Suncorp's strategic priorities, and she will seek your support for election later in today's meeting.

Today, we also announced the appointment of Caroline Clark who will join the Board on the second of November and stand for shareholder election at our 2027 AGM. Caroline brings considerable experience in leading across large regulated consumer-driven businesses with strong credentials in product innovation and digital transformation. The skills and expertise both Yen and Caroline bring complement those of our existing Board and are aligned to Suncorp's customer-focused and technology-led strategic plan which the Board considered this year and was pleased to endorse for the financial year '27 to '29 period.

The plan is focused on modernizing and transforming to meet the current and future needs of customers and addressing the challenge of insurance affordability and accessibility. While this continues to be a multifaceted issue, to solve and cannot be borne by one sector or one company alone. Your Board and management team take Suncorp's important role seriously. CEO, Steve Johnson, will speak more to this in his address.

As your Chairman, I am focused on ensuring your Board continues to provide constructive oversight, maintain strong governance and support management in delivering long-term value. That means balancing the needs of shareholders with our responsibilities to customers employees, communities, regulators and the broader insurance system. This year, following completion of a formal competitive audit tender process.

The Board appointed Ernst & Young as our new external auditor for the 2027 financial year onwards, pending shareholder approval at today's AGM. We have also committed to establishing a formal policy an audit tender frequency to be informed by imports from government and regulators and developing market practice.

On behalf of the Board, I thank previous audit partner, KPMG, for their service over many years. In closing, I would like to thank you, our valued shareholders, for your continued support of Suncorp. We don't take this lightly. I would also like to thank my fellow directors for their counsel and commitment and CEO, Steve Johnston for the -- and the executive team for their leadership throughout the year. My sincere gratitude goes to Suncorp's people across Australia and New Zealand. Many of whom are also shareholders. Their unwavering commitment to our customers and communities, often in very difficult circumstances, underpins the performance of this company. Suncorp enters the 2027 financial year with solid foundations, a clear strategy and a strong sense of purpose, and we remain focused on creating sustainable long-term value for our stakeholders. Thank you for your attendance today and for your ongoing support of Suncorp.

I'll now hand over to CEO, Steve Johnston.

Well, thank you, Chairman, and good morning, everyone. It's again a privilege to address you as shareholders of the Suncorp Group and to provide an update on our performance over the 2026 financial year.

Now while Suncorp is now a stand-alone insurer across Australia and New Zealand, we continue to be shaped by the resilience, optimism and the spirit that defines Queensland, which has not only played a significant role in our history, but it remains an equally important part of our future. But we also remain guided by our purpose, which is to build futures and protect what matters. It's this purpose that binds our people together each and every day. It guides the way we support our customers the way we contribute to our communities and the way we create sustainable value for you, our shareholders.

The outcomes we achieved this year, first and foremost, demonstrate that a well-run company can deliver for both customers and for shareholders. The strength of our foundations and the resilience and capability that we have built as a dedicated general insurer underpin our performance, and they remain key to delivering ongoing value.

Now before I run through the financial performance, I'll briefly recap on Suncorp's transformation journey. Since I took on the role as CEO in 2019. Now as you can see from the slide that we put up on the screen, the first phase saw us materially simplify our business. and importantly, align all of our teams behind improving the quality of our insurance products and services. Now having sole life, wealth, smart, Suncorp Bank and the New Zealand Life business in 2025, we emerged as a simpler pure-play insurance company.

Now alongside that simplification, we invested in our core insurance infrastructure, we've invested in technology, in data systems, in modern platforms and the operating capability that we believe we need as a future to carry out our future as a pure-play insurer. Importantly, the 5-year aggregate reinsurance cover that we secured this year forms part of this phase in combination with our broader reinsurance program that we purchase annually. And of course, the natural hazard allowance alongside that and the other initiatives, it will significantly strengthen the resilience of our business, providing additional protections through periods of elevated natural hazard claims.

Now, we're now embarking on the phase where we will leverage those investments in order to create better, more personalized products and customer experiences, all along enhancing the value for both customers and for your shareholders. Now these deliberate choices we have made to build a more modern, productive and scalable organization will support Suncorp's next phase of growth. and I'll touch on this in a minute.

Our priority during 2026, however, was in supporting customers and communities through 18 natural hazard events across Australia and New Zealand. Now in combination, they generated more than 120,000 natural hazard claims. The October and November storms across Southeast Queens, I'm sure many in the room will remember them generated more than 37,000 claims alone and required a significant mobilization of our people and our response capability. It's important to remember that behind every one of those claims is a person a family, a business or a community, and they're dealing with disruption and uncertainty.

Now I've had the opportunity to visit a number of these communities over the course of the past year. And what always stands out to me is the commitment of our teams on the ground, supporting customers at what is often one of the most difficult times in their lives. Just a few weeks ago, for example, I spent time with impacted customers in the very hard hit community of Clifton, which is near to [ Wamba ] West of Brisbane. Our mobile disaster response hub caravan was stationed there for the fifth time in the 10 months since the destructive hailstorms truck. And of course, that caravan and our team provide invaluable face-to-face claim support for our customers. many, of course, of whom are elderly and experiencing vulnerability. It was very clear to me from visiting Clifton was at the community in that community was that we were the only insurer, the only insurer, providing this on-the-ground in-person assistance, and that makes all the difference for our customers as they work their way through what can be sometimes complex and lengthy repair journeys.

But as I've said many times, our focus cannot be only on responding after disaster strikes. As a prevention-led insurer, we continue to invest in resilience partnerships and data-led initiatives that help our customers understand and reduce their risk. This remains the surest way to reduce premiums, reduce the risk, reduce the premium. Over many years of advocating for greater investment in mitigation, those initiatives that we have advocated for have started to pay off with governments now recognizing that a dollar spent in preparation saves many, many, many dollars in mopping up.

Funding is finally starting to flow into mitigating the impact of Australia's harsh climate on its citizens. However, the challenge we now face is that with the shortage of design-ready projects, which would accumulation change the dial on Australia's mitigation imperative. With a chronic under investment in mitigation over the last decade or more, our builders, engineers, town planners and hydrologists have understandably redirected their sort after skills elsewhere, skills that will be increasingly in hot demand as we edge closer to the 2032 Olympic and Paralympic games.

The consequence of all of this is that those mitigation dollars are disproportionately being invested in incremental rather than much-needed transformational infrastructure projects like levy banks, water storage facilities, and modern urban storm water regress. Right now, today, roughly 1 in 10 Australian homes are high risk to extreme weather with too many having been built in areas designed to flood to burn or erode often with little or no structural measures in place to protect those homes or the citizens that live in them.

As I've said many times, the build, build, build mantra to solve today's issue of housing affordability and availability comes with the potential for corners to be cut. And then we, as a community, put more people in harm's way. Now we've made great advances in how we think about a more resilient Australia. We talk about it every year, particularly as the summer season approaches, but it's now time to create a clear, long-term national plan, one that commits the resources and the coordination of the Commonwealth to deliver resilience infrastructure initiatives that provide real benefit to those communities in need.

So turning to our financial performance and just expanding on the comments provided by Duncan. Our FY '26 results highlight the underlying trajectory of our business. As you can see from the slide, the dashboard on the slide that we put up on the screen, we delivered cash earnings of $1.04 billion and net profit after tax of $1.03 billion. Underlying earnings, which I often record as the best means of understanding the year-on-year performance of the general insurance business increased by 4.5%.

In addition, we improved our expense ratio, and we grew in almost all portfolios with the underlying insurance trading ratio ending the year at 11.8%, and that is now the fifth consecutive reporting period where the margin has been at the top end of our target range. Looking ahead, Suncorp has a unique opportunity to help reshape the future of insurance. Our strong capital position and the targeted strategic investments in platform modernization and operational transformation under P&L opportunity. These investments will allow us to create more contemporary products, deliver highly personalized customer experiences, increased digital self-serve and use AI at scale to transform customer and claims journeys. Now this is important because insurance is fundamentally changing.

Customers are increasingly expecting products and services that reflect their individual circumstances. And if a customer invests in making their home more resilient, improving maintenance or reducing their risk, they will increasingly expect that to be recognized in the price they pay for their insurance product. The same is true for motor and for commercial as it has typically been for many years. Now importantly, the delivery of our strategy will see Suncorp make meaningful progress in improving both the affordability and accessibility of insurance for Australians and New Zealanders.

Now before I close, I wanted to remind you that in December, we at Suncorp celebrate 30 years since the establishment of the Modern Suncorp in 1996. Many in the room will remember it well. Our business has seen a lot of change and plenty of ups and a few downs over that time. But as I'm sure you would agree, today, we stand as a strong and resilient contributor to the Australian, New Zealand and particularly the Queensland economy.

In closing, I want to thank the Board and the executive leadership team for their ongoing sport support in particular, Simon and Sally, who are leaving us today. They've been a backbone of support for this organization and the management team over a long period of time. I also sincerely thank the Suncorp team members for their dedication to Suncorp and for making a real difference for our customers and the communities again this year. And to you, our shareholders, thank you for your ongoing trust and confidence in Suncorp and for our future as a leading insurer. We are proud of the role we play for our customers and the communities, and we remain firmly focused on delivering sustainable value for you, our shareholders over the longer term.

Thank you, and I'll now hand back to Duncan.

Thank you, Steve. Now to the formal part of the meeting. All resolutions for consideration today will be put to a poll, which I now declare open. The direct and proxy votes that have been received prior to the AGM were released on the ASX platform this morning and will be shown on the screen before we vote on each resolution. As set out in the notice of meeting, I intend to vote all undirected proxies held by me as Chairman of the meeting in favor of each resolution. The first item of business today is to receive and consider the financial report, directors' report and auditor's report for Suncorp Group Limited and its controlled entities for the year ended 30 June 2026.

KPMG was our external auditor for the FY '26 year and David Kells, the lead partner for the FY '26 audit is here with us today to answer any questions you may have about the auditor's report or the conduct of the audit. I will now address questions and comments about the reports or Suncorp's performance generally. As Belinda mentioned earlier, I will first address a number of relevant questions received from shareholders prior to the meeting.

In the meantime, if you're here in Brisbane and wish to ask a question about these matters, please make your way to the closest microphone. If you are participating online, please submit your questions or comments now or register your question via the phone line.

Belinda, could you please read our first presubmitted shareholder question.

Thank you, Chairman. We have received questions regarding the Suncorp's recent share price performance from shareholders, Mrs. Norel Brown, Mr. Richard Williams and Mr. Philip Payne. We have selected Mrs. Brown's question to be read as it best represents the themes raised. Mrs. Brown asks what factors have influenced the share price performance? And how does the Board assess shareholder outcomes when considering remuneration.

Thank you, Ms. Brown, Mr. Williams and Mr. Payne for your questions. As I said during my address, our focus is on delivering long-term shareholder value. In the short term, as we all know, share price performance can be volatile and is not necessarily reflective of the performance of the business and could be driven by other market factors. In FY '26, our underlying earnings, which removes the variability associated with natural hazards and investment markets grew by 4.5%.

Over the last 5 years to the end of June 2026, Suncorp's total shareholder return was approximately 125% versus the ASX 200 performance of 46% and remains positive calendar year to date. Further, as I said, in FY '26, Suncorp returned significant capital to shareholders, which should be taken into account where in assessing shareholder returns.

The remuneration outcomes disclosed this year appropriately affect both company performance and the need to attract and retain the leadership capability required to deliver on our ambitious strategy and continue generating long-term value for you, our shareholders. Our long-term incentive plan has a direct link to shareholder outcomes through 40% weighting on relative total shareholder return and a further 30% weighting on cash return on tangible equity. Next question please, Belinda.

Thank you, Chairman. We have received 2 questions from shareholder, Michelle Tai, which follows similar themes, so I'll read them together. The first question is, given the massive push for Suncorp to use AI in the business, how do you balance the executives wanting to use AI, while also acknowledging the negative impact AI has on the people that use it and the environmental and climate impact?

Her second question is, given the success, Suncorp has had with the pledge to invest in no new fossil projects and the promising results we can see in the annual report help make a positive impact on climate does Suncorp intend to also reduce investment in AI systems and infrastructure given the wine lead known environmental impacts.

Thank you, Ms. Tai, for your questions. I don't think anybody could miss the current very live debate in our community around the concerns around the environmental impact on AI and also the much broader debate about the growth of data centers and the resources they require. We acknowledge these are important issues, particularly as Australia, navigates the energy transition and the increasing demand for digital infrastructure.

Secondly, I'd say that our climate risk is absolutely fundamental to Suncorp's business, which is why we take the impacts incredibly seriously. However, we don't see it as a choice between climate action and AI. We were a main committed to using AI responsibly, to improve customer experience support and empower our people and help build a more responsive, efficient and affordable insurer. This includes a greater focus on monitoring emission impacts from Suncorp's proportion of cloud technology and the overall environmental performance of our technology partners through our climate transition plan. Through this transition plan commitment, we will monitor the emissions performance of our most material suppliers, by spend and build an understanding of our technology providers performance year-on-year. Next question, Belinda.

Thank you, Chairman. We have received questions regarding Suncorp's involvement with AMA Group from shareholders, Mr. John Harris and Mr. Wesley Malson. We have selected Mr. Harris' question to be read as it best represents the themes raised.

Mr. Harris asks her Suncorp and its subsidiaries all commercial arrangements with credit par and its subsidiaries, in particular, Armor Group and Force Legal. Is the Board happy to continue using companies against which the ACCC has taken court action knowing the reputational damage that will ensue?

Thank you, Mr. Harris and Mr. Mason for your questions. Firstly, I'd like to begin by adding my apology to apology already given by the company to Mrs. Walker. And acknowledging that the conduct is completely unacceptable and unreservably apologize. Immediately on becoming aware of the matters relating to Mrs. Walker. And I can assure you, this has had some considerable discussion around the Board table. Suncorp investigated and took action against Armor, which is contracted by Suncorp to perform some of our motor claims recoveries.

The arrangements we implemented with Armor already included contractual obligations to adhere to a number of standards including Australia consumer law and the general insurance code of practice. Armor accepted that its conduct relating to Mrs. Walker was not satisfactory and the individual concern was released from duty. A review of controls was also undertaken by Suncorp and staff supporting Suncorp's customers have since had refresher training on relevant procedures. As I said, Suncorp additionally apologize to Mr. Walker and offered a goodwill payment.

The Federal Court proceedings involving Armor remain before the courts and have not been determined. Suncorp has no involvement in the proceedings and it would be inappropriate for me to say more than that. We never use force legal. I would say, though, in concluding that recoveries do play an important part an important role in supporting overall insurance affordability. And we remain committed to ensuring our service providers uphold the conduct we expect from them and in line with all regulatory obligations. Next question, Belinda.

Thank you, Chairman. We have received a question from shareholder, Ms. Bretta Chapman. Her question is, what mechanisms does the Board use to audit and prevent duplicated resource expenditure by third-party contractors and internal claims assessors on individual claims. How is management being held accountable with operational efficiencies that directly impact the group's combined operating ratio and shareholder returns?

Thank you, Mr. Chapman for your question. And anybody who has had a been unfortunate enough to have a complex home claim in particular, will know how complex they can be and how many parties are involved. Operational efficiency in claims is a really important area of focus for management and for the board. And we continuously review our claims processes to ensure we are delivering timely customer outcomes while maintaining appropriate controls and oversight.

Depending on the complexity of the claim, there are many instances where simply there are multiple visits to a property from different claims specialists, performing distinct roles such as assessing damage, developing repair scopes, providing engineering advice or overseeing repair works. And that can be required and that is just a fact of life. These activities support claim activity, claim accuracy, safety and quality outcomes.

That said, reducing avoidable reinspections and repeat visits remains an important focus, and we're investing in digital assessment capabilities, technologies and more integrated claims and supply chain processes to improve efficiency and reduce handoffs across the claims journey. The Board oversees management's performance through regular reporting on claims costs, supplier performance, customer outcomes and financial results. Suppliers and internal teams are subject to governance, quality assurance and audit processes and management is accountable for delivering continuous improvement that benefits customers while supporting strong operating performance. Next question please, Belinda.

Thank you, Chairman. We received 2 questions from shareholder, Ms. Natasha Lee. Her first question is, as the company is moving towards greater integration of AI and its systems with greater understanding and awareness by staff, what safeguards are included to review and identify issues arising from the application of AI?

Thank you, Ms. Lee, for your question. As we continue to expand the use of artificial intelligence across the organization, we absolutely recognize as a Board that strong governance and oversight and controls are absolutely critical in ensuring it is used responsibly and safely. At Suncorp, all AI initiatives are subject to our established risk and governance frameworks, where AI use cases are assessed against our risk appetite data ethics commitments and governance standards. Additionally, we have a dedicated AI governance structure, including Board and executive oversight, supported by an AI council and AI safety framework. Our approach aligns with the Australian government AI safety standards and AI ethics principles. The Board and Risk Committee receive regular updates on AI adoption, governance and risk management to ensure appropriate oversight as our use of AI evolves. And we also take the opportunity as a Board to observe and touch some of the AI use cases that are implemented.

Our safeguards include across the organization, testing, monitoring, human oversight and review mechanisms, both before, during and after deployment. For higher-risk applications, particularly where decisions may have a material customer impact or financial impact, human review remains an important part of the process. We also continue to invest in workforce capability, training and responsible use guardrails so that our people understand both the opportunity and limitations of AI and can apply it appropriately to their day-to-day roles. Next question please, Belinda.

Thank you, Chairman. Ms. Lee's second question is, could you outline how the amy driver awards work? That is, is it app-based and can drivers decide when and how the behavior will be monitored, what rewards and enticements are provided to maintain take-up and use of this program?

Thank you, Ms. Lee. For your question, I'm delighted to be able to talk about the Amy Driver rewards. So thank you for giving me the opportunity to talk about it. I am a user of it. And so I have first-hand experience. So the Amy Driver Rewards feature is with the -- in the Amy app, and it uses telematics technology to help customers like myself better understand my driving habits, which I don't always want to understand. Through smartphone centers and driving data, the app measures key driving behaviors. So breaking acceleration, cornering, speed and phone use. And then you get a score out of 100 I'm pretty good on cornering speed and phone us, but not so good on acceleration and braking. But I do try to get over 85 every time because it's good to get over 85 because if you are an eligible customer and you receive a driving score greater than 85 on the first of each month, you can unlock cash back offers from participating retailers. So if you're not on it, it's easy to get on to get started. You simply have to access the driver section of the Amy app complete the onboarding process and enable the required permissions such as location and motion tracking. And if you don't want to do it, there's no compulsion for anybody to use the app. Next question, please.

Thank you, Chairman. That concludes the general sections received in advance, and we can now move to questions in the room. Shareholders, please hold any questions relating to specific resolutions until the time for those resolutions are considered. And please let the team member at the microphone know who you are, so they can introduce you to the meeting.

Thank you. Maybe microphone number 2. Chairman, may I please introduce Clive Ashton, who is the shareholder.

My question is due to the consolidation of the business, I'm not sure why you've maintained the same size board. And related to that, is the reasoning for having a director based in Singapore, looking at expansion of the business into Asia in the future.

Thank you, Mr. Ashton. For your question, really appreciate it. let me say that we have actually reduced even though it looks like there's a lot of us today, 2 are retiring at the end of the meeting. So we're slightly up. But by the end of the meeting, we will have reduced the size of the Board when we had the bank in a wider business. So we are very mindful of that consideration. At the same time, it's really important for us to have a broad set of skills across the board so that we have the diversity we need in both experience, skills and background and thinking that enables us to collectively govern Suncorp appropriately.

And we'll continue to just maintain a watching brief on the size of the board over time. In terms of an appointment, now it doesn't signal any desire to move offshore. We just believe that it's really important for Australia and New Zealand companies to get an international global inside. Insurance is a very, very global business. And whilst we're only based in Australia and New Zealand, having someone offshore, which Simon has brought for many years, and Jen will now bring. It just gives us a broader perspective of what's happening in other markets and what might apply to us here. So that's the logic behind that. question maybe microphone on?

Chairman, may I please introduce Mr. David Lismore from the Australian Shareholders Association.

My name is David Lismore. I'm a volunteer representing Australian Shareholders' Association and hold proxies from 172 shareholders representing 700,000 shares. Mr. Chairman, natural disaster claims cost Suncorp, $2 billion last year. That was about $0.25 billion more than budgeted. Does the Board think this is the new normal.

So thank you, Mr. Lismore for your question, and it was lovely to meet you a couple of weeks ago. trying to predict what the new norm is for this year's weather and next year's weather, if any of us knew the answer exactly to that, we would be probably doing other things. However, what we do is as we think about the way we set our natural hazard allowance, we do very, very detailed modeling and we use multiple models to try and get the best view of what we think is the most likely outcome for any particular year. And we try to set that with before the reinsurance cover that we've now purchased, we try to set that between a 6 to 7 out of 10 years, we're likely to be on the right side of the ledger. We've obviously bought some additional reinsurance cover this year for the next 5 years, which helps to increase the probability of sufficiency for those who are actuarial in the room, either likelihood of it being right or being too much to 90%. But it still means 1 in 10 years, there will be some volatility. That is the nature of the insurance business. That's the business we are in. And so that's the risk that we understand, but that we're trying to make sure we get the natural has allowance as accurate as we possibly can be, but there is an inherent volatility from period to period in natural hazards.

Thank you for telling ASA that Suncorp spent about $100,000 on political events last year. Will you publish that figure in the annual report each year so all shareholders can see it?

Yes. I note your request on that, and we'll certainly consider that for next year's annual report. Microphone 2.

Chairman, may I please introduce Mr. Rick Williams, who is a shareholder.

Yes. Good morning, all. Look, I -- this is about performance. I wrote to Mr. Johnston back in May. He put me across to the Head of wrote to you, Mr. West in August, and I had not received a response. Now it's to do with share price drop, dividend drop on our core business. Now I've been associated with Suncorp for probably over 40 years. I've been a shareholder for 30. I look at and I see choice give us a 66% approval rating on our core business. I see trust pilot give us 1.5 out of on our core business, extremely low in my opinion. Now I think my question that I've actually I know that we glossed over. Does the Board to continue to allow the share price and dividends to plummet based on the performance and practices of corporate management.

This is in the area of poorly designed, I called an algorithm. They addressed me and tell me it was titis. In the online portables, which fail honest consumers causing management to deny legitimate claims and giving the corporation a bad name. Now I've tried to address this with management. They're really not interested in hearing it. And I'd like to hear what you're going to do about this failure in our IT that we're not supporting Queenslanders.

Queensland is a blight on Suncorp and the group for 50 years longer, and I feel that they're actually failing. Now that's going to have a reflect on the people in this room and the shareholders across the board because 66% in the 1.5 out of 5 rating is pretty low. I'd like you to answer this, please. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Williams. And thank you for writing to me. I'm afraid I never got the latter, so I'm happy if you give me another copy, I will respond to that because I wouldn't not respond to a letter if I got it. I don't know where it's gone, but I'm happy to take that from you. In terms of share price performance, maybe I'll start there and then move to customer and components. So share price by, I think I outlined in my speech that whilst we have had some volatility during the last 12 months, our overall 5-year total shareholder return at 25%, roughly, which is way in excess of the ASX 200 performance. So your company has been performing well over that 5-year period.

And in addition to that, we have given $4.8 billion of capital back to shareholders in the last few years, which equates to over $5.20 per shareholder over that period. So again, I think we have looked after shareholders well over that period, but we can never be complacent on that. I completely accept that point.

In terms of customer components, I'm happy to have a conversation with you on the detail outside the room on what's going on in our systems. But overall, what we're seeing our Net Promoter Score, which is the way that we measure how our customers feel about us, has continued to improve over the last 12 months, but we acknowledge that it's every single customer interaction that really counts as well as the average. And we don't get everything right every time. And it's our commitment to make sure that we do try to get everything right every time and where we don't, we'll listen to customers and try to improve that. But on average, we are improving our position from a customer point of view. Thank you. Next question.

Chairman, may I please introduce Mr. Gary Bilby, who is a shareholder.

Thank you, Chairman. Recently, there was an article in the news with regards to the headlines Suncorp's debt collector engage in worth kind of bullying for my -- chairs. As a result of that, there was approximately supposedly approximately 320,000 debt enforcement notes sent to individuals that were allegedly misleading, factually incorrect overly aggressive and likely to cause extreme stress. As a result, there's a court case now taking place of involving Suncorp, the person involved that was named, receiving apology from Suncorp and compensation of a $1,500 goodwill fee.

First question is, I realize the matter is going to court. But since this article appeared in the Crest, how many other individuals have been in contact with Suncorp about the debt enforcement notices. Suncorp made further compensation payments? And if so, what figure we're talking about.

The Saga has not put Suncorp in a good light. Since it is alleged approximately 320,000 debt enforcement notes to be sent to individuals. This would suggest it has occurred over some period of time, probably years. As such, was the matter which involved the 81-year-old lady, the first Suncorp became aware of, the unsatisfactory enforcement actions being carried out -- or was it the case, the members of the Audit and Risk Committee were asleep at the wheel. Perhaps the Chairman or the Chair of the Audit and Risk Committee would like to address the issue and provide an update.

I'll deal with the issue. I gave a bit of an update in the answer to an earlier question. And I acknowledge that the conduct in respect of Mr. Walker was unacceptable -- completely unacceptable. And then we issue and continue to issue our unreserved apology to her. The matter that you refer to around Alma and the ACCC is completely separate Suncorp is not part of that. The numbers that you've quoted are not part of Suncorp being involved in that. So yes, we've had one case that we're aware of, but we are not part of the wider part. Obviously, there's not much more I can say on anything that's in front of the court, but it doesn't involve Suncorp, but I can say that.

Okay. With regard to the risk committee, with a aware of the situation because it's obviously been going for a number of years.

As I say that, that matter doesn't impact on Suncorp. So we have 1 event. And obviously, we have discussed it as a Board and as a risk committee, that 1 event as we do any serious events that occur. But it's not something that's systematic for Suncorp. And as a result, it's not something that would come that we would have spent time on because there isn't the issue. So we won't see any more compensation being behaved.

To any other individual...

Not as far as I'm aware at this point in time. If we found any further individuals, we would continue to look after them properly because what happened shouldn't have happened.

Okay. So there's 1 out of 320 enforcement notices that you're aware of. and you've had no other involvement since then compensation.

That's my understanding. Other questions in the room?

No, I don't think there are any other questions. So that appears to be all the general questions here in Brisbane. Do we have any general questions online or via the phone line, Belinda.

Chairman, I can confirm that there are no online or phone questions for this item of business.

Thank you. I'm just looking in the room to see whether there are still some additional questions on this item in the room. Yes, there are. So I will just give a pause for everyone to have the opportunity to ask their questions on this item. Microphone 2?

Chairman, may I please present Robert Buce, he's a shareholder.

Good afternoon, everyone. Thank you members there. My question is about reinsurance. And we've mentioned it a number of times, I guess, with Mike, when you have policies when you reach a certain amount, say, we had an event like the hailstorm. I'm going to use a broad figure of like $0.5 billion. When we reach that amount, do the reinsurers pay everything above that? Or is it more complex?

Now it's basically the amount that we reach, which is $350 million for the first event, if I've got that right, then above that amount is up to the maximum ceiling on the reinsurance. It depends on the reinsurance area up to the maximum setting, which is $6.4 billion, I think, from memory. That is all paid by the reinsurers. Microphone 1.

Chairman, may I please introduce Das Hilco, who is a shareholder.

Well, my suggestion is that why haven't we got an office here in Brisbane, so that we can personally go talk about our personal problems with Suncorp rather than by using a phone or a computer. So I think some of us would further talk in person. I do have a hearing problem so I find it difficult on the phone. That's a suggestion for me that you're establishing an office in Brisbane for people to go and have a personal conversation with them.

Thank you. Thank you for your suggestion. Just a couple of things I might then throw to Steve to make any other comments on it. But firstly, for those with hearing difficulties on the phone, we do have facilities that enable you to have the phone conversation if that would be helpful. Secondly, we are particularly at times of claims, we are very committed to going out into communities and we've, over the last few years developed caravans that can go and be in communities and talk to people, particularly after events, which is the most sensitive and difficult time for people, and we find those are really highly valued in those communities, the ability to just go and talk to somebody face-to-face is particularly important at the time claim time. But so they're a couple of comments. Steve, did you want to add.

Yes. Like, I think I mentioned it in my presentation, we did send caravans out to the big claim event because we recognize fully that there's our customers who prefer to deal with us face to face and those caravans have a very legitimate and a very useful purpose in big events given the complexity of some of those events. That's the first thing.

Second thing is, as we move forward through a digital era and probably into AI around distribution of our products, we have to recognize clearly that there will be people in our communities who do not like or feel comfortable interacting with an insurance company through either digital or AI means. And so one of the key elements of our strategy is to make sure that we do have alternatives. And many of that -- those alternatives will be around our sales and service activities over the phone. You can talk to a person if you need to. And I'm sure if you identified yourself in that telephone call is needing someone to deal with face-to-face. I'm sure that we could identify that pretty quickly and find a pathway for you to be able to have that interaction. We do have an incredibly big presence here in Brisbane, we are the biggest employers in the state. It's their head office. So we have a presence here, and I'm sure we can find a pathway for you or any individual that needs that specific service.

Thank you, Steve. Any other questions in the room on this item?

No, I don't think so. So having addressed all the general questions and comments, we'll move to the 2 remuneration-related items of business. Firstly, I'd like to introduce the advisory vote on the FY '26 remuneration report, which all shareholders had the opportunity to review. If you're here in Brisbane and would like to ask a question on the remuneration report, please move to a microphone now. Your Board believes the remuneration arrangements, as outlined in the remuneration report are strategically aligned and drive high performance. The Board also believes it has awarded fair and reasonable incentive outcomes to the CEO and the executive leadership team having regard to the overall performance of Suncorp.

In setting our remuneration arrangements, we have a program of active engagement with institutional investors, proxy advisers and the Australian Shareholders' Association. We also take into account feedback from shareholders more generally. Noting each director has a personal interest in their own remuneration from the company, as described in the remuneration report, the Board recommends shareholders vote in favor of this resolution.

Details of direct votes and proxy votes lodged prior to the AGM in relation to this resolution now appear on the screen. Would any shareholder here in Brisbane, who wishes to ask a question on this resolution, now move to your nearest microphone if you haven't done so already. Thank you. Microphone 1.

Chairman, may I please introduce David Lismore from the Australian Shareholders Association.

Mr. Chairman, the CEO's maximum annual bonus has gone up by quarter, but as long-term incentives stay the same. Why was the bonus increased? And why wasn't the long-term incentive reduce the balance it?

The increase incentivized the CEO to outperform and was set in the context of external market data. Historically, the maximum and the target for the CEO were the same, and we decided that it was appropriate to create capacity for the CEO to outperform. The remuneration, as you know, and as we talked about, is benchmarked and determined as reasonable to uplift the maximum STI opportunity without offsetting that with a change in the LTI. We think the LTI is really important in aligning management and the CEO in aligning with long-term shareholder interests. And Steve's package remains reasonable against the market being at median against the financial services comparator group. And just above the median against the market cap group.

The CEO's STI pay out over the last 5 years, just for background is, on average, is 88% of target. With 4 of those years being below target and 1 year at target. If the higher maximum opportunity of 125% had been in place it would have made no difference to the actual STI outcomes in at least 4 of the 5 years.

Suncorp told ASA, which aid companies, it compares the CEO's pay against. They include IAG, QBE and the 4 big banks. Will you name these companies in future remuneration reports.

Again, we're happy to take that on notice. As I said in the meeting, it's always a bit of a balance on remuneration reports are long and complicated already. And so getting the balance right about putting too much information in there, which we're happy to disclose, but it just means there's more and more in there. We do get a lot of positive feedback actually from various people about the simplicity and the readability of our remuneration report, and Sylvia has done a great job with the team on that over the years. But we'll take it on notice and have to think about it again for you.

Other questions in the room? Appears that there are no -- that addresses all the remuneration report questions here in Brisbane. Do we have any questions on this resolution online or via the phone line?

Thank you, Chairman. I can confirm that there are no online or phone questions for this item of business.

Thank you, Belinda. As addresses all questions and comments on the remuneration report. Would you now please now vote using the voting card in the online portal and the votes app or your paper voting card. Details of direct votes and proxies lodged prior to the AGM in relation to this resolution are again shown on the screen. Taking into account the direct and proxy votes shown on the screen and the total number of shares being voted today, it appears Resolution 1 will be passed.

The next item of business is to seek shareholder approval for the grant of 171,947 performance rights to your CEO and Managing Director, Steve Johnson. If you're here in Brisbane and would like to ask a question on this resolution, please move to a microphone now. Maybe I'll just say the purpose of the long-term incentive allocation is to focus your CEO on Suncorp's long-term business strategy. align his interest with those of shareholders and support the creation of long-term shareholder value.

APRA's CPS511 requires long-term incentives to have both financial and nonfinancial metrics and measures. As set out in the Notice of Meeting, Suncorp's performance measures are based on relative total shareholder return, cash return on tangible equity relative customer net promotion score and relative trust and reputation. The proposed performance rights will represent the CEO's long-term incentive remuneration for financial year '27. Further details are included in the Notice of Meeting. The Board, with Steve Johnson abstaining, recommends shareholders vote in favor of this resolution. Again, details of direct votes and proxies lodged prior to the AGM in relation to this resolution now appear on the screen.

Would any shareholder here in Brisbane, who wishes to ask a question on this resolution, now move to your nearest microphone. Microphone 1.

Chairman, may I please reintroduce Mr. David Lismore from the Australian Shareholders Association.

Mr. Chairman, part of the CEO's award depends on a return target that won't be published until 2030. Can you confirm the target is higher than the Suncorp's cost of capital? And is it well above what Suncorp earns today.

Thank you. I'm not going to answer specifically on what the targets are. And we're very deliberate about why we don't do that because they are commercial in confidence. They are based on the expectation of delivery through the 3-year financial plan that we signed off for the year, '27 to '29 and then roll that forward 1 year. Let me assure you from the Board's point of view that we sign off a challenging and stretching plan with management and it reflects those components.

Yes. So I wasn't asking for the target. I was asking whether it was higher than the cost of capital. I can assure you we wouldn't accept a plan that was below the cost of capital. Is it well above what Suncorp earns today. I'm not going to get into a debate about the relative compared to today because that's giving a potentially advice or forecast on our future expectations, which I'm not going to do for the obvious reasons. But thank you for your question anyway.

Other questions on this item in the room? No, that looks like that's all the questions here on this resolution in Brisbane. Do we have any questions online or on the phone?

I can confirm there are no online or phone questions for this item of business.

Thank you, Belinda. As that addresses all questions and comments on this resolution, would you please now vote using the voting card in the online portal, the Vote Plus app or your paper voting card. Again, details of direct votes and proxies lodged prior to the AGM in relation to this resolution are again shown on the screen. Taking into account the direct and proxy votes shown on the screen and the total number of shares being voted today, it appears resolution 2 will be passed.

The next item of business is to seek shareholder approval for the appointment of Ernst & Young as external auditor of Suncorp. If you are based -- if you're here in Brisbane, and would like to ask a question on this resolution, please move to the microphone nearest microphone now. As I mentioned earlier and as announced on the 12th of August this year, your Board resolved to appoint EY as the new external auditor of Suncorp from the end of today's AGM, subject to receiving shareholder approval. EY's appointment was also subject to the Australian Securities and Investment Commission, providing the required consent to KPMG's resignation, which was received on the fourth of September.

EY has consented in writing to its appointment subject to shareholder approval. EY has also met all relevant requirements, including independence criteria. Ian Hammond as a former partner of one of the tender participants is making no recommendation in relation to this resolution. All other directors recommend shareholders vote in favor of this resolution. Details of direct votes and proxies lodged prior to the AGM in relation to this resolution now appear on the screen.

Would any shareholder here in Brisbane, who wishes to ask a question on this resolution, now move to your nearest microphone if you haven't already.

Mr. Chairman, may I please reintroduce David Lismore from the Australian Shareholders Association.

Mr. Chairman, ASA welcomes the audit tender, which we asked for last year Will the change to EY cost shareholders more or less? And how will the handover from KPMG be managed?

Maybe I'll take the second question first. KPMG have been incredibly professional right through this year's audit, EY are ready to roll. And so the transition and part of the consideration by the Board subcommittee as you might expect, but consider this matter and then the Board was that we could fulfill a smooth transition effectively, and we're very confident that will happen. In terms of overall cost, the tender was good for shareholders. That's for me just to put that way. that appears to be -- address all the questions in the room on this resolution. Do we have any questions online or on the phone?

Chairman, I can confirm that there are no online or phone questions for this item of business.

Thank you, Belinda, as that addresses all questions and comments on this resolution. Would you please now vote using the voting card in the online portal and vote plus app or your paper voting card. Details of direct proxies and direct votes and proxies lodged prior to the AGM in relation to this resolution are again shown on the screen. Taking into account the direct and proxy votes shown on the screen and the total number of shares being voted today, it appears Resolution 3 will be passed. I would again like to acknowledge KPMG's service to Suncorp throughout their tenure as external auditor and to welcome EY as auditor commencing from the end of today's AGM.

The next 2 items of business are to consider the election and reelection of 2 members of your Board. First, as I mentioned earlier, Jen saw seeks confirmation of her appointment to your Board. through seeking election by shareholders today. To add to my earlier comments, Yen brings to your Board strong credentials in technology-led strategic transformation leadership and oversight that complement the existing skills of the Board. She is currently a Nonexecutive Director of Manulife Singapore and was previously a Nonexecutive Director on the QBE Asia Advisory Board. which oversees QBE's operations in Malaysia and Hong Kong. Yen's executive career experience includes serving as CEO of Tokyo Marine Insurance in Malaysia and senior leadership roles with Aviva, Transamerica Life, Swiss Re and Prudential. Your Board is satisfied Yen is an independent nonexecutive director and fully supports her election today.

I'd now like to introduce Jen to speak further about her experience and commitment to Suncorp in support of her election. In the meantime, while he speaks, if you are here in Brisbane and would like to ask a question in relation to Yen's election. Please start to move to the microphone now.

Thank you, Duncan, and good morning, shareholders. This is my first Suncorp called AGM, and I'm honored to be here seeking election to the Suncorp Group Board. It is an exciting time to join Suncorp as a dedicated general insurance company that is transforming to meet the changing insurance needs of customers and communities across Australia and New Zealand.

Since joining the Board in June, my early observations are as follows: Firstly, I have been deeply impressed with a genuine commitment and progress made in automation across the company. It is clear to me that the experience for Suncorp customers suppliers and people has truly been the core, and I believe Suncorp is a leader in this space across the general insurance industry.

Secondly, I have also been encouraged by the balanced approach Suncorp is taking to the adoption of AI. The comprehensive AI risk lens responsible and measured approach and robust governance framework recognizes the importance of managing both opportunities and risks that come with AI. Finally, it is evident to me that purpose runs through this organization. Champion by CEO, Steve Johnson. I have visited Suncorp's disaster management center and seen firsthand the great level of care and support that Suncorp seems have for their policyholders. It is, in fact, this sense of purpose, the very recent insurance exists and the central role it plays in our society that attracted me to the sector 3 decades ago. While a lot of time is often spend talking about profit, dividends and margins, equally important for a business like Suncorp, other lives and Livepods restored and the communities we help rebuild.

I'm now based in Singapore, but I studied and commenced my career in Australia and maintain strong connections here. I believe my experience gained over more than 30 years in governance and executive leadership roles across insurance, reinsurance and financial services combined with my digital transformation across a variety of businesses and markets positions me well to deliver value to Suncorp's port and strategy. The Australian and New Zealand insurance sector continues to have strong ties to the global economy, and I believe the global nature of my experience allows me to bring relevant and diverse perspectives.

If elected, these comprehensive complementary skills and experience will assist the board in providing effective oversight of Suncorp's growth aspiration in a rapidly shifting landscape. I trust I will have your support for my nomination to the Board. Thank you.

Thank you, Jen. Details of direct votes and proxies lodged prior to the AGM in relation to yen's election now appear on the screen. Would any shareholder here in Brisbane, who wishes to ask a question on this resolution, now move to your nearest microphone if you haven't already microphone one.

Chairman, may I please reintroduce Mr. David Lismore from the Australian Shareholders Association.

Mr. Chairman, after today, only 3 of the 9 directors will be women. ASA's objective is at least 40%. What's the Board doing about this? And when do you expect to get there?

I expect to get there on the second of November when Caroline Clark joins the Board and we will then be 40% female.

Thank you for the question, though. Any other questions in the room? No. Belinda, that appears to address all questions on the ends election here in Brisbane. Do we have any questions on this resolution online or either phone?

I can confirm that there are no online or phone questions for this item of business.

Thank you, Belinda. As that addresses all questions and comments on yen's election, would you please now vote all using the voting card in the online portal, the Votes App or your paper voting card. Details of direct votes and proxies lodged prior to the AGM in relation to yen's election are again shown on the screen. Taking into account the direct and proxy votes shown on the screen and the total number of shares being voted today, it appears this resolution will be passed. Congratulations. Jen.

The final item of business is to consider the reelection of Elmer Funke Kupper. As I mentioned earlier, Alma brings significant financial services, transformation and leadership experience to your Board. More detail is set out in the notice of meeting. Elmer has made a highly valued contribution to your Board since joining in 2020, including as current Chair of the Board Risk Committee, I and Elmer's fellow directors are fully supportive of him seeking reelection for his third and final term. I'll now invite Elmer to speak about his experience and continued commitment to Suncorp. If you here in Brisbane and would like to ask a question in relation to Elmer's reelection, please move to the microphone now.

Thank you, Chair, and good morning, fellow shareholders. I joined our Board in January 2020 and today marks the end of my second term as a director. Suncorp today is a different company from the one I joined 6.5 years ago. Suncorp is now a leading pure play general insurance company in Australia and New Zealand. The company has been performing well has produced attractive financial returns and increased its investments in its core insurance operations and technology.

At the same time, it strengthens its resilience in the face of increasing natural hazards and it's advocating for measures that reduce the risk of extreme weather for communities across our region. The transformation of Suncorp is a credit to your CEO, Steve Johnston and the executive team. As a director, I have enjoyed supporting this process.

My background is in financial services. I've worked with Australian public companies for 30 years as senior executive CEO and Non-Executive Director. I currently serve on the Audit Committee, and I chair the Risk Committee. In the Risk Committee, I'm joined by several of my Board colleagues who'll bring extensive industry knowledge, business experience and governance skills. The directors who are not formerly members of the Risk Committee regularly joined the discussions.

Managing risk is a core skill for an insurance business. It covers a wide range of areas, including the design and delivery of our insurance services, operations, technology, cybersecurity and more recently, artificial intelligence. Managing risk will support growth, investment and innovation. And as we heard earlier, reputational risk is a core part of what the risk committee focuses on as we continue our journey and become a leading insurer across Australia and New Zealand.

Your Board is deeply engaged in the strategy and governance of your company. It does this in an atmosphere of direct and open communications amongst directors and with management. I've enjoyed working with my colleagues and the leadership team and with your support, I look forward to continuing to serve on the Suncorp Board. Thank you.

Thank you, Elmer. Details of direct votes and proxies lodged prior to the AGM in relation to Elmer's reelection now appear on the screen. Would any shareholder here in Brisbane who wishes to ask a question on this resolution, now move to your nearest microphone, if you haven't already microphone 1.

Chairman, reintroducing Mr. David Lismore from the Australian Shareholders Association.

Mr. Kupper chairs the Risk Committee. Suncorp now runs more than 20 artificial intelligence projects. And you have mentioned a bit about how the Board makes sure AI is used safely and fairly for customers. My specific question is who checks this independently safely and value for customers and as Chair of the Risk Committee, it would be interesting if Mr. Kupper answered the question.

I'll have an answer to the question. I might throw to Elmer in a second. But so firstly, as I outlined earlier in one of my answers, we have a, we have a really mature risk management framework that operates right across the organization, and we have embedded the way we think about AI in that risk management framework linked to the appropriate policies around data management and so on and so forth that are really important as part of AI. Each initiative is assessed by management against the established risk appetite. The data ethics commitments we have, model governance standards we have before deployment. And then the Board Risk Committee gets regular updates on that, and I'll maybe get Elmer to talk to that. But in terms of who checks that the first line, so the business is accountable, second line reviews that. And then we have also used third line internal audit to also review things. So we have the 3 lines of defense, which is well established, are working well in respect of AI as they are to everything else that we do across the organization and business.

Elmer, was there anything you wanted to add?

Yes. So AI introduces new risks in the way the technology interacts with customers and our day-to-day processes. It amplifies risks that we already have today, particularly in cybersecurity. And so AI is now topic at much every risk committee and very regularly at the main board as well where we have deep interactions with management on both of those topics around cybersecurity as well as the performance of AI in the way we run our business. We also run simulations with management and the Board on a regular basis to test, if our cybersecurity controls are working in practice and if we can deal with events adequately. So this is 1 of the top 3, 4, 5 topics that sits in pretty much every risk committee.

Thank you. So my understanding of that in terms of my question of whether AI is used safely and fairly for customers is the independent sorry, internal auditors check it, but you don't have a process of independent review.

Not from an outside party at this point in time. But obviously, we listen very carefully to customer feedback. We don't -- we actually don't use AI that much in customer interactions, and we give customers, for example, where we do use it, often have an off-ramp particularly with voice and things where they -- if they want to speak to a person, they can speak to a person. So we allow them to deal with that. Obviously, as Elmer said, it's continually fast moving and developing sector. As our community expectations are also changing rapidly, and we'll just continue to monitor that very closely.

For 2 years, as ask the Board to show each director's skills not just the Board as a whole in the Director's skills metrics that would help shareholders vote on directors like Mr. Kupper today. Why won't the Board do this?

We've had this conversation a few times. There are a couple of reasons. And we have made some changes this year as a result of your feedback last year, and you'll notice in the notice of meeting, we've been very specific for the directors who are up for reelection on the skills. They are using the same words as in the skills matrix. So if you want to do the reconciliation, you can do it there. The real reason is that the Board is a collective not a bunch of individuals. And the real objective is to make sure across the board, we have the right breadth of skills in the right place rather than in each individual director. Obviously, we review it internally ourselves, but we don't think that's appropriate. Interestingly, the ASX principles in draft appear to be going in a different direction. However, we're comfortable with where we sit in terms of the disclosure that we have.

I'd like to just make the comment that yes, I do believe you disclose good information on individual directors. And when you introduce them this morning, you did that, too. However, the resolution is not to elect the Board as a collective. The resolution is to elect an individual director. And so that's why shareholders need that information on that individual director.

And that's why we give it in the notice of meeting in some detail. But anyway, thank you. I'm sure we will continue to discuss this in future years as practice evolves as well. Belinda, I think that appears to address the questions on Mr. Elmer's reelection here in Brisbane. Do we have any online or on the phone?

Thank you, Chairman. I can confirm that there are no online or phone questions for this item of business.

Thank you. The phones and online have been very quiet today. As that addresses all questions and comments on Elmer's reelection would you please now vote using the voting card in the online portal, the votes app or your paper voting card. Details of direct votes and proxies lodged prior to the AGM in relation to Elmer's reelection are again shown on the screen. Taking into account the direct and proxy votes shown on the screen and the total number of shares being voted today, it appears this resolution will be passed. Congratulations, Elmer.

I can now confirm that a total of 637 shareholders, proxy holders and other attendees joined us throughout today's proceedings. Belinda, before we move on, do we have any relevant shareholder questions that have not been addressed during today's meeting.

Chairman, I can confirm that there are no further questions or comments to be addressed during this meeting.

Thank you, Belinda, right answer. Thank you. That now concludes the business of the meeting. The poll will remain open for a further 5 minutes to enable you to complete and submit your online or paper voting card. If you're here in Brisbane and need assistance with your voting card, please see a team member at the back of the room. If you're online and need assistance, please contact the share registry online AGM support team on 1 (800) 990-363.

Once the share registry has counted the votes cast during the meeting, the results of the poll will be announced via the ASX later today and will also be available on Suncorp's website. a replay, if you want to watch one of today's AGM webcast will be -- also be available on our website. As that now concludes the business of the meeting. I declare the meeting closed.

For those of you who haven't already left the room, but are here in the venue at the AGM, light refreshments are available in the foyer and my Board colleagues and executive leadership team will join you, and look forward to talking to you. And to everyone participating. Thank you for your attendance and interest today. Thank you.

Well, good morning, and welcome, everyone here in Sydney and variously around the world on the line. So let me begin by acknowledging the traditional owners of the lands on which we meet and pay our respects to elders past and present. Today, I'm joined by our CFO, Jeremy Robson, to present the financial results for FY '26. We'll run through the presentation. and other members of the leadership team will then join us for the Q&A session that follows.

So let me start with some of the highlights of the result and FY '26 highlighted the strong underlying trajectory of the Suncorp business. We grew underlying earnings. We maintained margins at the top end of our target range. We improved our expense ratio, and we grew in almost all of our core portfolios. The strength of the business is also reflected in the balance sheet. And today, we've announced a fully franked special dividend of $0.10 per share and a further buyback of up to $250 million. This brings to over $4.8 billion of total capital that we've returned to shareholders over the past 3 years. Now there are now 238 million fewer shares on issue today than there were 6 years ago. And all along, that improves the EPS and delivers for shareholders.

But we've also continued to invest for the future. across our technology platforms, our data systems and our AI capabilities. We are building a simpler, more productive and more scalable organization. And I'll come back to that later in the presentation. And in April this year, we announced the placement of an aggregate reinsurance protection, which will significantly reduce earnings volatility and strengthen the resilience of our business. Now that cover was the last that was on our to-do list post the sale of the bank and the building of the pure-play insurer. That cover came into effect on 1 July, and will also improve capital efficiency and underpins today's capital return.

But finally, this result demonstrates that it's possible to deliver for both shareholders and customers with more than $10 billion of record paid out in claims, billion of which were natural hazard related. That's 120,000 individual natural hazard claims where we have supported our customers in getting back into their homes and back on the road.

So turning now to the headline result. The business delivered cash earnings of $1.04 billion and NPAT of $1.03 billion. Now this is a good outcome in a year where natural hazard costs exceeded our allowance by around $250 million. Now as I mentioned at the outset, given weather, asset sales and mark-to-market noise, the best means of understanding the year-on-year performance of a general insurance business is through the underlying earnings.

This metric increased by 4.5%, with our underlying insurance trading ratio ending the year at 11.8%. This is now the fifth consecutive period where the margin has been above 11%, and which is a significant achievement in its own right, but that level of return now comes with increased resilience in the allowance, less reliance on reserve releases and a transformative investment in the business. Investment yields remained strong, increasing to approximately 5% through the year and slightly higher at an exit point.

Turning briefly to the balance sheet, and the Board has determined a final ordinary dividend of $0.52 per share, which is fully franked, bringing the full year ordinary dividend to $0.69 per share. During the year, we also successfully completed our $400 million previously announced on-market buyback, and that resulted in the cancellation of 23 million shares. We've long maintained a disciplined approach to capital management. We didn't raise capital through COVID and we've been progressively paying back to shareholders the proceeds of the simplification of this business.

And we've been guided by the principle that capital in excess of the needs of the business should be returned to shareholders in the most efficient manner possible, including the repatriation of franking credits. That's why today, we've announced our intention to further -- for a further $356 million of excess capital through the $0.10 per share fully frank special and the on-market buyback of up to $250 million through the course of FY '27. This capital has been released through the placement of the aggregate reinsurance protection and the receipt of the deferred New Zealand Life proceeds. Now importantly, these returns are being delivered while maintaining a strong capital position and while we continue to invest in the future of the business.

So to the next slide, and here, we focus on growth across the business. At an aggregate level, gross written premium increased by 2.7%. However, when you adjust for the foreign exchange impact from the weaker New Zealand economy and the New weak a New Zealand dollar growth was 3.6%. In Consumer, mid-single-digit growth was supported by both pricing and organic unit growth, reflecting the strength of our brands and the value that customers place on our products. Importantly, we have continued to leverage our pricing and risk selection capabilities to improve the portfolio quality, growing in lower risk segments.

Commercial & Personal Injury also delivered growth across all portfolios -- in CTP, portfolio growth was driven by the pricing increases that were implemented across key schemes, but particularly in Queensland, where we've been talking for many, many periods about the need for reform in that Queensland CTP scheme, and that has come through. And the advocacy position that we've held for many periods is now being played through in the margin.

In New Zealand, our direct AA business continues to grow in both units and AWP across the home and motor portfolios. The intermediated business performance reflects the softer commercial market conditions, the exit of a brokered book of business and a weak economic backdrop. Now Jeremy will run through the GWP outcomes in significantly more detail in just a moment.

And finally, this slide provides a summary of the support that we provided to our customers over a very active year for natural hazards. While these events impact our financial results, they represent something much more significant for the customers and the communities that have been affected. Across Australia and New Zealand, we responded to 18 declared natural hazard events, which generated more than $2 billion in net natural hazard claims costs but required a significant mobilization of our people and our response capabilities.

I've had the opportunity, as all the members of the leadership team had the opportunity, to visit a number of these communities over the course of the year. And every time, we are reminded of the critical role our people play in helping customers recover and to rebuild. Now what always stands out to us isn't just the scale of the event but the commitment that our teams make on the ground to support customers at what is often the most difficult time in their lives. [indiscernible] respond effectively as a result of years of investment in disaster management capability in technology and claims operations and in community engagement.

And with that, let me hand over to Jeremy, and I'll come back after that.

All right. Thanks very much, Steve, and good morning, everyone. I'd like to start by reinforcing a few of the key FY '26 financial highlights for you. As Steve said, the results reflect a strong underlying performance. Underlying earnings were up 4.5%, with underlying ITR of 11.8% at the top end of our range. We delivered mid-single-digit or stronger growth across most portfolios. That's home and motor, fleet, workers' comp, CTP and in AA in New Zealand, all be acknowledging it was partially offset by the weaker commercial cycle and the weaker New Zealand dollar.

Our expense ratio reduced 50 basis points, reflecting our ongoing control of costs, at the same time as investing in the business. And then we delivered strong prior year reserve releases of nearly $160 million. We've continued, as Steve said, to demonstrate disciplined capital management. We announced today the fully franked special dividend of $0.10 per share and an FY '27 buyback of up to $250 million. And that, of course, is on top of the $400 million already completed in FY '26. Pro forma for these items, we still retain $162 million of CET1 above the midpoint of our range.

And then finally, we've further enhanced our earnings resilience with the purchase of aggregate reinsurance cover for the next 5 years as well as implementing some investment hedges. These add to the existing resilience features, including the buffer in our natural hazard allowance, further protecting against downside risk, while delivering significant upside opportunity in favorable weather periods. And then we continue to expect to deliver margins in the top half of our range.

So let's get into the results in more detail and start with underlying margin. The underlying ITR, as I said, was 11.8%, remaining at the top end of the 10% to 12% range. On a portfolio basis, Consumer delivered an underlying ITR of 9.9%, modestly up from FY '25, as our pricing continues to reflect inflation. Commercial & Personal Injury margin increased to 11% and supported by pricing improvements in CTP and workers' comp, offset by some pressure in property as well as the impact of ongoing remediation and elevated fire claims and platforms. New Zealand margins contracted taking into account internal reinsurance, but still remains strong despite moderating towards target levels in the second half as the softer pricing earned through.

Now looking ahead to FY '27, as I said, we expect to continue to deliver an underlying margin in the top half of our range. Pricing will continue to reflect claims inflation in Home and Motor, albeit margin is expected to moderate within guide rails. And then the benefit of ongoing remediation in Platforms and pricing in CTP is expected to be partially offset by New Zealand moderating to target levels, as I said. The FY '27 margin outlook includes the additional premium for aggregate cover. Now importantly, this will be broadly offset by a combination of expected profit commissions reinsurance savings on the main cat program, loss ratio initiatives and some pricing response in select portfolios. These dynamics are expected to result in a slight skew of the margin towards the second half.

Moving then to the divisional results, and we'll start with Consumer. Motor GWP increased 5.8%, reflecting input cost inflation. GWP growth was similar in both halves, albeit with a slightly different unit AWP mix, mostly in the fourth quarter, reflecting market conditions. Notably, we continue to see strong growth in our Bingle brand with 13% GWP growth in FY '26. In Home, GWP grew by 5.9%, reflecting pricing for claims inflation. We continue to see the benefits of our improved risk selection and pricing capabilities with a continued shift towards lower-risk properties.

Mid-single-digit claims inflation in Home was driven by the higher natural hazard allowance and higher claims for water damage and landlord covers, but offset by tight management of the claims repair chain. Similar levels of claims inflation in motor reflected increased credit hire, windscreen and towing costs, but importantly, parts, paint and labor inflation and total loss costs all moderated in the second half.

Next then to Commercial & Personal Injury. GWP increased 4.5% for the full year and 6.5% in the second half, demonstrating the strong momentum in that business. It also shows the benefit of portfolio diversification with resilient overall performance, notwithstanding the challenging market conditions. In tailored lines, fleet grew 15% at NTI grew by 6%. We also saw continued momentum from the successful launch of the new Vero Specialty Line products. CTP benefited from pricing increases in both New South Wales and Queensland, with total GWP growth of around 6%. These increases are still earning through, and we continue to engage with the Queensland government on the need for sustainable scheme pricing.

Workers grew 4%, reflecting the combination of strong renewals, new business and pricing and the impact of prior period premium adjustments in the first half was mostly reversed as we expected. Growth in platforms was impacted by ongoing remediation actions aimed at restoring profitability to target levels through improved pricing initiatives. Now the softer market cycle did impact growth in both Profin and Property, but I note that both portfolios continued to deliver strong underlying margins as we position these portfolios carefully through the market cycle. I also note that Commercial and Personal Injury recognized $177 million of prior year reserve releases, reflecting better claims development across pretty much the entire portfolio.

Turning now to New Zealand. Now notwithstanding the challenging market and economic conditions in New Zealand, the business continues to deliver very attractive returns. GWP was down 2.7% in New Zealand dollars and that's adjusting for the transition of the brokered book of consumer business that we flagged in the first half, but also noting a modest improvement in the GWP position in the second half. In AA Insurance, that's our direct-to-consumer portfolio in New Zealand, GWP was up 3.2%, reflecting the strength of the brand with good unit growth across both home and motor and then growth was a little stronger in the second half, reflecting modest single-digit motor claims inflation. The intermediated consumer portfolio was impacted by the brokered book exit that I spoke about, and adjusting for this, growth was a small contraction, reflecting the competitive environment.

The commercial portfolio in New Zealand contracted almost 10%, reflecting the softening pricing cycle as well as the weaker New Zealand economy. But again, similar to Australia, we've also maintained strong underwriting discipline in New Zealand portfolio with margins remaining in the target range. And then also similar to Australia, we saw significant prior year reserve releases with AUD $50 million of releases.

Now before we leave the divisional results, I'll just make a few comments on our growth outlook. We expect to deliver GWP growth of between 3% and 5% for FY '27. Consumer remains supported by pricing for input cost inflation across both Home and Motor. Commercial is well positioned to benefit from the price earning through the personal injury business as well as Vero specialty lines growth, and the ongoing remediation and pricing work in the platform business is also expected to contribute to growth. Now while the operating environment remains challenging in New Zealand, we continue to expect growth in the direct-to-consumer AA business and the impact of the brokered book of business that we flagged in the first half is broadly removed. We do, however, continue to expect a softer commercial market cycle and economy in New Zealand, particularly in the first half.

Next then to reinsurance. We manage our reinsurance program, as you know, through the lens of long-term shareholder value creation with a focus on fundamental economics. Our FY '27 main cat program is broadly consistent with the prior year. Reinsurance markets were favorable for our renewal and Suncorp continues to present an attractive scale market for reinsurers, and this has been reflected in the pricing achieved on the renewal.

As already announced, our program is now supported by a 5-year aggregate cover, providing up to $800 million a year of protection. This cover materially limits natural hazard risk capping downside at $50 million to the natural hazard allowance for FY '27 in approximately 90% of scenarios. The aggregate cover, as we've said before, is expected to be broadly neutral in terms of its fundamental economic cost.

Now the new aggregate structure adds to our existing multiyear buy-down arrangement on the main cat and both of these programs include profit share arrangements, offering material upside to reported margins where we see benign weather experience. Overall, the FY '27 program supports a more resilient earnings profile with upside opportunity without compromising long-term shareholder value creation or fundamental economics.

Now then to investment performance. The interest rate environment continues to support attractive returns with underlying yield on insurance funds in the Australian business increasing to 5.1%. And I note the exit yield at 30 June was 5.3%. Now as you know, the rising yields result in mark-to-market losses in both insurance funds and shareholders' funds and that drove net investment income for the year. We continue to adjust our investment portfolio in line with our strategic asset allocation.

In insurance funds, inflation-linked bonds were reallocated to structured credit and there's still a small rebalancing of the ILB portfolio required which is going to be implemented in the context of our outlook for inflation. And then in shareholders' funds, we've rebalanced cash into infrastructure and property with a final small rebalancing into infrastructure currently underway. We've continued to enhance the resiliency of the investment portfolio with the implementation of a hedge strategy, which effectively partially reduces tail risk in equities with no material earnings drag expected.

Turning then to expenses. We continued to deliver strong cost discipline while maintaining investment in our strategic growth initiatives. The expense ratio reduced 50 basis points year-on-year. underlying inflation across wages and technology costs have been offset by productivity benefits and continued management focus on efficiency. Importantly, we've been able to improve our expense ratio, whilst also investing in the modernization of the business, and that includes the digital insurer program, data and AI capabilities as well as technology platform upgrades. These investments are expected to further improve customer outcomes, simplify our business and support sustainable growth over time. We expect the total expense ratio to be broadly flat in FY '27 and noting that this excludes restructuring costs and restructuring costs in FY '27 are expected to be broadly in line with what we've incurred in recent years.

And then finally, on the results to capital. Our capital position remains very strong, and we've retained our disciplined approach to capital management, as Steve said. In FY '26, we successfully bought back $400 million of shares, reducing the share count by $23 million. Today, we're announcing a return of a further $356 million of capital to shareholders, with a fully franked special dividend of $0.10 per share and an on-market buyback for FY '27 of up to $250 million. Now this is in addition to a fully franked final dividend of $0.52 per share at a 70% payout. Now after taking into account the special dividend and buyback, pro forma excess CET1 remains $162 million above the midpoint of our target range.

Now from the chart there, you can see that we did experience some net usage of organic capital in the second half and there are a couple of items, key items, that contributed to this. The first was the impact of the foreign currency translation reserve from the weaker New Zealand dollar. And then the second was some additional prudent level of risk margin put aside for the current geopolitical uncertainty.

Beyond these are the key dynamics on capital during the half with the aggregate cover providing a one-off capital benefit, a target benefit of $107 million as well as providing confidence to reduce the level of excess CET1 we hold above the midpoint. And then, of course, the New Zealand Life sales deferred proceeds of $160 million were received on the 31st of July, making these funds available for return to shareholders.

Now before turning back to Steve, I'd like to finish by highlighting our enhanced earnings resilience profile. We introduced the new aggregate reinsurance cover in FY '27, which limits downside to natural hazard risk for the next 5 years. We have a robust natural hazard allowance, which includes specific resiliency buffer. By way of example, and you can see on the chart there, the top left box, average natural hazard experience -- average natural hazard experience would have been between $125 million and $200 million better than the allowance over that 15-year period. And that's with the current allowance, the current reinsurance program, inflation-adjusted and, as I say, average.

We've traditionally maintained a conservative investment approach enhanced by further diversification into structured credit, property and infrastructure and the implementation of the equity tire risk hedge strategy. And then we continue to place low reliance on prior reserve releases notwithstanding the material releases experienced in FY '27. Now these actions have provided significantly more resilience to our underlying earnings and all the while maintaining margins in the top half of the range. Importantly, there's also now a meaningful upside opportunity to reported earnings, as you can see from the slide on the right-hand side, including the profit commissions from our 2 structured reinsurance arrangements. This clearly represents a fundamentally improved risk return profile for Suncorp's business.

And with that, I'll now hand you back to Steve.

Well, thanks, Jeremy. And before I move to strategy and outlook, I just wanted to again remind you of how we believe long-term value is created at Suncorp. Our purpose delivered through our people in support of our customers and the communities that they live in, when done well, will always deliver superior returns to shareholders.

Now this slide is also familiar to you, and it captures our plan on the page. Our 5 portfolios reflect the breadth of our Trans-Tasman business and will provide significantly more detail on the individual portfolio priorities. At our Investor Day in October. Underpinning those priorities are the strategic imperatives that support our business and our strategy. These are focused on transforming how we work through technology, through modern platforms, AI and a culture that's centered on delivering simple, personalized customer experiences.

Now this next slide, I think, captures in a fairly simple way, the methodical evolution of Suncorp since 2019. The first phase of our strategy was simplification. And from the outset, we as a team, formed a view that the best way to create long-term value was to focus our organization on the areas where we could build genuine competitive advantage. And that led us through a multiyear program of portfolio simplification, which included, of course, the sale of Life, Wealth, Smart and of course, Suncorp Bank. With the completion of the New Zealand Life transaction in 2025, that simplification chapter largely came to an end, but what emerged was a significantly simpler business.

Now the second phase of the strategy was about investing in what we call the pure play insurer or Project Sunshine as we called it internally. Now alongside the simplification program, we invested heavily in the foundations of the insurance business. We began implementing a new policy administration system. We modernized our claims capabilities. We've invested in new telephony platforms, and we built out our data capabilities. We've, of course, also started the journey with AI. And finally, we also strengthened the resilience of the business, as Jeremy has pointed out through the enhancements to our reinsurance program.

Now this brings us to the third phase, which is where we are today. We are now entering a period where the focus shifts from building those capabilities to leveraging them to better deliver better outcomes for our customers. And this is fundamentally important because insurance is changing. Customers increasingly expect products and services that reflect their individual circumstances. If a customer invests in making their home more resilient and improving the maintenance of that home or reducing risk they will increasingly expect that will be recognized in the price they pay for their insurance. And the same is true for motor and commercial as it's been in commercial for many, many years.

But to deliver that future, insurers need modern infrastructure, modern policy administration systems, strong data capabilities and to utilize AI, decision-making and AI-enabled distribution systems. And that's fundamentally why we've made the investments that we've made. The future is ultimately about reshaping how insurance products are manufactured and distributed. And we see opportunities for highly personalized customer experiences and AI orchestrated customer journeys.

Now the structural changes we've announced today will ensure we are able to leverage our new platforms and those AI capabilities to maximum effect. A new function that will be led by Bridget will bring together our customer brand and digital distribution teams, and it will ensure we realize the opportunity that AI provides for faster and more efficient distribution of insurance products through our suite of multi-brand -- of multi-leading brand strategy. Lisa and Michael in the new roles will be responsible for product and claims across consumer and commercial, leveraging our digital insurer investments to deliver personalized products and market-leading claims experiences. Michelle Bain, who would be familiar to many in the room will step into Bridget's role as the CRO.

Now I'm more confident than ever that we're on the right path. We have simplified the business, invested in the core insurance franchise, strengthened our resilience, and now we're entering a phase where we can leverage all of that to create value for both customers and for shareholders. and that will be the defining opportunity for Suncorp over the next few years.

So before we go to the outlook, I just want to spend a brief moment on the topic of AI and how we're thinking about the opportunity. And we'll have a lot more to say about this at our Investor Day in October. We've spoken about it previously, and it's an area where the pace of change continues to be significant. On the left-hand side of the slide, I've highlighted again our foundational capabilities, which ensure we are well placed to leverage AI and to improve the operational efficiency of our business.

As I just touched on, we have invested heavily in the foundations. We built the core technology, established a strong strategic partnerships. We're not going to do this all on our own with embedded governance and safety frameworks. But importantly, we've invested in building AI capability right across the organization, right through to the individual team member level. We're in a point where we're scaling and accelerating these capabilities across the business and increasingly embedding AI across our claims and customer service processes. And we've got a few examples of where AI has been deployed at scale on the right-hand side of the page, which to date has been mainly in productivity-focused use cases.

So finally, before Q&A to the outlook. And as Jeremy said, GWP growth is expected to be between 3% and 5%. The underlying ITR expected to be in the top half of the 10% to 12% range. Total operating expense ratio expected to be broadly in line with FY '26. We'll continue to maintain a disciplined approach to the balance sheet, again, targeting a payout ratio around the midpoint of the 60% to 80% range of cash earnings. And finally, as we've covered off a couple of times, we'll be commencing that buyback with a target of up to $250 million over the course of FY '27.

So at that point, let's go to your questions.

I'll start Andrei.

Andrei Stadnik here from Royal Bank of Canada. Can I ask my first question around pricing and volume trends in the basinal book. So just reflecting back on what happened in the first half in unit growth. It seems at home and more in particular, were flat in the second half. And price in bridge was actually pretty robust, but units really slowed in the second half. So how are you thinking about price and maybe marketing strategy going forward? Because I mean, you we outright have been very aggressive with marketing some of the other competitors. How do you think about price and market and other initiatives going forward?

Yes. I might just quickly start off and then Jeremy can go through the detail. Look, I think the first point to make is that there continues to be elevated levels of inflation across the insurance value chain. And I'd make the point again, as we've made many times that the insurance inflation is different to CPI, and it's running at a different clip. So our estimation of insurance inflation is around 6% or maybe slightly higher relative to CPI just above 3%. Now that's going to be the first fundamental priority as we look at pricing the business. And I think what that does sometimes is create disparity between the pricing that we see and the rest of the market, and you will see that unit count move around a little bit over the period of time.

The other point I'd make about the multi-brand strategy, which again, I believe, to be a very effective part of our arsenal. And I know there's been questions about brands in an AI world, but we're seeing this multi-brand strategy play out very effectively for us. through this period of time. The 2 pillars of our multi-brand strategy in Australia AAMI and in New Zealand AAI. And if you recall back 5 or 6 years ago, AAMI was struggling. It's now performing incredibly well in our brand portfolio as is AI in New Zealand. Jeremy went through some of the niche brands which are growing. And I'd make the point about Bingo, which is growing at around 13%. And that's the brand we put up against some of the price challenges and it picks up that opportunity for us on the way through.

So the multi-brand strategy continues to be one of the most effective parts of our arsenal in this environment. Pricing to inflation is also a key part of the story and making sure that we've got the discipline around that so that we're always going to be ahead of inflation, not behind it, which is a big differential. But to some extent, that may see unit count drop or move around a little bit, and you saw that between the first half and the second half.

The only other comment I hand to Jeremy with a bit of a top-up is it's very hard to get a sense of what the market is doing. And so yes, while our unit count in an absolute sense might have come down. We also see new car sales and various other elements of system growth, both for Home and Motor falling away a little bit in the second half as well, which will put our unit count number in more perspective relative to our competitors.

I'd just add, Steve, Andrei, Motor and Home was, give or take, flattish on both apps and unit growth numbers. We obviously flat in Motor in the second half. Most of that was in Q4. So Q1 was actually okay. So most of it was Q4. As Steve said, system, we think system came off a little bit in that quarter, maybe connected to the Middle East conflict. We certainly saw competitors increase some of their activity around new business discounts, increased marketing, et cetera. Maybe that's to lead into a 30 June type dynamic.

And then for us, we kept price on in the motor portfolio because we are constantly tweaking the portfolio across Home and Motor in terms of a growth margin outcome. So we manage those portfolios around those 2 factors. In an outlook sense, the price we're putting through motor today. So the renewal prices increased in the second half in motor. Those prices that we're currently putting through should see us get to our outlook for FY '27, so the current AWP that we're seeing with a little bit of an improvement in retention ratios into FY '27 through some of what Steve spoke around that brand portfolio.

For my second question, can I ask just us around kind of balance sheet management and the new multiyear aggregate reinsurance cover? Given you highlighted your what protected on the downside with upside optionality in earnings. Does that mean investors should think that you will be -- you may be in a position to continue to deliver special dividends if you do have good years going forward?

Yes. Look, I mean I have a couple of comments, and again, then JR can top up. I mean, I think we've always had a disciplined approach to it. We've been managing the mechanisms through which we get capital back to shareholders in what we believe to be a very efficient way. We recognized credit the franking credit balance is of limited value to us as an organization, but of great value to our shareholders. So the mix of capital return, we favor on market buybacks for the reasons that very clear around EPS performance, return on capital, all the various metrics that sit in the business and will create that long-term sustainable shareholder value.

But we do recognize that from time to time, there will be an opportunity for us to repatriate some capital utilizing a special dividend and then releasing the franking credits to our shareholders. So the form of capital, I think, might change substantially over time, buybacks will remain our preferred course conservative management of the balance sheet, I think, will -- has served us well and will continue to serve us well. And we continue to take a reasonably prudent approach to that at the moment.

I'd just say that I think we've said this before that with a 70% dividend payout ratio, we sort of ordinarily expect something like 10% organic generation out of that, so 20% to fund the growth in the business. depending on where growth is at, but something around that sort of level. And so if we do have more profit through those profit margins or improved natural hazard experience relative to our expected then that should generate obviously more capital, which should actually improve that ratio in the years where we get that and lead to more opportunity for capital management in those years, yes.

And if I can ask a third and final question from me. Just can you remind us of your initiatives in terms of helping customers and communities deal with client impact? And are you offering incentives to help with fund the transition of the risk management.

Lisa, would you like to come up and talk about some of the initiatives that we I mean, obviously, we've got -- we've invested heavily in our disaster management capabilities. And what that allows us to do from a customer perspective is very much get on the front foot -- so we've got metrological capability now embedded in the organization, both short, medium and long term. And so typically, we will see good line of sight from our meteorologists around what's going to be happening in terms of the weather and then we can deploy that disaster management capability through our management center out into the field in terms of making sure that we've got our resources appropriately set.

Yes. So in terms of -- from a consumer perspective, prevention has been a core part of our strategy. And as Steve touched on a lot of work in terms of disaster management, proactive alerts to customers and then responding. But equally, we launched Haven probably about 18 months ago. And anyone across the country can type in their address and really understand the types of risks that they might be subject to and importantly, actions that they can take to make their homes more resilient. At the same time for Suncorp, we've got the MyHome offering as well. That actually gives rebates on some everyday items.

If you take some of those actions, customer feedback of those using those Haven and MyHome has been really positive, and we'll continue to look to scale that. And then I know many people know I talk about this often, but in the motor space, we did a lot around prevention. So Amy's safe driver tells you in terms of every drive, hay driving, how to be a better driver, stop speeding, stop your braking. And again, there's pretty significant cash rebates on Ample, Meyer, et cetera. So really pleased with the prevention work and it is making a difference. And over time, we'll look to continue to scale there.

Okay. I gave you 3 questions there, Andrei. You're good enough to come into the office. Tomlins?

Mark Tomlins, Hunter Green. With your new aggregate policy for 5 years, how should we be thinking about reinsurance and how that impacts it?

Yes. It shouldn't -- that shouldn't have any particular impact on the intergroup reinsurance. So we did reduce the level of intergroup between Australia and New Zealand last year, but that's remained consistent for this year, and that's what we'd expect going forward.

And you reduced your exposure to insurance-linked bonds during the half, and then we had sort of an increase in inflation expectations and rising interest rates. -- you sort of regret doing it when you did or you sort of mentioned that you're planning on further reducing your interest with funds exposure.

Let me just start the question because I was involved in buying those things back in 2013. I've always said the minute you're going to sell them. to kick up. So that's obviously the lore of the jungle.

Yes. Look, we've done a lot of work on inflationary bonds and that that position to reduce the exposure to them has been there for probably 2 years now on the strategic asset allocation basis. We don't need as many as we used to have to manage the inflation in the claims portfolio and anything above that is really -- it's unnecessary bet from our perspective on inflation. We try to pick the right time to do it, but sometimes it's hard to do that. But as I say, we've got a small residual rebalancing to do, and we'll try and pick the right time from an inflationary perspective to do that rebasing.

You mentioned that you've exited a broker portfolio in New Zealand and Smith to have broadly removed impact for FY '27. But how much should we expect the impact to be in first half '27?

As small as 1 month.

And then ASIC was out yesterday talking about motor insurance premium renewals and the poor job that was done in explaining the increases. You do a great job for us here in explaining what's going on. Is it just a case of poor communication?

Well, I think it's -- obviously, we'd like to communicate better. We'd like customers to understand in more granular detail the components of the premium. I mean it is very -- it's not an easy thing. It's a lot of insurance is very difficult to understand, particularly on the reinsurance side and getting customers to understand the impact of -- on their premium of things like reinsurance adjustments. But we do -- we have been obviously engaged with ASIC, and I've certainly had many discussions with the Minister of Molino. It's premium transparency is one of his top rating issues sit around the ICA table.

The industry is aware of the challenge that the minister has put to the industry around improving transparency, and I think that's going to be an inevitable improvement that we'll see. It's just not easy to do. And -- but it will need to get better. And we -- in terms of our strategy at Suncorp, we are -- with the new policy administration designing pathways that will allow our customers to have more understanding of the inputs into an insurance premium, but critically for them, what they can do to reduce the risk and bring the premium down.

And finally, just on the management shakeup, does your new divisional heads got any plans for each of the divisions?

Well, I think what we might do, Tomlins, with due regard is give them a bit of time to get their feet under the desk, and we'll come back to that in Investor Day with a portfolio rundown. I'd make the point. When we did the last organizational redesign and compressed a number of direct reports from 8 to 7, which is probably lower than most other ASX 100 companies. So that give a bit of flexibility. I think that this is very much aligned to the strategy, very much aligned to leveraging the value that we see post the investments that we've made.

But the important thing is these -- all the executives that are in the team are very familiar to the new portfolios as they were to the old. And particularly, Michael has been the CFO for Consumer Insurance. He's run claims. He run most of the parts of the engine there of consumer. And Lisa similarly has run most of the parts of the commercial business. So I think the breadth and the strength and the quality of the team will mean that the transition will be reasonably seamless and Bridget has got some great ideas and opportunities to drive that brand portfolio forward. And use AI and distribution as an adjunct to our demonstrable digital transactional distribution capabilities.

I gave you 4 questions. So anything else in the room? Might go to the phone.

[Operator Instructions] Your first question comes from Julian Braganza with Goldman Sachs.

Just the first one on the 80 basis points of profit commissions that you're seeing is upside to your underlying margin. So that implies about close to $500 million to $600 million kind of over the 5-year period of the contract. I just want to understand, one, how is that calculated? Is there any -- is it on the best estimate basis is any level of conservatism? I just want to understand -- and also the formula kind of how you -- what are you accounting for that in that number?

We'll leave out the spreadsheet to you, Julian, if it makes easy.

Good try on the formula, Julian. But Look, obviously, the profit commission arrangements themselves are commercially sensitive, so we won't be talking about those. But the way that upside is presented on the chart is it's an annual number, obviously. And the way we've done it is we include in the underlying ITR calculation, the expected profit commission. So on an expected basis, there's a certain level of profit commission that we would expect to get with the -- with those -- both of those arrangements in terms of the main CAT 1 and the aggregate one, there is opportunity to earn well above the expected profit commissions. And it's that number then appears into that 80 basis points.

And the calculations are simply, what is the what is the maximum amount of profit commission that we're able to achieve on those -- both of those programs, less what we have included in the underlying ITR.

And is it fair to say that it's broadly equally split between the aggregate and the structured solution?

No. The upside is heavily skewed towards the aggregate cover. Because the way we've done the structured main cat 1 is reflected on the FY '26 experience. So obviously, we had the hail in FY '26 that did attach to that part of the program. which then impacts on the profit commissions there. So we reflected that into it as the new aggregate 1 it's a maiden program. It doesn't have any losses attached to it, to date.

Okay. No, that's clear. And then just a second question. So the fee discussion on unit trends over second half 26, which is a bit weak. But a lot of the discussion as well now is about upside to margins, well above the sort of 10% to 12% threshold. So I want to understand here is the pricing versus volume dynamic or the margin versus volume dynamic is more skewed in terms of margins. So I just want to understand, what does it mean for pricing going forward? And -- is there a greater focus on volumes from here?

No. I think at the settings within the business, I think I went through them in the earlier question. I mean, inflation is the biggest driver of our pricing position. And and you've got to recognize that many in the industry will have different means of predicting what inflation might look like prospectively. But of course, in insurance, if you get behind, it takes a long time to catch up. So we'd like to be there or thereabouts or slightly ahead in terms of our assessment of inflation, not only underlying CPI, but insurance inflation and particularly as it flows through the supply chain.

And I expect that will remain elevated over the medium term. Some of the scarcity and pinch points that we're seeing in terms of housing trade availability. I think it's going to continue to play out into elevated levels of inflation. So what that means is that if you've got a more precise predictive capability as we believe we have, then we may get ahead of volume trends or slightly below volume trends. So that's the general approach to pricing, and it will see some variability in claims.

I'd make the point that we've delivered those 5 -- at least 5 periods above 11% and most recently towards the top end of that range. We do have to fund the aggregate cover now. and we're committing to continue to have those margins at the top end of the range, with an aggregate cover with the cyclone reinsurance pool. And so the risk sort of profile of this business has changed materially, and we're continuing to maintain that discipline around top end of the range in terms of margin with appropriate growth.

And why do we believe we can do that? Because we see continued opportunity. We see continued opportunity around loss ratios. If you look at our loss ratio versus some of our competitors is slightly elevated. Now there's some good reasons for that, that are portfolio-related geography-related, customer-related, but we believe we can bridge that gap. And we still believe there's opportunity in the expense base using AI as a productivity tool. Our workforce is significantly more productive than it's been, and we'll continue to go that way.

So opportunity, I think, to keep that margin towards the top end of the range. But don't forget, we are funding an aggregate cover. We've got a premium to pay there. There are some offsets, but we still have to pay that cover.

Okay. Got it. And then just to round up the last part of that answer. You're not really guiding to any expense ratio benefits from here on into FY '27. Just want to understand why and all the productivity efficiency benefits with AI, I guess, is there more of an opportunity that could come through? Or is it more of an out-year conversation?

Yes. Look, I think that's a fair question, Julian. So we have guided to a flattish, broadly flat operating expense ratio for FY '27. And the drivers around it are we're still expecting to have some inflation in the cost base, wages, technology costs. Technology costs run at a fair clip. We're still investing in the business. So we still expect to be investing through 2017 as well. And the profile of the productivity, operational efficiency benefits from some of these programs takes us a little bit of time to get up and spinning in terms of full run rate benefit.

And so those dynamics together, we are expecting to see operational efficiency and improvements in FY '27, but we're also expecting to see some underlying inflation and continued investment in the business, which keeps it flat for 27%. But to Steve's point, there is a longer-term opportunity here for us on that expense ratio, without a doubt.

Got it. And just last question for me. Just on reserving in the consumer business. So I understand any differences in inflation that you're calling out was the system given the reserving trends just for consumer Home and Motor. And is that going to necessitate more of a pricing response? Or not really? I just want to understand how you're kind of interplaying that into pricing.

Yes. Look, I mean on reserving, prior year reserve releases, we had some strengthening in -- particularly in Motor, a little bit in Home. That was all in the first half. We went through that in the first half results. It was around some of the timing around total loss and third-party claims way back in July. So that's not really a feature in the results beyond that. In terms of working claims inflation, I said in the presentation that work in claims inflation in Motor and Home around the mid-single digit mark, which we have no reason to think it's different to the rest of industry.

That's driven by, in Home, some scope of liquids water damage landlord covers as we've seen rent coverage increase and some liability claims increase. And then in Motor, it's largely been with some moderation in the parts and paint and labor and total loss for that matter. It's largely been in the windscreen and towage some of that in response to the Middle East fuel crisis. So we don't have any reason to believe that those would be significantly different to industry, except to say that when we look at our claims performance relative to industry, there's some stats you can look out there that we tend to run slightly better than the rest of industry.

And Julian, just finally on that point, one of the sleepers initiatives in the business is what we call home repair. It's our proprietary home repair business doing claims-related activity. We've taken some steps recently given what we see in terms of the outlook for claims inflation and supply chain challenges. We own that business. And we've extended both its geographical footprint, so it's now covering the whole of Australia and the sort of eligibility of claims that it will address. So we now have it doing escape of liquids type claims very successfully.

This is going to be a very big part of our toolkit for this claims environment going forward, give us access to more secure access to trades. We're working constructively with it alongside the rest of the panel but it's going to be a very important initiative for us and doing very well over the last 12 months.

Okay, let's go to the next question.

Your next question comes from Siddharth Parameswaran with JPMorgan.

Just a couple of questions, if I can. Firstly, just on inflation versus what we're seeing in terms of GWP growth. Steve, you made some comments that you saw underlying inflation around 6%. I think you gave a little bit of detail around Motor and Home being around 5%. I think that's how interpreting your numbers. But GWP growth ex the currency moves was 3.7% in FY '26 and was consistent first half and second half.

So I just want to understand, your guidance is also seems to be sub inflation going forward on GWP growth. I just want to make sure there's some consistency between your comments that you're basically pricing for inflation and just what we're guiding to on GWP growth. So maybe if you could break down where there might be consistencies in the numbers that I've just highlighted?

Yes. So I think one of the points is that the whole market has a different predictive capability around inflation. And again, to the point of our pricing discipline, it is to get ahead of inflation as best we can and be prospective around our pricing as best we can. And so that will obviously have 2 components. One will be it will lift the -- if we're pricing to a higher level of inflation, we'll lift the AWP, but it may have some short-term detrimental impact on units if the rest of the market doesn't have that same predictive capability.

Yes. Look, it's a very broad spectrum of inflation. So you've got to break it down. Inflation in Home and Motor has been around the mid-single digits. So probably around that 5%, maybe pushing into 6%, 5%. AWP in Home has been ahead of that. over the course of the year. In motor, it was a little bit behind that. But we do that to over the course of the year to manage the portfolio over the course of the 2 halves, that's reversed a little bit. So there is dynamism in the way that inflation, pricing works across the portfolio. But we are quite confident that as we sit here today, we're covering inflation in both Home and Motor, particularly on working claims.

The bigger challenge in home is the aggregate cover, of course, because most of that goes into the home portfolio. And we're seeking to -- with the other initiatives I spoke about seeking to get that price through. We will see Home and Motor moderate to in terms of underlying ITR back into the guidance the guide rates. But we're confident we're pricing for underlying working claims inflation in Home and Motor today in terms of the AWP that we're seeing going through relative to that inflation.

And then the concept of inflation in some of the other portfolios around commercial and workers' comp and the like is a little different because it tends to be more around large loss dynamics. But again, we're quite comfortable that we're pricing for inflation in those, and we can see margin expansion coming through in CTP as we earn more premium through. And that's to get those products back to Guidera target underlying ITRs. We can see expansion coming through in packages, platforms as we remediate that business. And in New Zealand, commercial is similar dynamics to Australia.

And then the other thing we've seen in New Zealand is in motor, motor claims costs and frequency really fell away last year, and they've come back a little bit in a modest way in the second half of '26. And so you can particularly see that in AA in New Zealand, where we expect to continue to get growth in AWP in New Zealand, albeit probably with a little bit more AWP over unit growth. We had 3% odd unit growth in AA Motor over FY '26.

Anything more, Sid?

I do, yes. Just one question around just the increase in margins in commercial. I think you had underlying ITRs at 2.6% in the second half, up from 9.2% in the first half. I thought there may be some pressure there just given some of the comments that we hear in the market around what's happening with commercial pricing in aggregate. And I think you flagged in your commentary, I think rates were flat in largest segment within commercial. I mean, I know that there were increases in some of the personal injury classes. But maybe you could just comment on either margins by portfolio versus your targets? Or what -- where is the improvement coming through? And should we not be concerned around some of the softness in the markets for the outlook?

So I said the -- again, you've got to break Commercial and Personal Injury down because it's quite a broad church of portfolios. We saw the margin expansion in both halves coming through CTP and workers' comp off the back of the pricing changes that we've been putting through those portfolios. We've put significant price to both Queensland, New South Wales and to some extent, some rate in workers' comp in WA. That's what drove most of the margin increase in commercial. We've seen across property, for example, which is a relatively small part of the overall Commercial and Personal Injury portfolio. But we have seen rate reduction there. We've seen rates down into the double digits, maybe 10%, but the market is probably down closer to 20%.

So we've done better than market. We've seen rates down in Profin. But again, we're a lot tighter than the rest of market. fleet has been a little bit of a change half-on-half. But the key driver to the growth in margins in commercial has been the personal injury and we would still expect that to continue into FY '27, as I said. Some of that rate still needs to earn through those portfolios. We still expect to see ongoing pressure in commercial into FY '27. And we expect to see a little bit of margin expansion in platforms in FY '27 as we remediate that business. They're probably the key drivers.

Okay. Just one final quick question, just competition. Just you did flag increasing competition in the second half in personal loans. I think you were singling out motor. Just -- is it broad-based? Is it the challenger brands and ever comments, where -- is that -- maybe you could just provide some color?

Mike, it lease very quickly to -- but you just got to watch the TV. The marketing from some of the competitors has lifted materially through the last 12 months. I mentioned the brand portfolio, which we believe is in fantastic shape. The growth that we've seen in Bingle, the strength of AAMI and Shannon, our 2 key brands there. I mean it's clear that some of the premium brands, Suncorp [ Australia ] have been doing it a bit tougher in this environment, which is what you would expect. And we continue to look at options opportunities there for us, but the competitive environment.

Yes. Look, I think Steve summarized it well. I'm sure any of us watching sport on the TV would see it is competitive. It is broad-based, whether it's challenges or some of the more established brands in terms of in that market. And obviously, we've started to see the dynamics with some of the motoring clubs start to change. But to Steve's point, we feel really well positioned for the competitive environment -- we have a strong multi-brand portfolios. Each brand is very specific to customer segments, so we can meet customers where they want to be met, which is something that is unique to Suncorp and you see in terms of some of the performance of those brands over the last year and years.

Equally in terms of -- we've got great capabilities around pricing, underwriting and claims management. And claims management, I'll touch on in terms of we've got great scale. And many of you remember when we spoke about the half for the consumer results, obviously, natural hazards played a bit of a role there. and we go back to November last year, we're probably close to 15,000 or 20,000 claims, and we were able to use our scale, our expertise of our people to assess 500 cars each and every day through our mass assessments, and that's -- that's something that matters for consumer insurance to be great at claims and something we're putting some big instruments through. So whilst it is a very competitive environment, and you'll see strong margins in the consumer portfolio, feels that we're very well positioned to compete in this environment.

Your next question comes from Kieren Chidgey with UBS.

A couple of questions. I'd like to start by going back to some of the discussion around volume trends in home and motor. And just to be clear, maybe on 2 things. I mean, Steve, you're very clear that you're pricing prospectively for a view on inflation, you don't want to get behind there, which fully impress. What I'm keen to understand alongside that, it's just seeing post of the aggregate cover. In your view, does that require you to price above system at the moment, particularly in home? And is that sort of having an impact in your view on the volumes you've achieved through the second half?

Look, I think we obviously -- I mentioned through the -- I mean, the aggregate cover does come at a cost. There's a premium attached to it. The components of how we seek to offset that by and large, and this is a broader assessment of it, through benefits that we've got through the reinsurance placement on the cat cover. Cat program, which against any measure was a very good outcome for us in terms of the savings there relative to the PCP. Then the second part of that is the opportunity we believe that exists on loss ratio. And I think, Kieren, you'd be understanding very much where Australia sits relative to some of our competitors.

Some of that structural, some of it we believe we can get out through a program of work, which we're doing, and then there's the expense program that we have in, which is AI CCT, which is Claims and Customer Transformation, and other expense initiatives that we believe will go there. So -- and there will be some pricing. There's no doubt there will be some pricing initiatives that we'll put through. But they sort of come in that order. -- the benefits on the cat that we've got through the renewal, the loss ratio work that we're focused on expense -- continued expense management and then some pricing initiatives in both Home and Motor.

And the profit commission as well that we expect to get through. And Steve, the point I'd make on reinsurance is what we are not saying is that the reinsurance delta relative to last year will help fund that aggregate cover. What we're saying is it's the delta between what we achieved and what we understand the rest of the market achieved. So we would understand rate online for 1 July renewals to be down somewhere 13%, 15% in the market. We did a fair bit better than that. So it's that delta that we would consider to deploy to cover the aggregate premium because that's the bit where we're better than market.

Okay. And sort of when we look forward in terms of our GWP commentary '27, what are sort of within consumer, what are the expectations from a volume or unit perspective?

Yes. So in that GWP growth outlook of 3% to 5%. For Home, we'd assume units are reasonably consistent with where they've been for the last few halves, which is flattish, which we would sort of expect is not too different from systems. So we don't think system growth in Home has been much different to that, and we don't expect it to be much different to that. And in motor, we'd expect to get a little bit of improvement on our retention rates through some of the brand work that Lisa spoke about that would improve the unit growth relative to the second half. So we probably expect to see unit growth similar to FY '26 in FY '27. And as I said, the other component -- one of the main component to GWP growth is and that's pretty consistent in motor with where we're pricing today.

And Kieren, like everything in insurance is a substory sitting behind the first tier of the story. And while we talk about reasonably flat unit count in home over the past 2 or 3 years, the composition of the home portfolio has changed materially low, medium, high risk underwriting. We have fundamentally changed the composition of that with a bias more to low and medium risk underwriting. And so in that context, a flat unit count is fine. We've grown in low and medium risk areas.

Right. And second question, just on your Slide 19, I'm quite interested in, I guess, the reinsurance profit commission element. You talked there. So Jeremy, you said there's an expected sort of contribution now sitting in that underlying margin, but the 80 basis points is, I guess, a maximum above that, that you could earn -- I mean if the back testing you've shown on Slide is obviously more around the cat budget. What would the reinsurance commission upside look like historically sort of overlaid on that 10- and 15-year period?

Yes. We don't have it at hand, Kieren, but the way -- that is the maximum. And so for example, for the aggregate cover, it assumes that we don't -- the maximum profit commission assumes that we don't call on the aggregate cover during a year. And you can see from the chart, those years where we have and haven't -- effectively where we have and haven't called on the aggregate cover. So that will give you a bit of a sense around the variability in that over a period of time. And then the main cat sublayer 1, 150 above 350, we don't give the details on that, but that's -- it's a relatively smaller part of that upside profit commission in the outlook because we've limited because of the experience in FY '26. I mean the actual upside in that program is significantly more than what we've got on that slide. But we've limited it here because we did have the burden in FY '26.

Cat is $50 million budget, you still earn the maximum on the ag?

Yes. If the cat is in line with or below that $50 million above the allowance, then we would earn the profit commission, yes.

And what point does it go to zero? Can you give us an indication?

At what point does the profit commission go to 0? I'd probably can't say because that would be giving you -- that's the commercially sensitive number in there, yes.

In your approach, Jeremy, to booking this some it's a 5-year contract. Your peers suggest that they've been conservative early on, just given sort of the multi nature of how Suncorp likely do approaches? .

I think similarly, but just acknowledging that this is a -- this is going to be subject to the vagaries of IFRS 17 and this GMM valuation model, which has complexity attached to it. So I expect that over the course of the 5 years, there will be some variability around the way it's recognized in the actual P&L. But obviously, come the end of the 5 years, it will be what it will be. But just acknowledge there is some complexity in the way the accounting treatment around this works. And yet we will try to be as we are with most things, on the side of prudence.

Okay. And just a quick third and final question. The reserve release, very good this period, plus you looks like your normalized assumptions ticked up a little bit for the year ahead. I'm just wondering if you changed your views on inflation sort of any, what is driving that higher outlook?

Yes. No, the fundamental inflation assumptions, superimposed inflation assumptions remained unchanged in the current valuation, the latest valuations. But the thing we have done is added on just that prudent level of risk margin on the valuations just to give some nod to the current geopolitical uncertainty. And that impacts on claims, risk marginal claims, which is in the P&L but then also impacts on risk margin on premium liabilities, which is in the capital as well.

Your next question comes from Nigel Pittaway with Citi.

Just like to delve a little bit more about the sort of pricing and your ability to keep pricing above what you describe as elevated inflation. I mean do you have any concerns about your ability to stay ahead of that? I mean it's interesting when you're sort of talking about home system growth, you're sort of saying that's subdued and you're sort of sort of describing some of that to the Middle East conflict. But I mean, it's the reason just -- I wonder is one of the reasons why home system growth is subdued is because affordability concerns are very real. And therefore, that presents some risk to your ability to be at a price above these elevated inflation levels moving forward?

No. I mean they're not disavowing the concept of affordability. Insurance premiums have now become a very material or a material part of the household budget. So we are very conscious of that. And it can, to some extent, see that playing out through our multi-brand portfolio. I'd be doing very strongly, Bingle doing very strongly. Shane's doing very strongly, a bit of pressure on GIO and Suncorp, given they are the premium at the premium end of the equation. In terms of our ability to do it, I mean, it is a fundamental principle that we have that you need to price to inflation. Again, we believe we've got good prospective capability around that. We should have a scale benefit given the scale we've got in our business, both in terms of underwriting and in claims to do better than the market.

So it's a principle that we adhere to. It will see unit count volume count move around a little bit half-on-half period-to-period. But we think through the longer term, if we deploy our scale effectively, if we focus on loss ratios, if we drive our expense base appropriately, then and continue to use that scale across the business, things like home repair, we will be able to cover inflation and we will be able to grow units, not substantially ahead of market, but with market and slightly ahead.

The only thing I'll just add on Home, in particular, is some of that cost of living pressure is -- there's obviously an AWP, our ability to price component to. But the other one is the customer's ability to manage their own profile. And we have certainly seen with our AWP growth, the impact of change in mix. So we've seen customers are taking modestly more and higher excesses in both Home and Motor. We've seen the mix for us of the skew towards lower risk properties. Obviously, a lower risk property has a lower average written premium. We've seen some of the mix impact in our portfolio around in home, the Terry share rest of the portfolio to the has got a lower average premium. So that mix impact is also evident in particular -- more so home than motor, but a little bit in motor. And we've allowed for that in our growth -- those dynamics in our growth outlook.

Okay. And then sort of maybe just also sort of recircling on one of the other questions on the expense ratio guidance, but also in particular to AI. I mean, obviously, all the investment you've made in AI looks impressive, it looks as though you've got a lot going. But in terms of sort of hard knows shareholder stroke financial outcomes, how should we actually think about what AI might do for the business moving forward? I mean, is it even right to focus on cost reduction, should we be looking more at revenue enhancement. How should we be thinking this about this through a sort of half financial plans?

Well, I'll just get Adam up very quickly to give a quick summary.

Yes. Thanks for the question. I think not surprising to me that the whole market is shifting its focus from not just what you're doing but what value you're realizing from I think your overall thesis is absolutely right, that this is much broader than just purely an efficiency and a productivity play. I think there's revenue growth, fraud, claims cost expense related opportunities. I think it covers the broad church. And as Steve covered in the slide earlier, you need the strong foundations to be able to exploit that at scale. That's about the technology foundations. It's about the people and workforce capabilities. about the risk and safety, it's around the governance, it's the partnerships that you have.

And the area where we see AI delivering the most impact across all of those drivers is where we're not just deploying things in a point basis and kind of quite discrete use cases, which is I think where many companies, including us, have been over the last few years. But when you're looking to completely reimagine end-to-end processes, and we've picked customer service, claims and the end-to-end technology delivery life cycle is kind of the 3 areas where we're looking for much more transformative impact that picks up on all of those levers. And I think it would be fair to say we and every company is pretty early days, but we have had some market early deployments in that more transformative opportunity in the last few months.

So we've deployed a new genic voice capability that allows a customer to when they call in, through the voice channel, have an agent that provides them with assistance prior to lodging a claim, we'll extend that towards the back end of this year to do a full first nose of loss. And then in home claims, we've just launched end-to-end capability that once the claim has been lodged, a series of agents working with humans and more traditional deterministic outcomes to do a whole range of things to assess the loss closes, the coverage, where the customer needs to make safe or temporary accommodation and a lot of the assessment related activity to then provide the claims manager with a kind of an integrated view of what to do next.

So that's where we see you start to drive the more significant opportunity. But as I think Steve and Jeremy covered, that's a bit longer dated and where we believe we've got the foundations but early in terms of the deployment of that at scale. And as we alluded to certainly look forward to share a bit more color on that in the October Investor Day.

Okay. Yes. Just one final one, if I can, just tips a bit more in the weeds, but just there's a mismatch loss of about $45 million, which is a bit higher than it's been for a while. Anything in particular going on there? Is it just sort of BAU stuff? Or what sort of stuff in there?

No. I mean it's -- it is in the weeds a bit natural, but it depends on what you've put into mismatch. So is that the liquidity premium differential is the earnings on the premium liabilities. I don't know where those are going in your math. But in underlying mismatch terms, we actually had a small gain for the year. So maybe we can take it offline and dig into why we've got what the difference, but in underlying mismatch terms, we try to limit that mismatch as absolutely much as possible. And this year, we had a small gain.

Underlying mismatch. Okay. Let's go to the next.

Your next question comes from Andrew Buncombe with Macquarie.

Welcome back to Steve, I hope you're feeling better. Just 2 questions on the capital side, please. Just in terms of your capital usage, just how are you and the Board thinking about buybacks compared to the repurchase of debt with where the stock is currently trading?

Yes. I mean look, we optimize our debt is obviously a lower cost of capital and equity. And so we just optimize that relative to the APRA standards and in the diversification benefit we can get across New Zealand. But the amount of debt we hold is optimized relative to those conditions. And so we don't trade off the 2 per se. We just make sure that we've got that debt level optimized.

Yes. And then maybe we'll go into this in more detail at the Investor Day in a couple of months, but just interested in your investment in the core technology stack and how should we be thinking about CapEx in FY '27?

Yes. And we talked probably a bit more about AI than we did about our platform modernization agenda, AI being an operational transformation initiative. We have a series of activities that have started with data went through pricing and now in policy administration. That program remains on track. As we have previously talked to the market about, and we'll continue to update that. through the course of the Investor Day and beyond. And then the OT piece in -- with the predominance of AI, we'll talk too as well as the capitalization.

Yes, Steve, I'll just say that we don't see any change in the run rate relative to what we've got in 2016. And so that change in capital impact from capitalization and amortization, would expect to be reasonably consistent into FY '27 and allowed for in that circa 20% for organic usage that I referred to.

Michelle, did you want to -- a quick question in the room.

Michelle Leong from Australian Ethical. Just wanted to know why did you do better than the market on your reinsurance pricing? What was it the reinsurers for Suncorp's business or why?

Yes. Look, I think the difference we can deploy is the scale. So we're a very attractive opportunity for our reinsurance partners, and that's worth something in the market. So I can't talk to how people do their relative negotiations, but we've got a good outcome. And we had challenged and pushed our main reinsurance partners to help us out with the aggregate cover, which didn't happen in the end. And I think with all that supply demand and shifts around the program, we managed to deploy a little bit more competitiveness on the main cap part of it.

But that's relative to smaller players, not necessarily to your largest competitor.

Well, they don't have so much of that 1 July renewal. So -- but yes, certainly, would be relative to those others who did renew in that 1 July.

And I was wondering, I'm not sure if you really disclosed this, so apologies if I missed it. With your skew to lower-risk properties, could you show maybe annual average loss per policy improvement over time or something where we can see evidence of that improvement in the lower-risk properties?

Yes. I mean, we could certainly take that on notice to see if that's something we disclose. But just to put some dimensionalization around it, 3, 4 years ago, we would have had 12-odd percent of our homes in what we call high risk. And now it's closer to 7% or 8%. So it's a slow-moving shift. So you're probably not going to see that much of an impact year-on-year. But over a 5-year period, it becomes more noticeable.

We'll ask a question on the phones.

Your final question comes from Freya Kong with Bank of America.

Can I just drill into Slide 18 and the capital walk -- would you be able to split out a bit more detail in net organic capital generation in the second half? Because you printed profits of $760 million less dividends, $180 million, which still gets us to $580 million. But then net organic capital generation was minus $57 million. And I know you called out the FX reserve in movement and charge for geopolitical risk, but could you split these out for us?

So the -- I mean, the profit number is -- you've got that and the dividend, you've got that and the -- in terms of the net, the net organic usage that we had in the second half is largely out of those 2 items I spoke about, which is the risk margin, which would probably work out somewhere in the deep in the accounts when you get to it is around $60 million for capital around $40 million of P&L. And then the FCTR impact, which, again, you'll get to in the accounts, when you get them was -- so it's not private, it was about $50 million of impact.

So those 2 combined is what the organic usage -- the organic unusual usage of capital was. And the delta then is just deployed into usual growth in the business, growth improvement liabilities, some of that CapEx that I spoke about, but just the usual ongoing demand of capital for growing the business.

Okay. Okay. Great. And so going forward, would we expect earnings to track capital, capital generation to track earnings more closely? Or would you expect to continue to deploy this?

Yes. No. So ordinarily, through, I'll say through a cycle, but ordinarily, we'd expect for the year for us to generate about 10% of profit in terms of organic capital generation. So that's -- of the profit, 70% goes to the dividend goes to growth in the business and 10% goes to that organic net usage. That's what we would expect over a cycle. We've seen that in the last few years, we'd expect to see that in the forward look. But in FY '26, we didn't see that. And so that's why I say it's not a guaranteed dynamic each and every year.

There is variability to it. And the variability, particularly we saw in FY '26 was that prudence around the risk margin that we probably wouldn't ordinarily do in the absence of some of the geopolitical event, the significant decline in the New Zealand dollar we wouldn't ordinarily expect to see those sort of moves. And then in FY '26 in the first part of the year, we also had that giant hail event, which gave rise to a much larger increase in the premium liabilities and a demand on capital on the claims outstanding claims from that event. So there are a couple of unusual things in FY '26 that we wouldn't necessarily expect to happen over a cycle.

But you can see it's all manageable within the construct of the 70% payout ratio. If it was 60% payout ratio to be -- or sorry, 80%, it would be a bit harder to manage. So that's the prudence and that's a conservative position that we've got. And as I say, things -- these unusual circumstances weren't to evolve, then we have got that excess accretion from the payout into the capital balance that we can use for capital management through the course of the cycle.

And Steve, I'll just add that we'll see where the geopolitical events get to, et cetera. But at least 2 of those things should reverse. So we would expect the New Zealand dollar to improve back to where the long-run averages. And as we pay out that giant claims hail event, the outstanding claims liabilities come down and the capital on those comes down too. So a lot of this stuff is timing, but it can impact in a particular period.

So just confirming nothing more on the phones, nothing more in the room. Thank you very much for your time. We remain very confident in the outlook for the business that's reflected in our outlook statement. We look forward to talking more about the initiatives that we've got in place around platform modernization, operational transformation, AI, the multi-brand strategy and by the time we get to the Investor Day, any of the answers that we don't know the new executives will know in precise detail. So that will be a good opportunity to catch up with each of them in terms of their new portfolios. Thank you, and look forward to catching up in the next couple of weeks.

Thank you.

Good morning, everyone. Standing room only for the external participants in the Sydney office here and many, many people, I'm sure, online and listening in. So welcome, everyone.

Let me begin, of course, by acknowledging the traditional owners of the lands on which we meet and pay our respects to elders past and present. As usual, I'm joined by our CFO, Jeremy Robson, and we'll present the financial results for the first half of financial year '26. We'll, as usual, run through the presentation. And of course, we have other members of the leadership team here who can join us and support us for the Q&A session that follows.

As always, I'll start with a brief recap of how we believe long-term value is created at Suncorp. This is a slide I put up every time. It's our purpose slides where our purpose delivered through our people, supporting our customers and the community, but in that order, will always result in a sustainable and growing business for our shareholders.

So to the headline result. And at the outset, I would acknowledge that this has been a challenging half for the whole insurance industry as we've responded to the extreme weather. The group's net profit after tax of $263 million and cash earnings of $270 million were well down when you compare it to the prior period as we managed 9 separate weather events at a net cost of $1.32 billion, which is $453 million above our allowance for the half year.

Of course, I'd also make the point that the NPAT in the prior period included the one-off gain on sale of Suncorp Bank, which was $252 million. Net investment income of $259 million was also down on the prior period. And of course, it was impacted by the negative mark-to-market movements in the bond portfolio. However, of course, the flip side of this is that investment -- the investment portfolio is currently yielding 5%, and that creates a tailwind for future earnings and future margin. As you know, insurance profits are subject to the vagaries of weather and investment markets with favorable periods driving higher profits.

But as we've said consistently, there are also times when the reverse occurs. And consistent with that purpose of ours, our focus as a general insurer is on creating long-term value. And while we've experienced significant natural hazard activity in this half year, the way we show up to support our customers during these events is what ultimately drives and underpins long-term value creation.

So while the headline results have been impacted by those 2 factors, the underlying business continues to perform strongly, and that's reflected in the solid growth of our consumer business and our underlying insurance trading ratio, which has remained at the top end of our guidance range at 11.7%. We've also further consolidated our market-leading expense ratios. As you'll hear later in the presentation, our key strategic initiatives, the digital insurer program of work and our AI program are on track to deliver material value. And as Jerome will point out, we have maximum flexibility when it comes to the structure of our reinsurance program.

Balance sheet and capital position remained very strong, and the board has determined an interim fully franked dividend of $0.17 per share, representing a payout ratio of 68%. Our disciplined approach to capital management enabled us to complete $168 million of our on-market share buyback program over the half year. And we'll recommence the buyback post the results and continue to target around $400 million by the end of FY '26.

So on this slide, I've focused on growth, which I know is going to be a key topic of interest growth right across the business. And at an aggregate level, our business has delivered premium growth of 2.7%. Below the headline number in consumer, strong premium growth was driven by both rate and unit count. Home written premium grew 7% with unit growth of 0.4%.

Now pleasingly, in Home, we continue to grow our share of low and medium natural hazard risk and we shrink that which we classify as high or extreme. Our motor portfolio grew by 5.8% with unit growth of 2%. Again, -- that's a very satisfying outcome in the context of a highly competitive market. In Commercial and personal injury, GWP growth was achieved across most portfolios, but is, of course, moderated from its prior levels.

In CPP, portfolio growth was driven by the pricing increases that were implemented across New South Wales and most recently, in Queensland. Now our New Zealand business tells a slightly different story. Growth contracted over the half and was impacted by challenging market conditions, particularly in commercial due to the softer market environment and, of course, heightened competition. Jerome will go through all the GWP moves, adds and changes in more detail in just a moment.

Now given the significance of weather events over the half, I've included this slide, which provides a deeper insight into the profile of the first half natural hazard events. As I mentioned earlier, we dealt with 9 declared natural hazard events through the half and we managed more than 71,000 natural hazard claims at that net cost of $1.3 billion.

On the bottom left-hand side of the slide, you can see the top loss causes Hal is by far the most significant contributor, accounting for approximately 3/4 of event-related claims and driving claims costs of more than $700 million from hail. The majority of those events arose in the October and November event periods. Now the financial cost of these events seriously underestimates their true impact on the communities. I've been on the ground across many of the affected areas, and I've seen the great work our teams are doing to support our customers in the aftermath of the events.

And etiological and our disaster management capabilities, which many of you have seen and are housed in our event management center in Brisbane have accelerated our response while our mobile disaster response hubs have been active across 27 affected communities, engaging with customers on the ground approximate to the events that they've just experienced. Our scale in motor insurance repair meant we could quickly stand up a pop-up motor assessment center, where more than 4,000 vehicles were assessed over the course of 2 weeks, significantly speeding up the repair process.

Now it's in moments like this, long-term value is either created or eroded. And while the impact on profits will be felt in this half year, I'm very confident that the way we have mobilized to support our customers will be rewarded over the medium to longer term.

So with that, I'll hand back to Jeremy hand over to Jeremy to go through the result in more detail.

All right. Thanks very much, Steve, and good morning, everyone. I'd like to start off by reinforcing a few key points on the group results before we get into the details. Now whilst as Steve said, our reported NPAT was impacted by elevated natural hazard losses and mark-to-market losses, our underlying insurance result was up 6%.

I just want to emphasize a couple of key points about the result. We delivered good unit growth in both home and motor, demonstrating the organic strength of our brand portfolio. Whilst the Suncorp business has elements that are exposed to the global insurance pricing cycle, these are a smaller subset of our business. Most of our portfolios are driven by input costs and upward supply chain pressures and natural hazard costs remain a feature.

We expect acceleration in GWP growth in the second half including the impact of higher pricing already implemented across a number of portfolios. The higher yields that gave rise to the first half mark-to-market losses were a positive going forward and give us an exit yield of nearly 5%. Our expense ratio reduced a further 40 basis points this half, reflecting our ongoing control of costs at the same time as investing in the business.

Our capital position is strong. and we have reaffirmed target for the buyback of $400 million for FY '26. We have optionality on reinsurance as markets continue to soften, which we're going to explore further. And we remain confident that our natural hazard allowance is set at an appropriate level. I also note the strong prior year reserve releases of $65 million, 90 basis points. We saw releases ahead of expectations in commercial and workers but with some offset in consumer.

Okay. So now let's get into the results in a bit more detail, and we'll start with underlying ITR. The underlying ITR remained in the top half of the 10% to 12% range at 11.7%. And dynamics included the earn-through of pricing, continued improvements in the expense ratio and lower reinsurance costs, partially offset by the increased resilience built into the natural hazard allowance. On a portfolio basis, consumer benefited from the earn-through of pricing with margin remediation in home.

For New Zealand, while the portfolio increased 150 basis points, the group contribution was impacted by the relatively lower growth and the weaker New Zealand dollar. The commercial portfolio was impacted by pricing pressure in property and claims repair costs in fleet with margin expansion in the CTP portfolios following our disciplined pricing actions.

Looking forward, we expect the second half margin to continue to be in the top half of the target range with the earn through of CTP price increases and platforms remediation but we do expect some headwind from New Zealand with ongoing moderating prices.

On to the next slide then, and I'm going to quickly touch on overall growth before moving to the divisions. Growth in the first half was particularly strong in the consumer portfolios with unit growth across home, motor and AA in New Zealand. GWP growth was good in CTP and fleet but workers was impacted in the first half by lower prior year adjustments. And whilst more muted than the overall market, the commercial portfolios in both Australia and New Zealand were impacted by the current cycle. We expect to see acceleration in GWP growth in the second half, and you can see that on the chart, to deliver full year '26 growth around the bottom of the mid-single-digit guidance range.

In motor, inflation in parts and labor is ongoing and pricing has been adjusted to reflect this. We expect commercial growth to pick up with further product launches in Vero Specialty Lines and rate remediation and platforms. Significant pricing has gone through the Queensland and New South Wales CTP portfolios, and this will continue into the second half, and workers will also benefit from ongoing additional rate. And then we see price decreases are expected to moderate in our New Zealand commercial portfolios. I do note, of course, that the outlook is subject to the competitive environment, particularly in the commercial portfolios.

Now in the context of growth, I'd like to remind you of how we see insurance pricing cycles work at Suncorp. On the chart, I've divided our portfolio into 2 broad categories, those where pricing is primarily driven by input costs. and those that are more exposed or directly exposed to global capital flows. In the first group, our portfolios that require important capabilities. So that's things like established supply chains such as motor repair networks and brands and brand prints. This portfolios are subject to cycles that are driven by input costs, such as supply chain inflation, natural hazard events and reinsurance costs.

In the second group is business with direct exposure to global capital flows. Now less than 10% of our book is in this group and includes some of the property and professional indemnity portfolios in Australia as well as much of the New Zealand commercial business. The 2 key points I'd like to leave you with here are: firstly, insurance input costs tend to differ to CPI, and they continue to be elevated with ongoing inflation in motor and home repair chains as well as natural hazard costs.

And then secondly, while Suncorp does have exposure to the global capital insurance cycle and our commercial portfolios, we have a good degree of portfolio diversification across the group. I also note, we benefit from this softer cycle in our reinsurance program the whole of our business.

Okay. So I'm now going to move to divisional results and start with Consumer. In Motor, GWP increased 6% with good unit growth and moderating AWP albeit with further pricing put through late in the half in response to ongoing repair cost inflation. In Home, GWP grew by 7% as we continued to price for higher natural hazard allowance and underlying claims inflation Unit growth was positive but reflected the continued low system growth.

Now pleasingly, you can see on the chart on the bottom left, we saw an improved portfolio mix with a higher proportion of low-risk homes. Underlying ITR for Consumer improved from 9.4% to 9.9%, with margin remediation ongoing in home and motor at the top end of its range. Looking forward to the second half, we expect consumer margins to expand modestly as pricing earned through motor but with some moderation in home due to the phasing of the natural hazard resilience allowance into the second half.

Next then to commercial and personal injury. Performance was mixed, reflective of our diversified portfolio. Fleet growth was strong in the double digits, reflecting our market-leading capability in this segment. growth was good, reflecting the results of our disciplined approach to pricing.

In Queensland, GWP was up 9%, and we continue to engage constructively with the Queensland government on reform, including a premium equalization mechanism. The Vero Specialty Lines continues to grow with 4 new lines now launched and live in market. But then the property and propene portfolios reflected the softer cycle, albeit to a lesser extent than overall market. and works, as I said before, was lower with the impact of prior year adjustments on premiums. Underlying ITR was a little lower with improved margins on CTP being offset by competitive pressures on property and claims inflation in fleet. Importantly, property and propene margins remain at the top end of the range and provide important flexibility as we manage the portfolio through this current pricing cycle.

Turning then to New Zealand. The business continues to perform strongly from a profit perspective with an underlying ITR comfortably above the top end of the range, and that is claims inflation and reinsurance costs have moderated rapidly. Whilst the business is well diversified, GWP contracted due to varying pressures across the portfolio. In consumer, unit growth continued in our Direct AA business in both Home and Motor, whilst the intermediated channel was impacted by the exit of a brokered book of business.

GWP growth for commercial continues to be impacted by the softer market conditions as well as the impact of a New Zealand -- a weaker New Zealand economy. But we are seeing some signs of a bottoming of the commercial pricing market as well as an improved outlook for the New Zealand economy. Going forward, we expect margins to remain attractive, albeit to normalize down towards the top end of the New Zealand target range as moderating prices earned through the book.

Okay. Now to natural hazards, and it's evident, as Steve said, the half was significantly impacted by elevated natural hazard events. The experience of $1.319 billion was $453 million above the allowance. Now just to put this into context, first half 26 for us was the highest retention ever in the half. 1 of the most severe halves this century, and it was significantly impacted by hail events, and those are relatively random in terms of weather patterns and less clear connection to climate change dynamics.

The first half result also included an increase in attritional natural hazard claims costs, and that was primarily driven by the higher rainfall and wetter weather conditions that were prevalent over the half. Now whilst this is a disappointing result, it should be taken in the context of a natural hazard allowance that is sufficient in 7 out of the last 11 years, including this half and 4 over the last 6 years, and that's based on the current reinsurance program and current exposures and costs. Over that 11-year period, we would have cumulatively been below the allowance by over $1 billion, again, including this first half result.

So we remain confident that our natural hazard allowance with the additional resilience flagged at the full year '26 results is appropriate. And we note that short-term variability is expected, and it's the long-term performance that drives value. Looking forward, the second half allowance remained the best guide for expected natural hazard experience in the second half of this year. And I do note that the January performance, and that's with the bushfires in Victoria and the storms and floods we saw in Sydney earlier in the month was in line with the allowance.

Next, the related topic of reinsurance. As previously flagged, we continue to review our program against our reinsurance framework and our key objectives are optimizing capital efficiency relative to our cost of equity and managing volatility, all with the overarching goal of maximizing long-term shareholder value creation. Our FY '26 program, best met these objectives were placed in July last year, but a softening market may provide the opportunity to reassess additional cover.

In the meantime, our program provides robust protection, limiting exposure to the need for reinstatements as well as drop-down cover against large events in the second half now enlivened. That means our maximum retention for further events will be limited to $260 million for our next large event and further limited for any subsequent large events. And of course, we'll continue to review our options on reinsurance leading up to the July renewal, and we'll update the market accordingly.

On then to investment performance. The average underlying yield on insurance funds was lower than the PCP, reflecting lower risk-free returns and lower inflation-linked bond carry I do note our tech reserve investment managers, again performed strongly with good alpha. The higher yield environment continues to support an attractive exit yield, which is currently around the 5% mark.

Now we've made some changes to our investment allocations in line with our strategic asset allocation. We've reallocated from inflation-linked bonds to structured credit and insurance funds and rebalanced from cash into property in shareholders' funds. Going forward, we'll continue with this rebalancing, but being mindful of the market outlook for inflation in particular and as suitable opportunities arise.

Turning then to expenses. Operating expenses increased by 4%, and that's whilst our total expense ratio reduced by a further 40 basis points. Expense growth was largely in our growth-related costs. That's driven by investment in the digital insurer policy admin system and investment in AI capability. We also increased our spend in marketing in response to elevated competitor activity and then run the business expenses increased modestly as productivity improvements continue to help offset wage and technology inflation. Going forward, we aim to keep our run costs as low as possible through operational efficiencies as we continue to invest in our key strategic priorities of platform modernization and operational transformation, including AI.

And so finally for me then to capital. Our capital position remains strong with $700 million of CET1 above the midpoint of our target range. And I'll just make a couple of points on the usual capital waterfall. The final dividend of $0.17 per share represents a payout ratio of 68%. It's around the midpoint of our target range and is fully franked. The GI capital usage you see on the waterfall was largely from the higher natural hazard experience enough, some business growth and then some of that investment portfolio rebalancing that I referenced.

The other category you see largely relates to the weaker New Zealand dollar. And then the completion of the $168 million of on-market buybacks in the first half was largely in line with our expectations. Importantly, the buyback is expected to resume after the first half results. And again, reaffirm that we continue to target $400 million for FY '26. Going forward, capital access to our needs is expected to be returned to shareholders using on-market buybacks, as we've previously flagged. I do note that we have a preference for managing capital in the top half of the range as opposed to hard on the midpoint in order to optimize ongoing capital flexibility.

And with that, I'll hand you back to Steve.

Okay. Thank you, Jeremy. And moving to the next slide. And here, we provide a quick update on our progress in delivering our digital insurer platform modernization program of work. Now at the bottom of the slide, I remind you of the progress that we have made in replatforming both our contact center and our pricing environment in Australia and in New Zealand.

As we touched on in our investor update last November, our first release of our new policy administration system went live in April last year for new home and motor portfolios in our AA Insurance New Zealand joint venture. The system has started to deliver more simplified underwriting and greater automation, and we remain confident the expected benefits that are baked into the AI business plan, but also into the whole digital insurer business plan will be realized over time.

We're now well into the delivery of our second release in our AAMI brand, which is, of course, our flagship national consumer brand. Now we're targeting this release for Amy Home and Motor new business around the middle of this year and migration of existing policies at renewal, which will follow soon thereafter.

But before I move to the outlook, I wanted to update you on our approach to AI, which as you all know, is a topic of key global interest, particularly as it relates to insurance. Now we spent a lot of time on this at our Investor Day back in November, but as usual, with these technology-based disruptions, a lot has happened in the past 4 months.

On this slide, I've recapped the Suncorp AI story so far. It describes how we are well placed to leverage AI to improve customer outcomes and importantly, to support long-term returns. We believe we are uniquely placed to be towards the front of the AI adoption curve. We have market-leading AI capability within our Suncorp team, and we have established partnerships with leading AI technology companies and BPO partners. With these partners know us know our processes and know how AI can be redeployed -- can be deployed alongside automation and process redesign.

Our agentic AI program of work that we showcased at Investor Day is now in full-scale delivery. We are on track with initial deployments across our claims and customer services processes, though we see opportunities right across the value chain of insurance to enhance the customer experience and to transform end-to-end processes.

Additionally, as I outlined on the previous slide, we continue to progress our broader technology road map, which is replatforming our business with SaaS-based cloud-enabled core systems, where importantly, AI is embedded into the core. We already have AI enabled across our enterprise-wide telephony platform and our earning pricing engine. And on this slide, I provided a snapshot of just some of the AI capabilities that are embedded into the core replatforming work program will work, some of which is already in place and more to come.

As a manufacturer of insurance, we see material opportunities for AI to improve product design in a hyper personalized insurance future and to transform claims processes from a customer perspective, all along reducing our loss and expense ratios and importantly, addressing insurance affordability. As a distributor, we see opportunities for AI to both strengthen the effectiveness and deepen the customer engagement across our market-leading brand portfolio. This will equally apply to consumer and commercial or as premium pills move between those portfolios over time.

In summary, AI will significantly improve our capabilities and efficiency in both manufacturing and distribution -- but over time, it will allow us to carefully and selectively assess other opportunities across the insurance value chain.

So to the outlook, and I'd like to summarize a few of the key points for the full year. GWP growth is expected to be around the bottom of the mid-single-digit range given the current cycle in commercial in Australia and New Zealand. The underlying ITR is expected to remain in the top half of the 10% to 12% range. The operating expense ratio is expected to be approximately 50 basis points below FY '25, but with an increasing proportion of expenses allocated to growing the business.

We maintained our disciplined approach to the balance sheet, targeting a payout ratio around the midpoint of that 60% to 80% range of cash earnings. And finally, as we've covered off, we'll be restarting the buyback as soon as possible with the target of around $400 million over the course of the year, the full year.

So in summary, our team continues to rally around a purpose. We are focused at this point in time on the needs of our customers, supporting them with best-in-class event response capability. Our brands remain well supported, and our multi-brand strategy allows us to reach a broader customer base. We are investing in modern technology, which alongside AI transformation will deliver leading customer experience and competitive pricing. We ended the second half with a strong capital position, active capital management, all of which will deliver improved shareholder returns. And as Jeremy has covered off, we have optionality on reinsurance as markets continue to soften.

So with that, let's move to questions. Why don't we just work our way along the front panel here, Nigel?

It's Nigel Pittaway here from Citi. First question, just I mean, can we just clarify exactly what we mean by bottom of mid-single-digit range? Does that mean 4% to 6% is the range and 4% is the bottom. Is that a correct ratio?

It's pretty sensible arithmetic to me Nigel, yes, mid-single digits. We would suggest would be 4% to 6% and bottom is 4%.

Okay. Fair enough. Okay. Moving on to Motor then. I was wondering whether you can sort of elaborate on what actually surprised you in terms of motor inflation in the period. You've obviously made some comments there about pressures across repair and total claims, but I was wondering for a bit more color there. And also whilst we're still on motor, I think you mentioned that you put through price increases towards the end of the half, which seems to have gone the opposite direction to one of your key competitors. So I was wondering whether you've seen any change in competitive dynamics in the first 6 weeks of this half?

Quickly just -- and Jeremy can top up on lease potentially as well around what we're seeing in inflation. At the highest level, the discipline that we apply is that we monitor inflation very carefully across the whole insurance portfolio. And we've often said that you can't look at insurance inflation through a proxy at CPI. Some of the work we've done over the past 6 months to try and understand the differential between CPI and insurance inflation would put insurance inflation running at between 3% and 4% higher than CPI across our portfolio.

So in Motor, let's start with Motor. Obviously, some of the dynamics might have been masked by the significant reduction in inflation as the repair chains became more accessible post COVID. So a big, big disruption, Motor. Those repair chains have broadly settled out, but labor rates remain high. That's the first point to make.

The second point to make is when you think about motor, often we tend to look right over the horizon to an automated vehicle world. But what's going on in motor at the moment, there is a very significant short-term dislocation with electric vehicles coming into the market, hybrid vehicles coming into the market, particularly with Chinese origin. We've seen a lot of that happen. And that will disrupt supply chains for a period of time. We saw that with the introduction of the first round of electric vehicles, where periods of time to get supply chains working and get repair capability where it needed to be, and we're seeing a little bit of that in the network at the moment.

We're also seeing elevated costs continuing in labor, labor rates across repair. Not to the extent they were post covered, but certainly still elevated relative to what they might have been pre-covered. And we're seeing some impact of parts supply, some parts inflation a bias to replace parts now with the technology that's embedded in them versus repair them as might have happened again 5 or 6 years ago. They're all the factors that we monitor very carefully.

And again, to the overarching methodology for the group, we believe we need to focus on cutting inflation in our pricing, and that's what we tend to do, and that's what we saw towards the back end of last calendar year and into this year. So those pricing increases have gone in, and we're very confident that they will be sustained.

On the home side, to jump forward to probably your next question, the underlying dynamics in home are not dissimilar to what we've seen before. So on the hazard book, we've obviously had a pretty challenging half. with a high predominance of hail-related events and we will go back through our modeling to understand the allocations of hazard premium to hail and whether the loadings that we put across the whole portfolio continue to be relevant. And I expect that there will be some adjustments to pricing, particularly in some geographies off the back of that.

And also in New Zealand, where we tend to see the New Zealand numbers as small numbers in relation to the group. But relative to the size of the New Zealand market, they are quite material events that have been going through in New Zealand now for the past couple of years, had some changes in pricing there.

On the home side, the underlying factors continue to be the case and they relate largely to large loss fire severity of large loss fire. We've talked about lithium batteries that continues to be a dynamic, stabilized a bit in the portfolio, not so much frequency but more severity. And similar trends in scope of liquids, where frequency is moderated or stabilized and severity continues to be reasonably well elevated.

The biggest dynamic in home, and we'll talk about this, I'm sure, for the next 5 years will be the supply chain and the pressures that are on trade availability, particularly in some geographies, but that will flow through nationally. And so when we think about inflation in the portfolio, we think about that dynamic that elevates relative to CPI, and I think we'll continue to have it elevated for some period of time. and our overarching sort of methodology within our group and discipline within the group.

And you saw it when we stood out of the market previously and -- we're prepared to do that from time to time when we don't have the confidence around the trajectory of inflation. But where we do have confidence around it, we will price to it in a disciplined way. And I think that's been evident in our previous performance and continues to be the case. Do you want to...

Steve, I'll just add just back to Motor and Home for that matter. I'm not sure any of those inflation signals that we're seeing, particularly idiosyncratic to Suncorp. I'll just add another 2. One is total loss, which is sort of nearly 50% of the motor loss claims, motor claims. And that's -- what we've seen there is we've seen not an increase in frequency and theft. -- but an increase in the average cost of test. So we're seeing more modern vehicles getting stolen. So that's been a bit of a trend. Victoria seems to have stabilized a bit, but still at a higher level. And then the other one is third-party claims, which were a reasonable component of claims as well. and we've seen elevation in third-party claims, particularly from credit hire, which I think others have called out as well.

Okay. And no comment on units in first 6 weeks?

Look, I think put the hierarchy of decision-making inside the organization, make that clear. I mean we will price to inflation. Our preferred target is to have unit land somewhere between 1.5% and 2.5%. So that we're tracking with market. In home, it's a little bit more nuanced because the home system rate is negative. So 0.4 in an absolute sense, doesn't sound spectacular, but relative to the system, it's good. And importantly, in our Home book, it's the distribution of units and customer growth relative to the risk characteristics.

And so our target for the portfolios will be to cover inflation and grow units in motor at 1.5% to 2.5%, thereabouts. But if we're above that or below that in any period of time, and we're covering inflation. Our primary objective is to cover inflation on a book that's got 26%, 27% market share. I think that's the right way and disciplined way to look at the portfolio.

All right. And then maybe just a question on the reinsurance. I mean just aside from obviously softer pricing, has the sort of experience that you've had in the first half of this year in any way changed your approach to when you come to buy your reinsurance cover? And is it really the case that aggregate covers are likely to be more available?

Well, I think they've edged closer to availability every year. And by definition, that's usually the case. We would like an aggregate cover in our arsenal. Since we divested the bank, obviously, that's amplified volatility across the group. And so an aggregate cover would be something that we would have always aspired to. 2 months ago when we went through the process of pricing it and seeing whether it was a commercially available product, sensible product in the market. We couldn't make it work.

our anticipation is that the continued softening of those markets and the profitability of the reinsurers across the broader catastrophe covers that we're offering, will put us proximate to that availability. Now we've got to go through that process. We firmly believe that as a primary insurer, we don't have the opportunity to pick and choose what markets we play in, in this country. And so we have a fantastic reinsurance panel with great partners, and we'd like to see some support to provide that volatility protection, which we think is the last part of our story.

Okay. Kieren Chidgey, UBS. I might just start on a similar area, the GWP growth on Slide 12 that you put up, you're flagging better growth in second half across each of the portfolios. But the commentary seems to suggest most of it's coming from price A couple of questions. Interested in if you can give us sort of, I guess, a feel for the types of level of pricing you're talking across each of those segments. And then secondly, sort of your view around the competitive backdrop in each of those and volume implications if you do have to push above market on price?

Yes. I mean it's fair to say we've emphasized price. And we've emphasized price, it's already been put into the book. Now some of that, obviously, CQP, their filings that have occurred, they're scheduled, they will come in. We know what pricing we put through New South Wales CTP. But ahead of price is inflation. And so when you think about price, think about us at that overarching level, looking to price to inflation.

Yes, I think if we go through a motor, we see a little bit more rate going through motor in the second half. As we said, we've already started to put that through in the back half of the first half. in home, maybe a little bit more rate, but homes pretty reasonable from a margin perspective at the moment. So a lot of the price is around margin remediation relative to where inflation is. So we think a little bit more in motor. CTP, as Steve said, it's pretty much already in. So we've got another $25-ish on New South Wales CTP this month. We've got another in or so in Queensland.

So we can see that price is already in situ. Workers' pricing in Western Australia and Tasmania needs to lift, probably towards the top end of the single diets. So you've got price going through those portfolios. Then as a set of elements like in Vero specialty lines, we expect to see continued growth there and continuing growth from the first half rollout and then there's some sort of like non-repeats, if you like. So in New Zealand, we expect the rate deterioration to start to bottom, but also the rate deterioration started in first half -- in second half '25.

And so the first half -- second half '25 as a base is already in that second half '26 growth number. We expect to see some rate growth in motor in New Zealand, particularly in the AA portfolio. So that will support that. And then in workers, I flagged that we had these prior year adjustments, that's burner adjustments on claims, wage adjustments. We haven't seen the same favorability this year that we saw last year.

Of course, the corollary on that is you're doing better on claims, so it sort of net P&L neutral, but it does come through the GWP line. We wouldn't expect that to occur in the second half as well. So that's the range -- there's a range of pricing in the 10 relative to margin remediation. There's some new business that's coming through and then there's some one-offs, if you like, baseline adjustments that aren't rearing.

And sort of specifically on commercial, I think it's sort of your Investor Day late last year, you continue to flag desire to grow market share to a natural level in that part of the business. I think the growth this period is suggesting that strategy is on hold in the current cycle. Can you just give us a refresh for how you're thinking about commercial over this calendar year?

Obviously, as Jeremy pointed out, there is some exposure to the commercial cycle, particularly at the top end, and we have to be conscious of that. Again, back to the overarching concept of discipline, we are going to maintain our discipline in those markets. We've got good margin sufficiency, particularly in property and profit. And our strategy there will be to be very cautious around growth, maintaining ourselves within that margin range. And as the cycle starts to change, be in a position to capitalize on that as others are potentially remediating portfolios that they've driven below the bottom end of their targets.

So if we can grow sensibly and conservatively, but with good margin sufficiency and the margins are in the top end of that range. then we feel we'll be extremely well placed when that cycle starts to change and others start to remediate to go harder. But now it's not the right time to do that in our view, particularly with the discipline that we need to display around the margin performance.

I'd also just add, Steve, that when you talk about commercial, it's a broad church. And certainly, the growth in top end commercial property and to some extent, Profin has been weak. But we've had very strong growth in fleet, which is a big part of our commercial business. We've had growth in other parts of commercial as well. We had a relatively weak growth number on packages in the first half. We need to get more right through that portfolio. It was the other 1 that she mentioned before, we need break-through packages.

And so I think the key point there is commercial is a broad church, and parts of it are doing well and sensible and good margin. makes sense for us to continue Vero Specialty Lines, et cetera. But it's the top end commercial property and propene where there's a bit more pressure.

Kieren, just to add to your first question. I mean, the other way of looking at home and motor, but particularly Motor is geographically because there's a lot going on geographically in insurance.

That's my next question. .

Right. Okay. I'll answer it. So obviously, there's a Queensland activity with RACQ and the work that's going on there. And again, home and made are a different portfolios for us in Queensland. We're more comfortable growing in motor, obviously, particularly in Southeast Queensland, and we'll be targeting some of that potential disruption that occurs as those portfolios RACQ and their acquirers start to merge.

New South Wales, it's been a softer spot for us historically. We feel significantly more comfortable with the performance of GIO now than we might have a couple of years ago. And AAMI is obviously very strong in that market. And we think there's a big opportunity in New South Wales for us now. And if you look at the market share leader in New South Wales, some of their performance might be an opportunity there, there is an opportunity there for us growing in New South Wales.

And then South Australia and Western Australia, where the unit volume count performance in both those markets is better than the average of the 2% that we talked about. And again, to varying degrees, there will be opportunities for us to capitalize on some of the dislocation in those markets. So if you look at it macro nationally opportunity, you look at it geographically opportunity. And then in New Zealand, with AI, we're getting 3% unit count growth there. Not all of it is attributed to the new policy administration system. But we have an embedded benefit that we believe in both -- at the written premium level, but particularly in volume through the implementation of that new portfolio.

Steve, just a quick follow-up, and then I'll hand over. But the Victoria Motor picture is kind of skipped over Victoria. How have you seen experience there?

Look, I just don't see the same material dislocation opportunity in Victoria, as I talked about in those other states. We are pricing to the higher inflation in Victoria, which is largely so much frequency, accident frequency or otherwise theft. But in the aggregate of the whole portfolio, Victoria would be a market where we'd be looking to grow with system in both home and motor, maybe a bit more in home than made it but grow at system but price to the inflationary environment. And there is a delta on theft to the rest of the country, both in terms of frequency, but particularly severity.

Steve, just to add in terms of that sort of geographic per se, but brand reach, 1 we don't talk about often sort of refers was Bingle. Bingle as growing 15% GWP on the same time last year, but half of that is rates units. That is an example for us of a brand that's got further reach and further stretch as we continue to roll that out.

Andrew Buncombe from Macquarie Securities. Just 2 from me, please. The first one is on the experience in the month of January and rolling forward the last couple of weeks as well. You've said in the slides that, that experience was in line with the allowance. This time around, you've put slightly more of a skew on the second half for the allowance. My question is, is the January experience in line with a straight line average or some sort of shape?

Very conservatively, I think you said in line with the allowance, I would call it within the allowance. So we might have been a little bit better than the allowance. What are we touching wood with sort of 18 days into February, and we had some weather in Queensland last weekend, which is very material and some weather ongoing in New Zealand, which will be a big reasonable event in the New Zealand, but not well within our means at the Alliance level. So I think it's there or thereabouts. So nothing happened in the first 6 weeks of this calendar year that sort of says that we're anything sort of a skew to the allowances we would track.

Yes, we said that the second half allowance is probably the best guide for the second half experience, which holds true. But the second half allowance theoretically, we should improve a little bit because of now the enlivenment of the drop-down covers in the second half. So there's probably a conservatism in that statement a little bit. And the January experience was actually slightly better than that outcome.

And then the other question from me was in relation to reserve releases. So 90 basis point impact from a release in the first half, correct me if I'm wrong, but my understanding is the full year guide is still 30 basis points. How should we be thinking about the second half? Should we expect a strengthening I think the expectation outlook is more around the underlying business performance. So we achieved, I think it was probably 40 basis points, 30, 40 basis points on CTP in the first half.

And so we continue to expect to deliver that for the full year. When it comes to the other portfolios, they're sort of plus margin, obviously, in the first half with some bigger plus minuses around them. I don't think we expect all of that to reverse necessarily in the second half, but really just calling out what we expect to see on the CDP because that's where we expect to get the reserve releases. The other portfolios we will see strengthening and releases, but we would expect those to net to a neutralish number.

Andrei?

Andrei Stadnik from Morgan Stanley. Can I ask around the OpEx ratio? So OpEx ratio fell nicely in this half. Do you think the OpEx ratio can continue to fall into FY '27. And can it continue to fall into FY '27 even if premium growth what is slow?

Yes. I think -- I mean, we have to have opportunity from our operational transformation agenda with the AI on. Obviously, a key determinant to the OpEx ratio is where premiums go but I mean we still see a reasonable premium outlook. So the chart I put up around that insurance pricing cycle. What we're saying is for that 90% of our portfolio, there's still a fair bit of premium growth to run through the portfolio. That obviously helps an expense ratio. So that's one part of the equation.

And the other one then is the absolute expense number. I think the key thing is for us is thinking about the mix of that expense, though. And so one of the things that we are fixated on is trying to keep that run the cost business as flat as possible. And it's not always possible to keep it absolutely flat, but as flat as possible. And then to reinvest back into the growth business expenditure. That's expenditure on things like the digital insurer policy admin platform modernization and operational transformation, and we see value in that. So to the extent we can do that and achieve our overall margin outcomes, then that's a good outcome.

And for my second question, can I -- just coming back to the catastrophe budget. Based on the internal modeling we received from the insurers your catastrophe to sufficient 7 out of 10 years. QB based on their modeling is out of 10 and IGs over 9 out of 10, right? So at the moment, as robust the bottom and block of Australian listed peers. How are you thinking about catastrophe budget increase in the next year? And if there is an aggregate reinsurance cover, would that help limit the increase?

Yes. Look, I think at some point, for Australian consumers, it becomes difficult to price, for example, 100% adequacy on the catastrophe losses because just doesn't make sense from a consumer perspective, and it doesn't make sense in terms of what insurance is for. Now we have -- and we have all extensively lifted over the last few years from what was a 50% type number. modeled. Actually, in practice, it was probably much less than 50%. So we've all lifted from there. I think there will undoubtedly be variations in modeling.

So our modeling won't be the same as other people's modeling. We all use different models. And so one thing to have to think about is what might be the variability in some of that modeling. I think we feel pretty comfortable with our natural hazard allowance where it is at the moment. But having said that, as we've always said, if there was opportunity to try and strengthen it a bit further or within the realms of delivering that margin outcome, then that could be a possibility for us. but we don't feel uncomfortable with the way it's set at the moment.

And yes, an aggregate cover. I don't think an aggregate cover would change the natural hazard allowance per se. It would sit on top of the natural has allows where we said that.

Okay. Barry Kong from Bank of America. Just a question on margin progression in the walk there. Correct me if I'm wrong, but last year, you said you were tracking above the top end of the 10% to 12% underlying ITR ratio. -- some of that which you'd reinvested into a higher hazard allowance? I'm just trying to understand the moving parts here. Have you reinvested some of the additional excess margin into growth?

Yes. If we go through the portfolios on the margin walk, we have seen a little bit of margin expansion in consumer, and that has predominantly come through home where we have -- that portfolio has been in remediation. It was below where the target range was. We're now actually up towards, if not above the top end of the range in home. And then in motor, we were above the top end of the range. We're now back towards the top end of the range in Motor.

And then in commercial, we are sort of around the -- around, if not a little bit above the range across the aggregate portfolio there. And obviously, in New Zealand, we're above the target range. And so when we think about are we reinvesting in growth, et cetera, what we're trying to do, as Steve said, is manage the business to that return to that margin and then make sure we're optimizing our growth relative to other brand assets, et cetera, relative to that margin outcome.

I mean we mentioned many times, I mean, you can take a complex business and simplify it quite materially through our targeted returns on incremental capital back to our book capital return back to an ITR for the group or the Suncorp business in its entirety and then back down into the portfolios. That's a target margin that we would aspire to. We cover the cost of inflation, and we'd like to get some level of market levels growth. in some portfolios, particularly made where we've got scale.

Home, the story is more about improving the quality of the home book and going and in aggregate, delivering at system growth. Commercial, we think there's an opportunity at the other end of the cycle to grow ahead of system and get back to that natural market share. And CTP, because we've got an overweight position in Queensland, we're prepared to see some share. So you can take a very complex business and reduce it down to something that's a little bit more simple in terms of how we sort of intellectually seek to run the business.

Okay. And just some capital questions. There was some drag in excess capital in the period from higher insurance liabilities, I'm presuming because of the cat claims. Will these get unwound as the claims get settled in the coming months?

Some of them do get -- I mean, theoretically, eventually, it gets unwound, but some of these events have a fair tail on them. So we would expect some of that to get on wound. I think the largest driver was that natural has an impact on claims. You also see some impact on things like mix. So New Zealand growth was lower than the rest of the group. And so the excess tech is higher in New Zealand relative to the group because it's relatively high profitability. So you get a mix impact from that. And then there's always a bit of seasonality in that capital movement in the first half as well. So those are a couple of other moves in there as well as the rebalancing of investments.

Great. And just last one on capital management. Given the strength of the capital position, can I ask why the buyback was paused so early into the end of last year? .

Yes. I mean it's less about the capital position per se, but more about the confluence of events that we were dealing with at that particular time. So we were right up against sort of getting towards the end of the half year period. So obviously, that Christmas period is a period where you probably don't do much trading anyway. So the timing sort of was reasonably proximate -- and I think just with the nature of the events unfolding through October and November, we thought it best to pause. But we'll restart as soon as possible after this result.

Richard Amland from CLSA. Just would like to ask a little bit about risks to your pricing aspirations. There were some political sensitivities last year around sort of prices. You guys are acknowledging the input cost discussion that you've had, trying to push ahead of CPI by a magnitude might be somewhat challenging. Can you just give a flavor of any regulatory or political engagement that you've had that gives you comfort that you're not going to get hard pushback from any unforeseen corners?

Yes. I think it's never good to deliver a profit outcome that's significantly down on the PCP and probably driving returns on capital at that actual level and an aggregate level below our targeted returns. But I think what we've done as an industry and particularly at Suncorp over many years, is educate policymakers and regulators that we have got a cyclical business. So when we do generate returns that are above our cost of capital, through benign weather or favorable investment markets that we need that to deal with events like we've seen in the last 6 months or so. guess there's an ongoing dialogue.

Affordability is a huge challenge for Australia more broadly and for New Zealand, but particularly Australia and the incoming of the new Minister for the Assistant Treasurer, Dr. Molino is very focused on that agenda, particularly for the sort of 2% of the population or 3 or 4 or whatever it is that they can't obtain affordable insurance.

And so as an industry, I think we're working constructively with the government constructively with Treasury about how we might find an industry-wide solution for that problem. But in the industry-wide solution, has to, by definition, be industry-wide. It can't be 1 or 2 players that solve this problem. And it also needs to come with support from the government in terms of resilience and mitigation.

So there's an ongoing dialogue. There's no answers to that just yet, but it is an active part of the minister's agenda and at the individual company level at the IC level, we're working constructively with the government around that. Beyond that, I think the factors that drive insurance inflation, and I've talked about to use CPI as a proxy, are reasonably well understood now, I think. But we are very conscious as a business that while we might talk about inflation I talk about pricing to inflation, there's a consumer with the cost of living challenge sitting off the back of that. And over time, with the things we're doing with AI and digital insurer. We need to get better at designing new policies, new premium, new product for that subset of consumers who are really challenged to continue with their insurance.

[ Brian ]?

A couple of questions, if I may. In your analyst pack, you talked about the reallocation of Strata premiums from home into commercial. Does that reflect the pressure on them from the commercial property cycle or you've got a sign of further strata growth insurance plans?

Michael, do you want to?

Thank you. It's a clear strategic move. So with VSL or our specialty lines, one of the products we do want to enter into is strata. And so we have a small Strata book in our personal lines business. It's about $120 million a year. Thought process is bring that across and then run that direct book right next to the intermediate book. and grow it as 1 from a pricing point of view, distribution, knowledge. It makes a lot of sense. So it's probably just the foundations of building out that state opportunity.

Great. Then in terms of your internal reinsurance, there was a big drop in the premiums you are booking in terms of internal reinsurance, presumably because of the fall in reinsurance costs. Should we expect further falls in that looking for like possibly a similar level in the second half and then if the reshape cycle continues to fall, maybe a further reduction next year?

The key driver was retention. So that's internal reinsurance between the Australian business and New Zealand. And the key driver was an increase in the retention in the New Zealand business. So the Australian business just provided less reinsurance to the Australian business. which was then funded through effectively through Tier 2 diversification. So that didn't have an impact on capital. So I think the level we're at now is probably a more appropriate level. That's the baseline. But yes, I mean as markets soften a bit, might move down a little bit, but the key one was just the retention levels.

Great. And then with the improvement in your underlying margins, principally the improvement due to claims costs, how much of that was due to reinsurance or alternatively, if you want to answer that, how much was due to the earn through of phase?

Yes, most of it would have been a chunk of would have been earned though rate. I think if you look at the accounts, you can probably see where reinsurance costs are year-on-year, and you can see a reasonable reduction in reinsurance rates. But we don't split it out between those 2 categories. But you can see reasonably chunky reduction in reinsurance year-on-year, particularly relative to some others. And you can see in the pack where our price positions are on AWP. So you'll probably step on the back of the envelope on it.

Yes. Okay. And finally, how much of the expected drop in the expense administration ratio is to roll off in bank transitional costs?

Nothing. So with the bank transitional costs, they're all provided for as part of the bank sale process, and they were baked within the profit that we recorded on the sale of the bank last year. So that's all the P&L of the insurance business immunized from that bank sale process. Okay. I think we've got a couple of calls on the phone.

[Operator Instructions] Your first phone question is from Julian Braganza with Goldman Sachs. .

Just a first question on underlying margin. Just to be super I think of the guidance where we now have expense ratio is up 50 basis points as those yields holding up better than expected into the second half compared to initial expectations. Typically what is offsetting the impact in the margin?

Well, I'll get Jeremy to go through it in more sophistication than this, but the answer is pretty much New Zealand is that the answer. So pretty much all New Zealand, Julian. Obviously, we've had a period of time where the underlying margin in New Zealand is significantly elevated above its usual guide rails. We expect that, that will come back within the guide rails maybe towards the top end of the guide rails through premium adjustments that have already been made and starting to -- it's a reverse of what we've talked about in Home and Motor to some extent.

There was a little bit related to the natural hazard allowance phasing. So we put lighted more the resilience that $100 million into the second half and the first half. So that's a little bit here. But the key one is that margin fall in New Zealand.

So to be clear, do you have the new in underlying margins coming back to 16% in the second half, just to be clear?

Well, we've never really explicitly called out what it is, but it's something ahead of 15%.

Got it. Just my second question, you mentioned growing in 1 property, an opportunity to grow other than to try to understand how you're thinking about that from the perspective of a drag on your GBP going forward? And also secondly, what does it mean for how company you're being what it here on pain and what is the strategy? And what makes you think you'll be successful in growth of the market.

Sorry, you might have to repeat, Julian. Which portfolio are you talking about?

So just in our home portfolio, as we mentioned and long property. There's an opportunity for growth. So not understand what gives you confidence that you'll be able to achieve that growth with it just in terms of product in and how competitive you gave versus peers? And will that lead to other with GWP going forward as well?

Low-risk portfolio in home Yes. Look, I think -- I mean the first point I'd make is that this doesn't happen overnight. And you can see, I think, from a period of time where we started to reset ourselves around the apportionment of growth between low, medium and high from 2021 to 2026. First half '26, it's about 4% in aggregate. So this doesn't happen immediately. The 3 -- the composition of it all and go to the margin drag story is the components of it are to better risk select, better focus on that low and medium natural hazard area, but most importantly, to price at the technical level, close to the technical level for high and extreme.

And so when we talk about that in its totality, yes, we're improving the quality of the book, but we're also focused on making sure that the cross subsidy that potentially set in those 3 categories historically as being unwound, and we're getting closer to an aggregate home portfolio level to pricing actual and technical at the same rate. And so that has an impact on the distribution of risk between the 3 areas, but also improves the margin.

And when we talk about remediation of the home book, remediation is probably not the right word, but you can see 2 things. One is we're now growing at system or ahead of system. We're growing in a better quality way with a focus on low and medium. But importantly, we've also got the margin back to the top end of the range or slightly above the top end of the range. And so that's the way we think about it.

Again, it's more about making sure that the cross subsidy that might have sat there previously is adjusted to reflect the fact that we need to price closer to technical because as you know, if we are providing any cross subsidy there of any significant magnitude than others in the market who don't focus on those higher end risk areas will target only the higher risk parts of the portfolio -- the lower risk parts of the portfolio.

Okay. Got it. Now that's clear. just the last question in terms of your AI [indiscernible]. You just comment on some of the risks you forebody the just pricing competition disruption to some of the news that we have had in that area. You've talked a lot about Yes, that's the and looking for your sort of the [indiscernible].

Yes. So I think if I heard correctly, it's AI and the risks of AI, particularly around various of the domains. Yes. Look, I think 1 of the key elements that everyone is looking at, at the moment is the risk profile of AI relative to where you sit in the adoption curve. Now you can quite easily sit sort of in the fast follower or follow a territory and sort of watch others make mistakes and potentially benefit from that. or you can be more at the leading end. So our risk settings are very much approximate to the position and the leading position that we seek to take in AI.

So we're very conscious of making sure that when we implement AI initiatives right across the value chain, but particularly in the customer area that we're focused on and making sure that we don't disrupt the customer experience you saw a bit of that when digital started to flow through insurance and particularly banking and other industries. Those that adopted it early, obviously, made some mistakes in the early adoption of it. We're going to adjust our risk settings to make sure we can reduce or have a risk appetite to reduce those errors, but also to make sure that we're not falling behind the market. So that's the sort of aggregate risk view.

Clearly, we also need to make sure that as we go through this evolution like all major corporate players that we're investing in our people to reskill and retrain them and set them up for that AI world. So yes, the risk profile. We're doing a lot of work on retrofire at the moment to make sure that when we implement the programs of work we do that we're not disrupting the customer experience, that we're continuing to deliver what customers expect us to deliver, but we can do it in a more efficient way.

And Steve, just to add that net-net, we see AI as an opportunity. I mean, yes, there a risk around it, but we see it as a net opportunity, an opportunity in terms of within the business and how we run the business, how we can run it more efficiently, more effectively, better client experiences, et cetera. Insurance is already made for that sort of opportunity.

And then from an outside-in perspective, there's been market chatter around how AI may impact on distribution. Again, we feel well positioned around that from a consumer perspective, from a commercial perspective, with our brand portfolio and our expertise in how we, over a long period of time have dealt with that distribution channel.

And I mean, obviously, there's distribution potential benefits for us if we're early adopters, and we focus on it. But at the end of the day, you have to manufacture a product and manufacturing a product in insurance is about pricing and risk selection, and it's about claims management. And that's where we see material benefits as a manufacturer of insurance products to make our products better, more personalized to make our claims processes better and to continue to improve the quality of our risk selection and underwriting.

You've got all of those things working, you're going to drive material benefits for customers and for shareholders. If you just sit there, I think it's a distribution opportunity and you don't focus on risk selection, pricing and claims management, then you're going to end up with a book that's skewed to areas that you might not want it to be skewed to.

The next question on the phone is from Siddharth Parameswaran with JPMorgan.

A few questions, if I can. Firstly, just Queensland City, please, Steve. It has been a drag on your margins. I think 6 months or 12 months ago, quite a sharp drag from where we were with commercial margins previously. With the price increases that you're pushing through, does that get CTP back to target and where are you at with your discussions with the regulators on change particularly in Queensland CTP?

Yes. Thanks, Sid. I think it's well known that sort of 12 to 18 months ago, we had a very challenging CTP portfolio, very much reflective of -- we believe it wasn't a sustainable scheme going into the future. You saw the exit of RACQ and bringing it back to 3 insurers with us holding around 60% market share. The discussions with the Queensland government and the regulator have been very constructive. We've had, I think, 4 consecutive premium increases in that portfolio of different magnitudes.

From the start of the journey, we would have said those 4 in the quantum that's included in them would probably be sufficient, but there has been some deterioration in the scheme. So we still believe there's more pricing that needs to go through the scheme, but it is on a trajectory to return to the target margin that we would have in the portfolio.

In terms of the broader scheme reform, there's a couple of components there. There's proposals around the premium equalization mechanism. We think that's are supported by the government, supported by the regulator, but now in a process of having it legislated and system changes and all those sort of things, that doesn't happen overnight, but we think that there's support for it. And the wheels of government are stepping in that direction. So we think that's occurring.

And there is new scheme -- a new scheme regulator, not yet appointed but the all scheme regulator has moved on, and there's a new scheme regulator coming in, and we think that, that's -- we're having some constructive discussions around that at the moment.

Thank you for that color. Just a second question, just on the -- some of the difference between underlying and reported margin, just a little check on 2 components. So the ongoing reserve release assumption of 0.3% of NEP that you expect. Is there any thought about changing that going forward? I know there was a favorable release this period, but you had previously indicated that, that might start to drift towards 0. So just on that -- just that question. And the second question was just around risk margin strain. I think there's a risk margin strain of $35 million in the half. And I think that should be an ongoing component of the difference between reported and underlying. I just want to confirm that, that would be a consistent difference between the 2 per half.

Yes. So the reserve releases what we've said with those is that we expect 30 basis points this year. And as I said before, that's around the CT portfolios. The others will move a little bit, but we sort of expect those to be net-net. What we've said is that that was 150 basis points a few years ago. It's now 30 basis points. I expect over time, it may come down to a lower number. But what we have committed to reasonably clearly and demonstrated delivery on, I think, is that -- to the extent that comes down, we will manage our underlying ITR still within the guidance ranges that we're giving.

So I think it's come down to a small number. It may come down to a smaller number. It's becoming less significant, and we will manage that within the within the underlying ITR. And then the risk margin question, the elevation in risk margin adjustment that we saw this half was really off the back of the natural hazards. And so to some extent, that's really part of that natural hazards adjustment because obviously, with the experience we got, we get the claims on it, we put more risk margin on. So I don't know that we would ordinarily expect a risk margin of that same quantum because it was connected to that event pattern we had in the first half.

But there should be something in there?

There will be something. There will always be something there, yes. .

Okay. Okay. Great. Okay. Just a final question for me just on the -- you do have some drop-down covers, you would have done some modeling on the expectation of reinsurance recoveries and maybe things which may help your allowance in the second half versus what you all up for. Just wondering if you could help us understand if you are expecting anything at all given the quantum of the claims that you had in the first half, what should we expect this possible set of recoveries in the second half?

Yes. So I mean, it is fair that on most of those drop-downs that the deductible ratable erosions have pretty much been taken care of in the first half. So they are now, as I said, in Livent, give or take a couple of million dollars. They're now pretty much in Livent. And as I referenced technically, we have done the model technically, when you model that through the allowance you get a slightly lower allowance in the second half than the budget, the original budget for the second half, but it's not material, but it is correct, it's a little bit lower than the budget allowance because there is expectation now of recovery against those programs.

There are no further questions on the phones at this time. I'll now hand the conference back over. .

Okay. Anything more in the room here in Sydney? Nothing more. One more question over here.

Just a quick question on their specialty line launches. How much of these new products compete with global Capital? And are the launches dependent on what happens with the cycle more broadly?

Michael?

I think there's 2 parts to answer that. So firstly, strategically, VSL is around getting product breadth. We're a big believer in specialization. And so when you do these smaller products, you do them very, very well. You get the right underwriters in there. You can make some really good margin to support your brokers and your clients. And they're also not by themselves. I think it just -- when you have the breadth, you can use the specialty products and the more general products together and in multiline opportunities.

So that's the reason why we do them. We look for premium pools where there is opportunity, where there is a size and where we can get the talent to do it. And the second part of that question is how we tactically actually funded. Look, we do use global reinsurers. We look at our own capital we look at overseas as well. And if we can find the capital that is cost effective to us and they want to back us, then we will use quota shares and the like. So that's quite fluid though. We don't have to. But quite frankly, if it makes sense economically to use that capital, we will. So that's sort of the thought process there.

And just to add, Michael, I think some of the specialization that sits in there, through the underwriting through the broker relationships through the industry relationships. Some of it helps immunize some of that global capital pressure.

Okay, nothing else in the room. If not, thank you, everyone, for coming down or being on the phones, and we'll look forward to catching up over the next couple of weeks.

Well, good afternoon, and welcome, everyone. Welcome to our Shelley Street office. And let me start with the usual housekeeping matters. Please, if you could put your phone on silent. And obviously, in the event of an emergency, follow the directions of the team. I'd also start by acknowledging the traditional owners of the lands upon which we meet and pay our respects to elders past and present. So we've got a very full agenda today. So why don't we get straight into it.

And I want to start where I always do with our purpose and which I always put up at the start of every presentation, the inverted triangle, and it explains how value is created at Suncorp. Our purpose, which is at the heart of everything we do and delivered through our people to support our customers and the community in that order, we feel will always lead to sustainable and a growing business for our shareholder. Now I feel personally, and I think the team feel very privileged to be working in insurance, where the connection to purpose is not something that we have to force down everyone's throat. It is something that is so obvious. And I've been managing -- not managing, but I've been sort of watching 2 claims that have evolved from the Cyclone Alfred event that occurred earlier in the year. And both the claims resulted in -- from massive trees that fell through the roofs of the houses and obviously, the resultant damage of water inside the home.

One of those claimants, an elderly lady doesn't speak English. The home was built hand-built by her now deceased husband. So you can imagine the connection to that home. And the other family a 4-year-old and a newborn who are currently displaced from their home, obviously, as they go through that repair. The trauma of that event, quite extreme and now living in a caravan alongside the home of their in-laws. So that's not a pleasant experience. I don't think at least they explain it that way.

Now among the many issues that I deal with in my job, and many of them are very much in the line of sight of the people in the room here, those 2 claims and others like them occupy a lot of my attention. I've been out to those properties 2 or 3 times personally to look at the repair work. And I know that our competency in managing those claims will result in both of those families potentially getting back in their homes by Christmas. And that means a lot for them. I know that. And it means a lot for us, too, to be able to help them get back in their home and hand those keys back, which I will do before Christmas, and I'm sure they'll be very happy with that.

That's what purpose is all about. It's real. It's real at Suncorp. And it's why I always put it the first item of business in any of our strategy presentations and any of our financial presentations. So to the next slide. And here, we've captured that simple picture of what's next. Now obviously, having completed the bank sale and the divestment process and simplified the business, the question on everyone's mind is what's next for Suncorp. Our financial year plan '26 to '28 and the strategy sitting behind it marks an important milestone. And it's the first plan that we've actually developed as a dedicated pure-play insurer. And people sort of ask me, what's it like not having a bank? You've got nothing left to do or got 30%, 40% of your time back. And that obviously can be filled up very quickly with insurance work, that's for sure.

This is the first plan we've delivered where we haven't had to compromise each of the businesses that we previously had. And obviously, in banking, when you've got scams and anti-money laundering and cyber and all those things that impact on banks, there are things that cannot be -- or can be not disinvested in. So this was the first plan that we pulled together as a dedicated pure-play insurer. It was really my first insight into just how simpler the group is relative to its previous incarnations. Now the strategy accelerates our focus on transforming how we work through leading technology, through better data, through the modern platforms that we're building and a culture that's centered on delivering simple, personalized customer experiences. And we refer to these as our strategic imperatives.

The 5 portfolios that we have, and we have done a lot of remediation in each of those 5 portfolios, whether it be lines of business within them or the quality of the underwriting sitting in them, but the 5 portfolios remain the same. And the core foundations remain strong and what the strategy is built on. We want to be a leading voice on advocacy, and we'll get Bridget to talk through some of that in a little while. We've got a strong balance sheet. We've got a fantastic reinsurance program, and it's designed to deliver stable returns. Our risk appetite has been reset to reflect our strategy as a pure-play insurer, and we've obviously got a commitment to best practice ESG standards. And finally, our people strategy is designed to equip the team with the skills needed to fully leverage the investments that we're making in technology and transformation to innovate, to allow them to innovate and to solve the complexity of problems that prevails within any insurance business.

So before I run through the agenda, I just want to quickly reprise a slide that many of you will have seen at the FY '25 results. and it captures the core settings that underpin the strategy as a leading Trans-Tasman general insurer. On the left-hand side of the slide, we restate the principles that underpin the business. We believe our superior underwriting skills supplemented by the use of market-leading technology and the skills and capability of our team underpin our claim to be a superior manufacturer of risk products and claims services. We believe we've got strong organic growth prospects. We don't believe we have to be scouring the world for inorganic opportunities. We've got a runway of organic growth that we can work on for at least the foreseeable future, the short to medium term. And our disciplined approach to capital and the balance sheet, the sufficiency that we've built into our capital reserves will protect us in the event of extreme shocks.

Now on the right-hand side of the slide are the differentiators. And they are what set us apart from many of our competitors, and that's what will give us over time the competitive advantage. And today, we'll spend a lot of time covering those differentiators in detail. Our multi-brand strategy, which we're very proud of, allows us to reach a broader customer base than any of our competitors. And that, combined with the investment that we're making in technology, the ongoing AI transformation means we can deliver leading customer experiences and competitive pricing, thereby driving growth.

When it comes to claims, best-in-class claims program, we will leverage the scale that we've got in our supply chain, provide seamless end-to-end customer claims processes and we'll deliver market-leading event response through the disaster management center that I know many of you will have seen. And again, there are underpinning asset that we have always is the capability, the skill and the quality of our people. So today's agenda, and we'll expand on the key components of that 12-point plan, and we'll highlight the core settings and the key differentiators. We'll start with Lisa providing an overview of the multi-brand strategy and importantly, how we're leveraging the brands to drive growth across the consumer business. She'll then introduce the Digital Insurer program of work that we talked a little bit about last year before handing to Adam to dive deeper into the broader platform modernization agenda and the operational transformation agenda with an obvious focus on the big differentiator for us, I think, which will be AI.

Michael will then take you through the Commercial growth opportunity, which we think is material. And after a short break, Bridget will discuss advocacy, and we'll follow up, as usual, with Jeremy providing an update on the financial settings of the business and obviously, capital management. Plenty of opportunity for Q&A. Then we'll farewell the guests that are online, on the webcast. And for those that are with us here in Shelley Street, we would ask you to rotate between 2 breakout sessions, and we're going to showcase a deeper dive into the Digital Insurer program of work to substantiate the benefits that we obviously see flowing through that, both in terms of financial benefits, but also product and other benefits that will flow from that and obviously, a deeper dive into the work that we've got, the use cases that we're deploying in Artificial Intelligence.

So before we move to Lisa, I'd just quietly remind you that this is an Investor Strategy Day. It's a once-a-year opportunity to dive deep into the strategy of the business. We don't ordinarily get the chance to do that at our half and full year results. So it's not a day for a detailed trading update other than the ASX that we've had to release this morning, and we can obviously talk a little bit about that if you choose off the back of the weekend events in Southeast Queensland and Victoria. So with that brief intro, let me hand over to Lisa. And while Lisa is coming to the stage, we'll play a short video.

[Presentation]

Just do it. I'm loving it. The spirit of Australia. I imagine you all just thought of 3 brands. Maybe even saw some logos in your mind. And that's the power of brands, and we've got them in spades. And why do brands matter? Because brands with strong equity deliver superior returns and are more resilient in times of crisis. And for many of our customers, they deal with us when they are in crisis, and they need a brand and a name that they can trust.

Good afternoon. It's great to see you all. My name is Lisa Harrison, and I look after the consumer insurance business, including brand and marketing for the group. Today, as Steve touched on, I'll provide an update on our brands and demonstrate how the multi-brand portfolio is a unique competitive advantage for us at Suncorp. Given limited time today, I will talk to the consumer brands, and we can address questions about the New Zealand and commercial brands in the Q&A.

Many of you will remember that 5 years ago, we made deliberate decisions to reinvigorate the brands to better meet customer needs and drive growth. A first step was to update our segmentation and ensure each brand is well positioned around distinct customer segments. Let me make this clear. More brands strategically placed equals more customers. Each brand has a clear role, enabling us to reach a higher share of Australians. AAMI is our national champion. It has the highest reach across the country and attracts a broad age demographic. Given its track record of making insurance easy, it doesn't suffer from an age skew that many large brands can encounter.

GIO and Suncorp are state-based champions that have both heritage and trust in 2 of the largest insurance markets in the country. And Bingle serves the needs of customers who are price conscious and competes directly with the challenger brands. At Suncorp, our niche brands make us distinctive. Terri Scheer and Shannon's are the standouts, having both #1 market share in their niches of landlord and motoring enthusiasts. And we round out the portfolio with APIA for retirees and CIL, the leading caravan insurer.

As you can see, we really have the market covered. And whilst others have sought multi-brand strategies through either corporate partner models or acquisitions, our portfolio is unique and advantageous. And let me highlight to you why. We have the highest levels of consideration across the country with AAMI having a clear 9 percentage point lead. And brands take time to build, and our brand portfolio has a strong history in their target markets with our oldest brand, GIO, turning 100 in 2027. That will be a good party. The portfolio is underpinned by customer segmentation, allowing us to maintain brand relevance with segment-led innovations and propositions, especially with the niche brands.

We control and own our own brands and are almost exclusively direct to customer. This means we have end-to-end control of the brand experience and speed and autonomy of decision-making. And we can also operate the portfolio brand model efficiency efficiently with an industry-leading expense ratio of 14.5% Importantly, the portfolio has helped us to achieve growth, having delivered 3% growth in policies over the past 3 years and maintaining #1 market share in motor and #2 in home. Three areas I would call out that have helped us build on our brand strength, marketing, digitization and customer relationships. We continue to invest in our team, partnering with top-tier agencies and leveraging an award-winning marketing team.

Using AI-driven marketing mix modeling, we are able to optimize campaigns and channels to deliver superior results. And operational efficiencies have enabled us to increase our marketing spend by an average of 5% year-on-year, ensuring our brands remain highly competitive. Nearly 70% of Australians know our brands and 60% consider them when buying insurance with AAMI ranked #1 for both awareness and consideration. We've also made it easier for customers to manage their insurance with us by investing in digital leadership, streamlining processes, expanding AI and innovations like automated crash detection for AAMI. We deliver fast, convenient service at a lower cost, and this matters for our customers.

And finally, we continue to focus on deepening our relationships with customers to ensure we remain their #1 choice. I wanted to take a moment to touch on attractive growth opportunities we see in WA and South Australia and via our Bingle brand. First, in WA and SA, we know there is a change of ownership with the motor and clubs, and this presents an opportunity for us as peers focus on integration. Across our overall brand portfolio, we have strong existing growth momentum in these markets for both Motor and Home with growth rates outpacing other states already. AAMI is an existing brand in these states best positioned to capture the further upside. And in the key measure of awareness, AAMI is already ranked #1 in South Australia and #2 in WA.

Equally, the Bingle brand, which focuses on the price-conscious segment, is a really important brand in the portfolio. It's been built to be low cost by design, simpler features, motor and digital only. And it's been successful with 9% unit growth in FY '25. To achieve this, we updated our marketing, and I'm sure many of you would have seen the No Fluffy Bits campaign, which has been a huge hit with over 20% GWP growth since its launch. We've taken the brand nationally, and we've invested in our pricing and risk selection strategy. Much of Bingle's success has been driven by the Eastern states. And with the national focus, we see even more potential for future growth.

Segment-specific innovation is a hallmark of the Suncorp brand portfolio. No other insurer is able to engage with different segments with compelling propositions like us. Our brands, they're proactive, they're reducing risks and engaging with customers to deepen the relationship. Through the AAMI app, drivers are given scores and tips every single day, and our good drivers receive cash rewards to recognize and incentivize their safe driving. As you can imagine, our customers love it, and it's been a great way for us to proactively engage outside the renewal process. Suncorp continues to lead on home resilience, further cementing our position with the launch of Suncorp Haven and investments in disaster management.

By collaborating with top-tier data and expert sources, we empower our customers to understand their weather risks and strengthen their homes. The platform has attracted over 150,000 visits to date. From a claims perspective, we've invested in the state-of-the-art disaster management center and mobile response hubs to support customers in weather-impacted communities. And in fact, we have the hubs in operation this week supporting those impacted by the past weekend sale. Shannon's customers love their cars and Shannon's has a deep relationship with them. What does it look like? It's over 20,000 enthusiasts each year coming to our Shannon showrooms to engage with unique cars in the brand and attending over 1,200 motoring events nationwide. This is unmatched customer engagement. And as digital insurer comes online, we'll unlock new opportunities to launch propositions and accelerate growth.

Our strategy has delivered strong results. The consumer business is growing, is profitable, has digital leadership and delivers better customer outcomes as evidenced by improving NPS scores versus peers. We've continued to invest and future-proof the business by driving digital leadership in AI. As a result of this focus, digital transactions are growing, and we are well positioned to compete in the future. I'm sure many of you are wondering what a future with AI will look like in the context of brands.

So looking into the new world of AI and AI models, we've taken action already. We're leveraging AI buying techniques in search engine marketing to enhance search volumes. To enhance better discovery with large language models, we've refreshed our content strategy. We've started to experiment and have diversified our marketing channels with emerging platforms. And we truly believe our multi-brand portfolio sets us up for the future. At its core, our portfolio delivers personalized propositions through the brand, and we are able to maximize our portfolio visibility against very prompts, intents and price points.

So in closing, let me recap 4 key points. Our brand portfolio is a strong competitive advantage. We've continued to strengthen the brand portfolio through digitization, investments in marketing and propositions that resonate with target segments. Segment-led innovation and personalization will continue to deepen relationships, and this will be an increasingly important way to compete, and we are well placed. And we have and continue to deliver strong results. So I'll now shift gears with the Motor [ and Home ], but shift gears importantly to the Digital Insurer program. And so for those that joined us at our last Investor Day in November, you'll recall that Adam provided an overview of our technology modernization and simplification journey and the role of Digital Insurer.

Pleasingly, over the past year, Digital Insurer has made considerable progress, and I'm really excited that the program is now in full delivery swing for AAMI. So today, I'll provide a brief recap of the strategic context and the benefits, and I'll be then joined by Adam, who will cover the technology considerations and delivery status. So the context for the program is both clear and compelling. Today, our lines of business have significant scale. We support millions of Australians and New Zealanders, but we run a stable yet 40-year-old policy system built long before mobile phones and well before a hyper-personalized world. So the opportunity in front of us is to combine both scale and modern technology and realize all the benefits it brings. And there are 3 areas that will drive benefits, business agility.

Specifically, our speed to market with new products and propositions will increase. We will also benefit from rapid core system updates as we are leveraging our cloud-based solution. Pleasingly, the system will help us support more propositions to support risk reduction and improve loss ratios. For our people, it will radically reduce complexity. It will cut training times and help reduce risk through a simpler, systemized control environment. And DI will deliver better engagement for our customers. We'll see this immediately through empowering our people to have better conversations with fewer systems to navigate and more intuitive tools. And we'll extend our leading digital channel offerings across all the brands, enabling customers to self-service transactions that have been previously restricted to contact centers. Importantly, DI has strong financial benefits, unlocking growth, improving loss ratios and reducing costs.

So I'm now delighted to hand you over to Adam to share more.

Thanks so much, Lisa, and good afternoon, everyone. Delighted to provide updates today on 2 topics: Digital Insurer and AI transformation which are 2 areas of our strategy that I'm equally and extremely passionate about. So I'll pick up where Lisa left off on Digital Insurer and start with the technology approach that we're taking. And as Lisa referenced, after careful review over an extended period of time, we concluded that our legacy policy administration system was no longer fit for purpose. As Lisa said, it served us extremely well over many years, but we were facing into its limitations. Particularly its inability to enable rapid product innovation, more personalized propositions and support emerging distribution models.

At the core of the target state technology solution that we're delivering through the program is the Duck Creek OnDemand policy, billing and insights platform from Duck Creek Technologies, and as Lisa referenced, importantly, we're implementing the latest Software-as-a-Service version of this platform, which is known as Active Delivery.

And this means that we have an evergreen software platform and are receiving updates literally on a fortnightly basis. It also provides a modular and highly configurable platform that means that as we're rolling it out across the various brands and portfolios, we get significant reuse. But it's worth recognizing that DI or the Digital Insurer program is delivering much more than just a new policy admin system or modern tech. It's touching literally every aspect of our end-to-end operations from digital sales and service to customer management, pricing and underwriting, billing and payments, customer correspondence and integration into finance, claims and our downstream data reporting and analytics ecosystem. With another benefit of the globally leading cloud platforms we're deploying, is taking advantage of the embedded AI capabilities that will fundamentally transform how we build and deliver products to our customers over time, which I'll come back to in the AI discussion.

So moving to where are we on the delivery. And FY '25 was a pivotal year for the program as we foreshadowed in the update last year. And we were successful with the launch in April of our first release which focused on our AA insurance joint venture in New Zealand with the New Zealand Automobile Association. And we felt AAI New Zealand was the ideal candidate to take the lead on new -- moving to this new platform and set of technology assets before we then deployed it across our other portfolios and brands.

So as I said, April, we went live for new business across Motor and Home in both the digital and the assisted channels, and then earlier last month, we commenced the migration of AAI's existing circa 1.1 million customer policies onto the new policy platform at renewal. And for anyone who's been involved in these large complex core platform replacement programs over time. This was a really massive milestone for the program and certainly pivotal to realizing the benefits that Lisa described.

And while it's, of course, early days, we are confident that the benefits that we envisaged in the business case will be realized over time. And just to give you a sense of a few of the very early indicators in the AAI New Zealand experience. We've simplified underwriting with a 97% reduction in referrals to manual underwriting. Which has streamlined our decision-making and materially reduce the cost to serve. There's greater automation. For example, with an average 120,000 premium payment transactions, auto receipted every month, we've materially reduced manual effort, lowered error rates and improved our compliance. And we've significantly improved the employee experience, demonstrated by a 50% reduction in the time required to train new frontline staff and which clearly reflects the highly intuitive modern systems that we've deployed. And these early wins are further supported by the strong anecdotal feedback from our frontline teams on the ground who are fully embracing the new systems and the simplified processes.

So looking ahead, release one laid the core technology foundations, which will be leveraged and extended initially to our consumer brands in Australia. The high quality of the delivery to date and the capability of the integrated team creates the confidence that we can extrapolate those benefits more broadly. We're now well into the delivery of our second release which focuses on AAMI, our flagship national consumer brand. And we're targeting this release for AAMI Home and Motor, new business around the middle of next year and then migration of existing policies in the same pattern that we've approached AAI New Zealand to follow then after. And while release two, certainly brings with it increased customer scale, there's circa 2.7 million policies and new scope and integration requirements. We are leveraging the core foundations and all of the valuable insights that we've received from the first release for AAI New Zealand. And pleasingly, more than 95% of the core Home and Motor product build is reusable from the first release. And then we've started planning for the deployment to our other consumer brands in Australia, including compulsory third party. And additionally, we've started the early work on how and when we can extend these foundation to our commercial portfolios. And we've got an initial technical pilot underway that's proving out the more unique requirements of our intermediated businesses, which will become a key focus for the program in FY '27 and beyond.

And as Steve said, in the showcase for those here in the room, we'll give you a live demonstration of the old and the new system, and you can see firsthand the benefits that are being derived. So that's not all we have on our platform modernization agenda. So if you zoom out, Digital Insurer is clearly the marquee investment, but we have several complementary initiatives. Over the past year, we've achieved the milestone of 93% of our technology workloads now being hosted in public cloud environments. This has enabled us to exit completely 3 legacy data centers delivering cost efficiencies, strengthening our technology resilience while improving business agility. And with this milestone achieved, alongside the successful separation of Suncorp Bank systems and data through the sale of the bank to ANZ. We've been moving at pace to simplify and modernize our end-to-end technology estate.

I'll give you a few examples up there on the chart. We've introduced a new cloud-based contact center platform for over 7,500 team members that we delivered in less than 12 months. We started with voice and then over time, we'll integrate chat, e-mail, social media channels and add AI-enabled capabilities like guided prompts and real-time recommendations to our frontline employees to assist them in their customer interactions.

In Jimmy's business in New Zealand, we're enhancing our pricing and underwriting capabilities by implementing a new pricing platform from Earnix and many of you will recall that we've adopted Earnix in our Australian consumer portfolios through our previous investment in what we call CaPE, customer and pricing ecosystem. The first of Vero New Zealand's portfolios went live on earnings in August of this year, and we are already seeing the benefits and well progressed on extending across other portfolios. And in parallel, the New Zealand team are investing in digitization and automation, enabling their staff to manage the full policy life cycle on Salesforce CRM, which delivers seamless digital connectivity and is materially improving the service to brokers, corporate partners and customers.

We're also making strong progress on modernizing our enterprise platforms. We're shifting our people and finance processes to a common platform called Oracle Fusion, which is driving a range of business benefits. Over this past financial year, we upgraded the foundational platform for finance, and we're now building on that to streamline our various finance business processes and improve our reporting and analysis. And additionally, we'll implement a new reinsurance management platform in the second half of this year also from Duck Creek Technologies. And on the people front, we are on track to go live in the second half of this financial year with a new integrated human capital management platform and managed service payroll solution, which will both significantly simplify the technology landscape while also transforming the end-to-end employee experience. And as we touched on last year, we're already looking to the next horizon and firming up our plans to modernize our claims platform to the next-generation cloud version.

So a lot happening. And if that wasn't enough, move now to the second strategic imperative that Steve touched on upfront, which is operational transformation. This is about becoming a seamless digital first insurer, enabling us to reduce our cost to serve and provide our customers with superior sales, service and claims experiences. We've a proven track record of operational transformation through the work we've done in our sustained focus over many years on digitization, automation, partnering and artificial intelligence. And you can see on the slide just a selection of the proof points, which have all contributed to the industry-leading expense ratio that Lisa referenced. And whilst we expect all of those levers to continue to be relevant, AI is where we see the greatest transformational opportunity over the next horizon. We continue to believe, which has been further validated by a range of external data points, including recent reports from analysts that are participating in the call today. That insurance is one of if not the industry most right for AI-enabled transformation. And why? Well, this reflects the highly data-intensive nature of insurance products and operations but also how that extends into our supply chains and broader repair networks.

It is important to emphasize that AI is not only about driving productivity and efficiency gains, which, of course, is a big part of the story. But we see AI as a fundamental lever to enhance the customer and employee experience and ensure the sustainability of our industry. For example, helping us to address industry challenges such as insurance affordability and accessibility. We talked last year about the strong foundational capabilities that we've established that pave the way now for our accelerated adoption across the organization. And we continue to take a holistic enterprise-wide approach to AI and continue to make progress against 4 complementary pillars: strategy and governance, risk management, people capability uplift and, of course, our technology foundations.

So I'll just share a couple of quick examples against each of those pillars, starting with strategy. We've established an enterprise-wide governance model to monitor our AI settings and policies and a structured prioritization framework to drive alignment and ensure that we're accelerating the highest-impact AI initiatives. Moving to risk management, where we further strengthened our AI risk and control framework, including importantly, AI safety. And while we don't take anything for granted, we were very pleased to receive the accolade of the Australian Financial Review AI award for ethics and responsibility earlier this year. On to the all-important people pillar. We continue to empower our people to play an active role in how we both create and adopt AI solutions. Over 1,200 people participated in our recently launched AI Academy and more than 2,000 participated in our annual AI new program of learning helping our people to better understand the potential of AI, but more importantly, actually test and learn and experiment with it for themselves.

We're also investing heavily in the up-skilling and reskilling of our workforce to adapt to the uncertain but the clear future era of AI. And then finally, to technology, where we continue to deploy AI through 3 complementary modes. Firstly, enterprise AI utilities think of things like Microsoft CoPilot, AI, which is embedded in our modern core platforms that I outlined earlier. And then thirdly, what we call intelligent process automation. Which is where we see the greatest opportunities to create competitive advantage. Here, we're leveraging our internally managed data science and AI platform that we call SunGPT to deploy more proprietary use cases, which are powered by leading foundation models from providers like OpenAI and Anthropic. So this holistic approach is already driving demonstrable value. With more than 20 specific use cases delivered over the past financial year across every part of the value chain you can see on the chart, with scale adoption and daily use by many thousands of our people, each individual use case is tracked for tangible benefits, whether that's enhancing the customer experience, enabling our frontline teams of course, improving operational efficiency and productivity or building strategic capability that can be leveraged across the enterprise.

So I won't go through all of the examples on that slide. You'll see a few in the breakout. But just a couple of examples. So in our commercial business, our motor fleet "slip" has halved the turnaround times from 4 to 2 days. This increased capacity has meant that Michael's commercial business can manage an increase in motor fleet "volumes", which are up over 50% in the past 12 months without the need to add more frontline staff. In our broader frontline teams, our smart PDS utility, which is enabling our home claims teams to answer complex product disclosure statement questions faster and with improved consistency and accuracy. While we've only just gone live, we're anticipating a 50% reduction in referrals to the support teams for these type of coverage and PDS inquiries. And we would then expect a 25% reduction in the average handle time for these types of calls. And those benefits are predicated on what we've seen in some of the other use cases that are now already at scale.

And then finally, in our technology teams, the rollout of GitHub copilot for software development has enhanced developer capacity and is achieving much faster code delivery and a stronger security posture, for our over 500 software engineers. And while we're pleased with the tangible benefits that we're already seeing, we equally acknowledge that this is still scratching the surface of the full potential opportunity of AI. And perhaps the most material development since the update that I provided last year has been the acceleration of our ambition and the adoption of what you hear describe broadly as Agentic AI capabilities. What does that mean? Simply that's where AI can plan, apply judgment and most importantly, act autonomously because it's been given agency. And this means that we can completely reimagine our customer experiences and end-to-end processes in every part of the organization. Our initial focus for deployment of Agentic AI is in claims and customer service which is, of course, where we see the largest value pools.

However, this by no means limits its broader potential. We've just completed an in-depth ideation phase, and we're now in full scale delivery. Having developed a clear execution road map with cross-functional representation from every part of the organization as well as further investing and uplifting our core technology capabilities, which we'll showcase in the breakout. Our initial efforts will target things like simple customer service interactions through voice and chat as well as automated claims lodgement and assessment across consumer, commercial and personal injury. And we'll share more details on that program of work as we progress through delivery.

So in closing, we believe that moving at pace on AI-enabled transformation will create first-mover advantage and competitive differentiation. We're building on strong foundations that we're developing over many years with early benefits informing our approach to broader adoption and scale out. We are confident in our trajectory, but we're equally not in any way complacent given the pace and the scale that the market and technology capabilities are evolving.

And so with that, I'll now hand to Michael to share a view of how we're achieving our growth aspiration in commercial. Thank you.

Thanks, Adam. There is a lot going on in the technology space. It's always good to hear it, and good afternoon, everyone. It's always a pleasure to be here talking about Commercial Insurance at the Suncorp Investor Briefing. So last year, I spoke to you for the first time as Chief Executive of Suncorp's Commercial and Personal Energy business. I outlined that Commercial is benefiting from the improved focus of a pure-play general insurer and the ability to make disciplined targeted investments.

Commercial, in particular, is emerging as a key growth engine for Suncorp. At that time, we have been operating under the current structure for 12 months, a change that elevated the Commercial business to the ELT level and allowed us to organize around customer value chains to drive greater customer centricity across the group. We also established a platform business to reflect the growing role of broker platforms and the distinct capabilities required versus our tailored line business. Our strategy remains consistent with the last year.

Now the growth engine for Suncorp. We often get asked why we can grow Commercial. And this slide sets out the clear reasons why we can grow the Commercial business, importantly, as part of the Suncorp Group, and they are, room to grow. In terms of market share, our commercial business is ranked #4 at around 9% in market share, meaning there's plenty of room to grow into a natural share, both on new products and also in existing products. There is good broker support for an Australian-based commercial insurer, with clear focus on the Australian market. We hear this loud and clear from our broking partners, which is very pleasing to see.

Our best-in-class claims, which is evidenced by numerous awards, for brokers who use our claims capabilities consistently time and time again, there is a key differentiator for us from other insurers. The scale of the group. Our ability to leverage the scale of the Suncorp group across pricing, claims and customer service. We could not invest in these capabilities to the same extent as a stand-alone Commercial insurer, a team with deep specialized capability in Commercial Insurance. Vero, our branding in the Commercial Insurance side has always prided itself as an underwriting shop and the expertise is very priced.

We continue to have risk engineering teams assessing the risk management of a large risks. This is a core capability. We're also benefiting from increased tech investment, as you saw from Adam there, Commercial features very prominently across the group, and we're seeing that both in Commercial Insurance and personal injury. Commercial also provides an important diversification benefit for the group. In terms of non-correlated risks and Commercial itself is also diversified and operates in all market segments, but is strongest in mid-market and also in SME.

And finally, a collaborative business model across home, motor, Commercial and also personal injury and also New Zealand, bringing scale and expertise, which brings competitive advantage to Commercial and also the group more broadly. Our ambition for the Commercial business remains to grow to #2 in market share, but of course, within target margins. And I will reiterate that target margins are paramount, and we focus on those very, very clearly. Now last year, I also shared with you our approach to commercial and how we have structured with 2 distinct businesses being the platform business and also tailored lines. I thought it was worth touching again on these briefly as it shapes the way we think about our strategy and the different needs of customers and brokers across different segments of the market.

We continue to see demand from brokers for more digitized straight-through processing, particularly for simpler business in the SME space. At the same time, there's an ongoing requirement for the trusted and tailored propositions we provide for larger clients to meet their more complex needs. They are quite distinct capabilities. And why this is important is that it recognizes there are different skill sets required in both of these areas. Our platform business is technology-driven, data analytics, they all play a key role, whereas tailored lines requires deep commercial insurance experience in underwriting and also distribution. Also important is that both segments require a focus on portfolio performance through pricing and risk appetite, which our portfolio teams support both those parts of the business. And of course, all of this is supported by our award-winning claims business.

And so what have we done over the last year since I last spoke to you? Well, we've delivered materially on our strategy. What have we done? We've expanded broker connectivity through our modern VeroEdge platform, enabling instant underwriting decisions and driving growth in SME and also non-fleet motor. We've established Vero Specialty Lines, VSL for short, a vehicle for launching new products in response to feedback from brokers that the clients were after more specialized product solutions. Through this business, we launched 3 new products in FY '25 being equipment breakdown, higher hazard property and higher hazard liability. Now these are higher hazard occupations and not geography, and that's important. Higher hazard business that's well managed, has good risk management processes and can be underwritten, represent good risks, and we actually price these and trying to find them.

And we have received great feedback on the more specialized proposition. Now we've expanded this further in 2025. We've launched a fourth product called combustible paneling, and that is going well already. To derisk this expansion, we've utilized bespoke reinsurance structures to balance risk and return as we build out this business. And that's an important factor to make sure we manage that volatility. We've also continued to drive efficiency and better customer outcomes by increasing digital claims lodgment and also delivering claims excellence. So that's quite a lot in a year. We are well diversified, which is an important point. And this slide illustrates that. You can see we have a diversified product set across our portfolio in terms of products and also geography. In addition, we operate across all market segments, but in particular, that mid-market and the SME are our focus. There remains a number of product categories that we do not operate in, as you can see, and that provides growth prospects for new products.

Now we are well positioned for growth, and this slide sets that out. Our fundamentals are well set. Our margin overall is at the top of our target range, and we have grown above market, indicating that we have a healthy, resilient portfolio and our proposition is resonating with brokers. In terms of the business split between platform and tailored lines, I note we still have some work to do on our platform business to get margins to a target level. We've seen improvement over the last 12 months as we hone our data analytics and our people and understand the strengths of our new system.

And the middle slide there, which is my most favorite chart is broker NPS. You can see we've gone from strength to strength as the culture orientates towards customer and broker centricity. This is a key focus for myself and also the leadership team and is paying dividends across many aspects of the business, such as growth, margins and also an engaged workforce. And that consistent service delivery model and evolving culture of customer and broker centricity is also being recognized by the market. And you can see there, we won a number of awards year in and year out. You can see from the chart that we've been named NIBA Insurer of the Year for the third consecutive year and have won the Gold Mansfield award for 6 years in a row. And for those who don't know, The Mansfield are voted for by brokers, recognizing the best commercial claims performance in the market. And likewise, the NIBA awards are voted for by brokers with NIBA being the National Insurance Broker Association.

So opportunity and outlook, and this is my final slide. It's worth noting that the external environment has become more challenging. Some segments, most notably top-end property and some financial lines are softening as more offshore capital has flowed into these markets. Despite this, we believe we are well positioned to continue to deliver sustainable above-market growth while maintaining profitability and creating long-term value for shareholders. The market structure and our position in it are favorable. Despite outgrowing our peers for the last few years, our market share remains less than 10%, leaving significant room to grow. With increased focus and investment in our commercial insurance business, there is significant upside. There are also segments of the market we don't participate in yet, meaning there's plenty of room for us to grow an untapped opportunity, if you like, in that product breadth.

Suncorp's structure as a more integrated domestic pure-play insurer is also a competitive advantage. We are benefiting from the scale of our consumer business as the organization is closely connected and values collaboration, enjoying benefits through scale efficiency in areas like motor, claims, pricing and call centers. And we're further increasing investments in AI and accelerating the digital replatforming of the business to improve underwriting quality, product agility and efficiency. And I think you saw that quite clearly from Adam and Lisa's presentation.

Our broker experience and claims excellence remains key differentiators. We can turn this into growth. And we also now have an underlying infrastructure to enable broker platform connectivity, and we have developed the reputation in the market being the best insurer to connect with. And Vero Specialty Lines is now established as a platform for us to launch more products, and we plan to launch up to 3 new products each year to continue to use more of our risk appetite. And finally, as a mid-market insurer with a diversified portfolio, we're less exposed to market cycles than some peers. Our financial health positions us well to navigate market cycles, whatever they may be.

Thank you very much. I think we're having a break now for 10-odd minutes.

No, we'll back here 02:05 everybody. So just a short break, given that we started late. Thanks.

[Break]

Welcome back, everybody. Welcome back, and good afternoon. I'm Bridget Messer, Suncorp's Chief Risk Officer. I also have the privilege of leading our advocacy teams, and you get a really unique vantage point when you sit at the intersection of risk and advocacy, not just on what can go wrong, but on how to make things go right. And our advocacy agenda is all about making things better. Think about it like shock absorbers on a car, not always visible, but essential for smoothing out bumps and designed to reduce and respond to impact.

So I want to start today with the obvious question, why advocacy? As Steve showed at the start, advocacy is a strategic lever in our 12-point plan, and our ambition is to be a leading industry voice on advocacy. So why? Well, we are, as you well know, and as you've heard today, a purpose-led business, we recognize the critical role that insurance plays in the prosperity of our communities and the role that we play as a leading Trans-Tasman insurer in making sure that insurance remains affordable and accessible. Many problems in our built environment, paired with climate change are creating real challenges for our communities, and it's important that we take a leadership position on these challenges.

In doing so, we really engage our people. We drive better insurance affordability for our customers, and we enhance the relevance and the trust of our brands. For our shareholders, better insurance affordability increases insurance participation, which drives growth. It also helps to take risk out of the system, and it ensures that we're at the table during important public policy debates. Advocacy is not new for Suncorp. In 2020, we launched our 4-point plan for more resilient Australia, where we advocated for reformed planning laws for more resilient infrastructure, for government subsidies for household mitigation and also for removal of regressive taxes that disproportionately hit those who can least afford it. And our advocacy is starting to deliver tangible results.

For example, we've seen the New South Wales government. It's committed to removing the Emergency Services Levy, which will reduce the tax our New South Wales customers pay from $0.36 in every dollar of premium to $0.20. We've also seen $2.66 billion committed to resilience initiatives over the next 5 years from the federal, Queensland and New South Wales governments. And we've seen joint commitment from the federal and Queensland government to build a $175 million levy in Bundaberg, which was directly supported by Suncorp.

So what next for our home agenda? Well, 5 years ago, we were one of the few voices raising concerns about emerging risks, risks that were evident in our own claims data, but not yet widely recognized across industry or by policymakers. And today, I'm pleased to say there's broad awareness that action is needed to preserve the safety and prosperity of our communities. This shift is a testament to the impact of sustained advocacy, not just by Suncorp, of course, but by the industry as a whole. And so we have our updated resiliency blueprint, which builds on our existing 4-point plan by adding in 3 things. The first is the need to create a globally recognized disaster response capability for our nation through better sharing of technology amongst industry, government and emergency services.

The second is the need to create an industry government partnership to address insurance access for the highest risk locations across Australia. And the third is the need to tackle new risks inside the home like flexi pipes and lithium batteries. On this last one, we recently launched a 6-month pilot to identify at-risk flexi hoses. The trial by our home repair company saw us inspect 1,800 flexi pipes and perform water pressure tests in 650 homes. From the inspections, 30% of flexi pipes were replaced and water pressure devices were installed in 60% of child homes.

We see similar risks associated with lithium-ion batteries with the average Australian home set to house 33 lithium-ion batteries by 2026. Now we are confident we're pricing accurately for these new risks, but we firmly believe that action is needed across the system to reduce these risks going forward to ensure that insurance remains affordable and accessible. The progress we've made since 2020 has galvanized our belief in the value of advocacy. We've seen firsthand how working across the system with government and with communities can deliver meaningful change, and we're excited for the opportunity that our resilience blueprint brings. Right.

From homes to highways, let's change lanes, at least out upon items. While home resilience remains a cornerstone of our advocacy, our strategy extends to road safety, a critical issue for our customers and for communities. I'll give you a couple of stats. Across Australia over the last 12 months, it was estimated that 1.6 million road accidents occurred that required vehicle repair. And in 2024, more than 1,300 lives were lost on Australian roads. Looking beyond this human tragedy, the economic cost is really significant, estimated at more than $27 billion a year due to medical care and property damage and loss of productivity and reduced quality of life, which is a point we see really clearly firsthand in our CTP portfolio, where claims can often last several years before injured people get back to living life to the full.

Now despite many advances in vehicle safety and despite ongoing investment in road infrastructure, the reality is that driver behavior remains a stubborn challenge. Fast acceleration, hard breaking, much more common than we like to admit. And this is a challenge we see clearly in our data, not just in our claims experience as Australia's largest motor and personal injury insurer, but also in the 550 million kilometers of telematics data that we've amassed. For most Australians, driving is the most dangerous thing that we do on a regular basis. We've long since been a voice on road safety. And in 2024, we marked the 30th anniversary of AAMI's Annual Crash Index. But this year, we've stepped it up by launching the AAMI Driving test national campaign. It educates, it engages and it incentivizes safer driving behaviors, harnessing Aussie's competitive spirit and our digital capabilities. And we are already seeing improvements in driver behavior amongst active users of AAMI's Safe Driver platform, including a 10% improvement in mobile phone distraction scores.

To amplify our efforts, we're partnering with government and the Australian Road Safety Foundation to bring road safety into schools and communities. We're deeply committed to being part of the solution on road safety in the same way that we have been for home resilience. So to close, I just wanted to end with the link between our advocacy agenda and digital insurer. As you've heard from Adam and Lisa, digital insurer gives us new ability to create product and customer experiences that are fit for a modern day leading insurer. A digital insurer also gives us product power that can amplify our advocacy agenda. It gives us the power to create innovative products that incentivize risk reduction like great driving and home maintenance.

So today, I wanted to show you that advocacy is not just a concept or a lofty ambition. It is a strategic investment in Suncorp's future and in the communities we serve. It helps us deliver on our purpose. It engages our people and it enhances our brands. It also delivers tangible benefits for shareholders, taking risk out of the system and ensuring we are at the table for important public policy debates. Our track record on advocacy shows real impact and our future focus is clear. We are committed to leading the industry, collaborating widely and delivering value for shareholders.

So thank you very much for your time today. And I just want to end with a practical tip, if you're ever here running water and you're not in the bath, do check your flexi pipes. Over to you, JR.

So the drip -- drip are here. Hopefully not. Thanks very much, Bridget, and good afternoon, everyone. It's great to see you all here today, and welcome to those on the VC. Look, I'd like to start today with our overarching investment proposition. I presented the key elements of this on the slide. No doubt it's going to be familiar to many of you, but it's worth reiterating, I believe.

Firstly, Suncorp is a growing business, and this has been demonstrated by our strong profitable growth over recent years. The strategic imperatives that we've taken you through today of platform modernization and operational transformation are primarily designed to drive growth. Lisa has taken you through how we are leveraging our unique brand portfolio and optimizing our distribution channels to drive ongoing growth in consumer. Michael has outlined key components of the key commercial growth strategy, including introducing new products through Vero specialty lines and leveraging the Vero and group capabilities. And our New Zealand business, which we haven't spent much time on today, is in good shape, along with the high-performing AA joint venture in New Zealand.

But noting the current ongoing softer market in New Zealand with a weaker economy and New Zealand dollar, along with competitive conditions persisting. We aim to deliver strong and resilient risk-adjusted returns with an underlying ITR range of 10% to 12%, giving a strong return on tangible equity. I've got a chart I'll show you later today that shows Suncorp's leading position on earnings per share growth and return volatility that helps demonstrate this. And I'm also going to remind you of some of the changes we've made to improve the resilience in our returns, and I'll do that next.

We have a well-managed balance sheet in lead up to our renewal in July, we conducted a very thorough review of our reinsurance program. I think we covered this off comprehensively with the full year results, but I'd just like to reiterate that we have a very clear and disciplined framework to use on how to use reinsurance to optimize sustainable long-term shareholder value creation. But having said that, I also want to be very clear that we continue to review our reinsurance program and assess the market, and we've retained significant optionality as market conditions continue to evolve. And also on the balance sheet, we have a well-balanced and diversified investment portfolio with a good spread of high-performing managers as well as a strong risk management capability.

And then finally, we have a disciplined approach to capital management. We have a robust and sophisticated approach to risk-based capital modeling and our capital settings. Our target CET1 range is between 1.025 and 1.325x PCA, and we look to operate in the top half of this range. And we believe these settings are appropriate. And I'll remind you that we are one of the few financial institutions not to have to raise capital during COVID. We optimize our hybrid gearing -- capital gearing within the regulatory framework that APRA set out, and I'll cover this off later as well. We remain committed to paying dividends between 60% to 80% of cash earnings, targeting the midpoint of that range. And then we'll continue to return excess capital through on-market buybacks. And I'd like to confirm that we're on track to return the $400 million identified for FY '26. Now this capital framework, we believe, combines to deliver a good dividend and an ongoing EPS accretion.

So let's move to the next slide. And the plan we've presented today does represent an important shift from the focus over the last few years. We're moving from being focused on margin remediation to being focused on growth and the ongoing resilience of those strong margins. We're now delivering margins consistently towards the top end of our 10% to 12% range, and the quality of those margins has been improved significantly with added resilience driving a very different quality proposition. Our natural hazard allowance has increased from $720 million in FY '19 to $1.77 billion in FY '26. And this reflects a reset over the period, but also an explicit resilience buffer built into the FY '26 allowance. We're investing more in the business with grow the business spend increasing from around 19% of our OpEx in FY '19 to 25% in FY '25. And our discretionary project investment has tripled over that period.

Now we believe it's critical that we have a sustainable level of investment built into our financial framework. A healthy, competitive and growing business needs ongoing investment. And the program of work we've outlined today is fully embedded within the expense and margin guidance. And then finally, our reliance on prior reserve releases has reduced to just 40 basis points in FY '25. So all up, our printed underlying ITR today is of a significantly higher quality, and we've got more confidence in its connection to reported profit all the way through to the cash profit that pays the dividend. On to then the next slide. And look, last year, we demonstrated how the Suncorp General Insurance business has driven superior growth in fundamental value relative to insurer and bank peers. And today, we give you a slightly different perspective on Suncorp's investment proposition. I've presented here a chart that positions Suncorp, domestic insurance peers, the big 4 banks, international insurers and the ASX 200. And it's based on growth in earnings per share, the volatility in earnings and the size of the circles, the bubbles representing the next 12-month P/E ratio for each.

As you can see from the chart, domestic insurers trade at a relatively attractive multiple set compared to domestic banks and the wider ASX 200 and with lower earnings volatility generally. Acknowledging that Suncorp included banking and life operations through the period on the chart, we've included a bubble that removes those businesses from the metrics, which both increases the earnings per share and reduces earnings volatility, demonstrating the quality of the earnings we've achieved in the General Insurance business over recent years. And then you can see compared to domestic insurance peers, Suncorp is attractively valued with a good mix of earnings growth and earnings volatility.

Moving to the next slide, and I'd like to take you through how we think about financial value creation and particularly the role our strategic imperatives of platform modernization and operational transformation play. Now both programs are effectively an investment in improving customer experience. That's delivering an experience that's faster. It's got less friction, it's more convenient and is right first time. In other words, just simply better for our customers. Now this obviously helps us drive growth, but also has, as Adam said, a very clear line of sight to a lower cost to serve. This then provides us with optionality for more competitive premiums to drive growth, to invest further in customer experience, driving more benefits or as required, cycle the benefits into margin.

Now given our strong current margins, our bias is to invest the benefits in value creation via growth. This creates a virtuous cycle that in turn drives more growth, scale benefit and opportunity for Suncorp stakeholders. Now I'd like to just reinforce a couple of key points at this point. The development of our leading capability on AI underpins Suncorp's ability to deliver ongoing competitive advantage as AI continues to evolve. We want to stay at the front of the wave. Our strong credentials and capabilities on tech program delivery that Adam took you through as well as the Software-as-a-Service cloud nature of our DI program are also a good source of ongoing competitive advantage. And then finally, the costs of our strategic programs, as I just said, are fully embedded in our margin guidance.

Turning then finally to capital management, and I wanted to provide an overview of how we look to optimize the capital stack at Suncorp. It's not something we spent a lot of time on recently. So the mix and level of capital that we hold is determined by our regulatory framework and risk appetite settings. And then this is then validated through comprehensive stress testing and risk-based capital modeling. In terms of mix, the APRA capital standards allow us to hold AT1 and Tier 2 to reduce the level of CET1 we hold. These are capped at 20% of our stressed regulatory requirements for each Level 3 entity. But then we have additional Tier 2 able to be utilized to fund diversification benefits between regulated entities, which, in our case, means the Australia and New Zealand businesses. The level of hybrid capital at any point in time includes buffers to manage volatility and covers future business growth, taking into account the expected future timing of refinancing plans. And I do note that we expect all remaining bank stranded AT1 and Tier 2 capital to be utilized during FY '26.

Now future issuance plans, including that bank stranded capital, will consider the profile of existing instruments, available excess capital and then projected growth. So in short, we optimized the gearing in line with APRA parameters with hybrid capital above that amount being inefficient. Now whilst on capital, I would just take this opportunity to remind you that the buybacks that we are conducting will reduce our excess capital as well as the associated investment earnings as those buybacks are completed.

And then just to close out, I'd also like to draw your attention to the ASX we put out today and the details at the bottom of some pro forma P&L and what I would call geographical moves, just reflecting a cleanup in the way we present the P&L post the bank and life sales. And importantly, they have no impact on the bottom line and no impact on our key metrics.

And on that, I'll hand back to Steve.

Thanks, Jeremy. And as we close out, I would like to just emphasize where I think and where we think the insurance industry is leading and the program of work that we've outlined today, how it will allow us to participate in that insurance industry of the future. So in my view, very strongly, in the future, insurance will be hyper-personalized. Now Digital and AI will transform underwriting, ensuring significantly more precision in both pricing and risk selection. The flip side of that is that customers will increasingly seek to monetize this precision in the form of new products and personalized premium, which together will better reflect their particular risk profile.

Investments that are undertaken inside the home and those mitigations that will be funded by government outside the home will also need to be monetized, and that, too, will have to be reflected in premium. Cross-subsidization or pooling, which has been the cornerstone of insurance for hundreds of years, it will continue to exist, but it will exist in far narrower bands. Here, the multi-brand strategy that we outlined today sets us up well for this hyper-personalized customer-centric future. Digital will be the prevailing method of engagement with your insurer.

Now that didn't sound that obvious 5 years ago, but it is obvious today, and it will be more obvious in the future. 90% of end-to-end transactions will be digitized with a residual, highly skilled workforce equipped to support those who don't want to or can't engage digitally and those, of course, with vulnerabilities. Automatic payment of claims will be the norm, the norm, with AI addressing noncompliance and fraud, effectively breaking down that historic contract-based and at times, adversarial nature of insurance customer engagement. We and others in the industry will partner with government to extend the coverage of insurance closer to 100% of the population, supporting affordability and availability of insurance products, especially for those who cannot afford the premium.

Therefore, the insurer of the future needs modern core systems across data pricing, policy administration and claims. It needs best-in-class digital interfaces and claims processes. It needs AI capability across all of its processes. It needs a readiness to advocate on behalf of its customers. And finally, of course, it needs a strong balance sheet and capable and skilled -- reskilled workforce. So today, what we've tried to do, and obviously, we'll go through in the breakout sessions is outline how we intend to be a leader in the modern insurance industry of the future.

So with that, let's move straight to Q&A before we go to the breakout sessions. Let's start in the room. Andrew?

Andrew Buncombe from Macquarie. Maybe I'll go in reverse given what you just said, Steve. If you think that insurance is going to be more personalized in the future, what are you doing from a technology point of view to deal with changing distribution channels because everything has been about costs and pushing that back into price, but nothing on distribution. So what are you doing there?

Well, distribution in the historical sense for insurance has been very contact center driven. It's been very brand-based. I believe that insurance will continue to be brand-based and the brand-based hyper-personalized insurance of the future will be very much the way that we differentiate bands of customer segmentation. So that's why we spend a lot of time on segmentation.

Distribution will also be increasingly digital. And I sort of outlined what I thought the digital ambition would be. Now we've -- sort of 5 years ago, we had 20% of our sales, service and claims lodgement undertaken digitally. And when we started the program of work in 2020, we set ourselves the ambition of saying, well, that's going to go from 20 to 80. I'm going to flip it on this year.

Last week and the week before, we originated 90% of AAMI sales through digital channels. So we're there. We're beyond where we were. The challenge for us and all other insurers and the pace at which we need to move is to take that digital engagement from not only sales, service and claims lodgment at the front of the distribution, but to take it all the way through the process inside Suncorp, outside Suncorp to the supply chain back inside Suncorp and through to the end, and that will happen. That's going to be a big challenge, but that will happen.

So distribution, 10% will be through contact centers will be high-quality, high capable, heavily skilled people. Then there'll be an encroachment of AI and other digital means into areas of what we otherwise would call the commercial insurance business, particularly at SME. There, we've got our own brands, GIO and AAMI, they've been underinvested in, but they're set for that environment. And obviously, as we work through into SME, there will be more engagement from AI.

So in terms of distribution, brands will continue to matter. Digital will be the predominant source, and there will be an encroachment of what we would today call direct into areas that otherwise were light touch intermediated.

Steve, I'll just add that in that future of AI in distribution, large language models, doing search, et cetera, as Steve said, we do feel that brands are going to retain extreme importance in that world and a multi-brand portfolio that we've got is going to position us really well around that. And we believe that -- so the brand piece will be important, but what changes is the way then the search is carried out. And we're already investing pretty heavily in thinking about how our brands interact with large language model search engines, for example, doing some work with leading partners in that space. And so there's undoubt change coming in that space, but we feel pretty well positioned to deal with it.

Excellent. The next one, just interested in your overall technology spend. Can you just remind us how much you're expensing compared to capitalizing? And on the capitalization side, what you're assuming for useful lives?

Yes. I think we are reasonably conservative when it comes to useful life on CapEx. We're talking major programs. We have a pretty high threshold to start with on capitalization. So we don't end up with an awful lot on the balance sheet. The only thing we've had material in recent years has been the bank core system. And the only material thing that we would look to have going forward would be the digital insurer system, at least in the next few years. The amortization period we've got that is 7 years. And if you look at peers, you'll find somewhere between 10, 13 might be usual. So we might take the opportunity to have a look at that, but we will be conservative when it comes to amortization period. We think that's appropriate given the advancements in tech.

And in terms of capitalization, I think when we get to the end of it, we'll probably have something like 40% of it on the balance sheet.

And then the final one from me is as you're rolling out the technology spend and the digitization and you're migrating the policy and pricing work over to Duck Creek and you're rolling all of that out, how should we think about the time frame for turning off the legacy technology?

I might get Adam to come up and go through that. Obviously, it doesn't happen day 1. It's a program of migration occurs.

Yes. Thanks for the question and for your research that I referred to earlier. So the principle that we're taking is that we're not just creating these platforms for new business. We have a high ambition to as quickly as possible, migrate existing policies across and reflected in the AI New Zealand experience, literally 2 or 3 months after we went live for new business, we started migrating existing policies. Very high quality, like more than 99% of policies cutting over automatically every night, a small subset of exceptions being managed with some data exceptions and getting in there. So that obviously takes 12 months to roll through the book once you start the migration.

So effectively, 12 months beyond the last release would be the time that you would be able to decommission the legacy systems. We haven't got absolute precision on some of the outer releases in the plan. But when you looked at the kind of overall road map, you can see that we've got a few years of the build and rollout across the brands and then a 12-month lagging period to get the migration completed. So it gives you a pretty good ballpark.

And I'll just add, Adam, that the cost of running duplicate systems, if you like, over that period of time is all allowed for in the way we think about those expense and margin guidance.

Yes. But I think the key message is that we're not just putting in new tech. The ambition is to get the existing policies migrated across, and we've proven that out very definitively in the first release and same principle applies for AAMI and beyond.

Nigel Pittaway from Citi. Just a question on the growth. I mean you say you've got renewed focus on growth, having remediated margin. What kind of volume growth for the overall group would you view as a success of that strategy?

Without giving definitive guidance on the topic, you've heard us talk about this previously, and I'll break it into the portfolios. It's the best way to look at it. I mean motor insurance, we've got sort of high 20s market share. There, you look to sort of grow with the market or slightly ahead of the market. Now if the market is growing and it very much depends on new car sales and various other factors that are going on in the economy. If the market is growing at 1.5%, 2%, then we look to grow at that level or slightly higher.

Home insurance is a more nuanced sort of assessment of aggregate growth because we're now in a position where we can look at every individual property in the country and identify it from a peril perspective along the lines of low, low-medium, medium, medium-high, high and extreme, and categorize it in that area. And so the aggregate position that we take on home insurance is to improve the quality of the book by growing more in low, low-medium and medium as opposed to growing in high and extreme, but in fact, sort of ceding share in those areas. And we've been very successful with that over the past 3 or 4 years as we start -- turn to that level of precision in our underwriting. And I think as we build out the tools that AI will provide us, that will significantly improve the granularity of how we price home.

So we might have low 20s market share in home today. We would like to grow with system, but we'd like to grow disproportionately ahead of system in low, low-medium and medium and seed share in high. And so that sort of quite a nuanced sort of answer to the question. But again, I think the ambition for us in home is to grow with the market and ahead in low.

Michael has been through the commercial opportunity. We think it's material for us. I see our natural market share that we -- it was a bit of a nebulous sort of concept, but to be somewhere between 12% and 13%. It was around 12% before we started to remediate the portfolio ahead of the rest of the market, came back to 8%, and it's growing steadily and we'll be in double digits fairly soon, I would suspect.

The pathway of opportunity in commercial, it's multifaceted. I said we had the brands there to leverage. They've been underinvested in. We're starting to invest in them. The Vero Specialty Lines opportunity that we've got, the opportunity we've got in SME, I think there's an opportunity for us to grow well ahead of system in commercial, but conscious of the macro environment with the insurance cycle. So it will always be margin first, growth second. But I think we can achieve a bit of both of those metrics.

New Zealand, I think we've got around 26% market share there. And everything I'm talking about is organic, by the way. There's an opportunity for us, I think, to edge close to 30% over the time of this plan and maybe a bit longer. Again, conscious of the cycle, but we have a unique position in New Zealand. We went back after all the weather events 12, 18 months ago, 2 years ago, whatever it was now and reassessed the portfolio we have there. And I think if you're going to build a portfolio in any jurisdiction, what we've got in New Zealand is fantastic. Vero, Vero driving commercial intermediated, Vero liability, which is a fantastic business and AAI, which is our motoring club business, which grows well ahead of market and the second most recognized brand in the country.

And so there's no reason why as we start to build capability, and we haven't talked a lot about the New Zealand technology investment other than we will talk about AAI. There's also a big investment going into the underwriting layer, corporate partner layer in New Zealand. So I think there's a pathway for us to get to 30%.

Obviously, workers' comp, CTP, state-based schemes, we don't want to grow any more in Queensland. Obviously, with CTP, opportunity for us to grow a bit more in New South Wales. But again, that is very much an underwriting story as opposed to a growth story.

So when you wrap all of that up, at least for the next 3 to 5 years, there's an organic pathway for us to grow and to grow strongly, but to grow carefully and deliberately and to leverage the opportunity that we've got. The opportunity now with new platforms and with AI to really leverage that to -- with the margins where they are, the returns are, I think, adequate and satisfactory. Every dollar that we can save in AI and that we benefit from in their platform can be recycled into growth, lower customer premium relative to where it would otherwise be, more affordable products, more available products. Our franchise is growing, and that's reflected for shareholders in a better multiple. I don't know whether you want to add anything.

And maybe just a second question. I mean, it's early days, but it does look as if reinsurance rates might be reasonably favorable again come 1st of January. You obviously said you'll review the reinsurance program and assess it as market conditions change. As it looks at the moment, is that going to throw up more opportunities to revisit that, do you think?

Yes. Look, both of us are fresh, not fresh, but reasonably fresh from Monte Carlo, which is somewhat an underwhelming experience, let me tell you, everything from the accommodation all through. So despite what it sounds like, it's for us, 45 meetings back to back over 3 or 4 days with reinsurers.

We had a favorable renewal, both a favorable renewal in an absolute sense and a favorable renewal in leveraging the scale. I think -- and I'll just be careful, there might be reinsurers in the room and they're fantastic partners of ours. But I think the reset went too far. We went through the reset over the last 3 to 5 years. And when I say went too far, I think there's been a transference of risk from the reinsurers to the primary insurers around the world. And so reinsurers profit and loss statements and balance sheets are incredibly strong, and they continue to be incredibly strong. But they're not handing that back necessarily universally to shareholders, their shareholders, which means they see good opportunities still.

So I don't know what that means for 1 January renewal. It's still very much reflective of what might happen in a macro sense. But we take it upon ourselves in those environments to argue on behalf of the policyholder because reinsurance costs are a big input into pricing. So I think there are all other things being equal, a continuation of the rate online reductions that we've seen. I don't know what scale they'll be, but they should continue. By definition, they should continue. And this transference of risk, we believe, should pop out also in access for primary insurers to things like aggregate covers because we don't have the choice but to cover the whole of the country, and we do that. That's our social license. And we would like our partners in reinsurance to help us do that. And so I don't know what form that takes. We are active in the market at the moment, trying to test some of those propositions, and we'll see where it ends up. But I think there is more room to move on reinsurance pricing.

I'd just add, Steve, that as we've said a number of times, we have no physical philosophical -- physical philosophical opposition to any of these sort of reinsurance programs, but they've just got to make sense for us. And we do have a reasonably disciplined framework that we assess it through. But should the market continue to evolve, one could imagine that at some point, those thresholds might come into play and aggregate covers, quota shares, they're sort of the obvious things for us to be looking at?

Kieren Chidgey, UBS. Steve, I just want to come back to the discussion on the hyper personalization of insurance moving forward. You guys have a very strong competitive advantage on the expense ratio. But we're still seeing challenger brands grow strongly, still attack the pricing cross subsidies of bigger insurers. What specifically will change from an underwriting capability perspective with your digital insurer and AI capability that's going to change that story?

Yes. I mean, I might answer it in a couple of parts, but just to the concept of hyper-personalization, why I believe emphatically that it will be part of the future. We are now segmenting our apparels by those 7 -- 8 or 9 categories that we do. What we've talked about today, flexi pipes and lithium batteries. But the home of the future is going to have so much AI capable technology embedded in it that if you're prepared to get a roof or up on the roof to repair your roof and put -- make sure that's -- we give you a certificate for that, if you're prepared to get a plumber in the house and replace all your flexi piping, the little robot that you've got, the little thing that does the vacuum cleaning today, that will be an AI-enabled device, that will take photos of all your contents and load that into your sum insured calculator and it will go straight into the policy administration system. It will probably turn off the water if there's a leak, I'll put the fire out. Who knows what it will do, but that's the future of insurance.

But if you're going to pay $30,000 or $40,000 for that, you're going to want to monetize it because you're not going to pay the same premium as your next door neighbor who doesn't do that. And so I think the consumer of the future is going to heavily monetize their premium to get the benefit relative to the risk that others may have. And that's what I think will underpin hyper-personalization. And if you haven't got the systems that allow you to do that, our old protect policy administrator couldn't do it. Our old pricing engine couldn't do it. Our claims system of the future will need to be able to manage that process. So that's what I think is -- why we all have hyper-personalization.

I think in terms of the -- what they call the smaller players, and they have built scale over time, I think we've got all the assets available to us to offset some of that. Lisa has talked about Bingle. Bingle, I wouldn't say in hibernation, it's been there all the time, but we rolled it out nationally. It's pointed directly at a subset of the customers of those -- and we'll use our firepower if we need to, to offset that.

Cross subsidies in insurance are getting very difficult to sustain. You can't cross-subsidize. That's why we took a very strong position on Queensland CTP with the government because we can't subsidize Queensland CTP margin through comprehensive motor because we'll be taken out of the market. So the cross-subsidy effect, portfolio to portfolio, is less obvious and less possible today. There is still some subsidization between brands, and there always will be, but the narrower -- it will be far narrower than it's ever been.

So I think what you've heard today with AI and with the platforms and the business that we're building, plus the brands, they're the core of the competitive advantage for Suncorp into the future. And we're now in a position with margin where it is, returns where they are to be able to invest fulsomely in them to capitalize.

I just had one second question sort of around, I guess, Adam's presentation around Agentic AI use. And just wondering if you could talk to sort of any examples or leadership globally that you look to in terms of deployment around service and claims.

Yes. Thank you. I mean we obviously are infatuated with what others are doing, both locally and globally, and we spent quite a bit of time connecting with other counterparties. I think it's fair to say it's still relatively early days. So I think seeing end-to-end examples like the ones that we're envisaging, I think, are contemplated, but hard to see them play out yet. But we certainly -- and you'll see in the breakouts that we've got some building blocks that we can start to bring together some of those more end-to-end experience. And you'll see in claims when you go through lodgment, assessment, the management of the claim, [indiscernible] the claim, you can start to take a lot of those capabilities and put them together. So we've certainly seen plenty of good examples offshore of people who are doing interesting things, but I think it's still at the kind of starting of that journey, and we would like to be not just a local leader, but globally recognized in what we're going to achieve in that regard.

Freya from Bank of America. I agree with you that the application of AI is huge to the industry, but do you see it as good, bad or neutral? What's to stop your smaller competitors or even new entrants from also going down this hyper-personalization route because it seems like AI is reducing the barriers to entry. What's your competitive advantage here?

Well, I think the competitive -- you're right, the smaller players can go down that path. And to some extent, the way that they target niches and target sort of better customers either by geography or more brutal means, they're doing some of that today, but not the level of sophistication that AI will be able to deliver. So yes, they can do it. And probably it reflects if we didn't do what we're doing, that what would happen over time, and that's not a good outcome.

The competitive advantages that we've got are our brands. Firstly, the segmentation of our brands and the way we can position that into subsets of the market so that we can participate in that personalization. The technology that we've got, I think we're towards the leading edge of some of this stuff. And while over time, the benefits of AI as they are applied across the industry will be recycled back into customer outcomes generally. If you're at the front of the wave, you can leverage that to the benefit of your shareholders. And so we want to be at the front of the wave, not in the middle of the wave and certainly not at the back end of it.

And then I think the key thing for us beyond all of those that we have as a significant advantage over smaller players is scale. And to the way I answered Nigel's question in terms of the growth, if we can retain that scale, while we're doing all of this work to modernize our business and be at the forefront, I think we've got the unique opportunity to drive superior value relative to any of our competitors. So brands, segmentation of brands, new systems at the front of the curve in terms of AI and then leverage that scale effectively, that's the way we think about how we can be at the front and not the back.

I'll just add, Steve, to the question, good, bad or indifferent or whatever the other term was -- good, bad, ugly, maybe. We generally think AI is pretty good for the insurance industry. Obviously, insurance is right for AI. We've been through that. But if you think about the benefit of it for -- the broader benefit of it, broader community benefit of AI and insurance is it will help insurance make it more affordable and more accessible, which is a good thing for insurance and community. So net-net, we have to say we think it's a good thing.

On the -- I mean, it's linked to that, but you talked about less pooling of risks because of personalization. Does that actually improve affordability and access if people are being more individually priced for risk?

Yes. I think the caveat I put around that is the partnership with government. Because today, there's roughly between 2% and 4% of the population where insurance is very difficult for them to achieve. And that's through no fault of their own. They've just been with the full government approval built and bought in areas they should never have been able to build or buy in. And obviously, with the emergence of climate change and frequency and severity, that 2% to 4% is going to sort of edge forward over time.

And some of the issues I talk about inside the home all make good sense for someone who can spend the $20,000 or $30,000 or $40,000 to improve the quality of their home. But if you can't do that, then you end up having the inside the home example relative to the outside one where you end up with a higher insurance premium. So I think that's where it becomes very important for the industry. And certainly, we're at the forefront of it to sort of agree with government around how we can provide incentives for people to make those investments in outside the home. They may well be tax deductible. They may well be subsidized by third parties. And certainly, mitigation resilience, et cetera, helps improve that outside the home piece.

So you're right. I mean, the nature of insurance in a hyper-personalized world will see it more difficult to cover 100% of the population, and that's where we're working closely with the government to try and make sure that we can expand that coverage with the support of the government to close to 100%.

And just last question on PYD reliance. Has this -- is this less conservative reserving over time or business mix changes?

Sorry. What's that...

Reduced PYD reliance in your earnings.

I mean it's primarily a result of just business mix. So particularly in schemes like New South Wales that have been reformed more -- less in common law and more in defined benefits, just the opportunity for reserve releases becomes less. But we do think that's a -- having less reliance on that leads to a better quality of underlying earnings.

I got time for one more question.

Andrei Stadnik from Morgan Stanley. Can I ask my two questions, if I can. First one, AI, can you talk about the dollar spend? And what kind of benefits ratio are you getting for the dollar spend on AI, if you can?

Yes. We won't reference the actual -- the absolute dollar, but the payback on AI is probably somewhere around the 2-year plus a little bit mark, somewhere around that. So we would say that the -- relative to a lot of these sort of investments, the payback on AI is pretty attractive.

My second question, can I -- can you -- if any chance to talk about the current pricing trends that you're seeing since 30 June across portfolios?

And a very snazzy pair of sneakers there, Andrei. I mean, I might try some of them out for the next roadshow.

All right. Well, thank you. I'll leave that there. And I'd ask everyone just to -- we're just going to disconnect and thank everyone on the webcast for joining us.

Good morning, and welcome to Suncorp's 2025 Annual General Meeting. As Chairman of the meeting, I'm informed we have 204 shareholders, proxyholders and other attendees already participating today, both here in Brisbane and online. As a quorum is clearly present, I declare the meeting open.

Before I proceed, could I please ask everyone to ensure your mobile phone is on silent mode. Please now join me in welcoming Rafiti Tovee to share a welcome to country with us. Rafiti is a proud descendant of the Turrbal peoples. Raised in culture and guided by her elders, she has learned traditional law and protocol. With over a decade of experience in early childhood education, Rafiti is passionate about empowering the next generation and strengthening her community through truth telling, advocacy and cultural connection. Rafiti is here with us today with the blessing of her Auntie Turrbal Elder, Songwoman Maroochy to deliver the welcome to country on behalf of the Turrbal people of Brisbane. Please join your Board in making her welcome.

Before I start my welcome to country today, I really would acknowledge any Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples here today, and I would like to pay my respects to all elders past, present and emerging, all actually acknowledge Yuggera Peoples as our neighboring traditional custodians. [Foreign Language] Welcome. Welcome. [Foreign Language] Welcome to Turrbal Country, Meanjin. My name is Songwoman Rafiti, I'm a proud Turrbal descendant of the lands that we gathered here on this morning, Meanjin, also in Brisbane. So can we say Meanjin together?

Meanjin.

Well, you're practically fluent. So the purpose of this ceremony is to continue one of the oldest cultural protocols in the world and to really continue the same essence and connection as my Turrbal ancestors did for visitors coming to and from Turrbal country. And that really extends to the Turrbal story from my ancestor Daki Yakka, who is a healer and the Chief of Brisbane, who was able to keep his law LOIE. And also this is thanks to the resilience of his daughter, Kulkarawa, a songwoman, who was able to abscond [indiscernible], Brisbane River all the way through to Sunshine Coast Kabi Kabi country that she remained her truth telling, storytelling culture and her law. And that's why I'm here today on behalf of the Turrbal people.

So now I would like for you to connect with me to our country today to, as I was saying you the Turrbal blessing song. A blessing song to invite positive energy into your space. And wherever you are in life, it will help you cleanse wherever you are.

[Presentation]

Thank you for having me today. Have a great day.

Thank you, Rafiti, and what an absolutely beautiful voice you have. Please, let's thank, Rafiti, again.

I would also like to acknowledge the traditional custodians on the land on which we gathered here in Brisbane and pay my respects to their elders, past and present.

I'd now like to introduce Belinda Speirs, our Chief Executive, People, Legal and Corporate Services to cover the meeting procedures we will be using today.

Thank you, Chairman, and good morning, everyone. For the shareholders and proxyholders who are participating with us at the physical AGM being here in Brisbane and wish to vote, please make sure you can access the Vote+ app using the PIN on your green attendance card or that you have a yellow voting paper card. If you wish to ask a question or make a comment, please move now to the nearest microphone. If you are unable to move, please raise your hand now and a team member will assist you.

In the unlikely event of an emergency, please follow the directions provided by the Sofitel staff. For those shareholders and proxyholders who are joining us online and wish to vote or ask section, you may be familiar with the platform from our previous AGMs. You also have the opportunity of asking your question via the questions and comments phone line that is available during the meeting. To help with the smooth running of the AGM, we invite shareholders and proxyholders who are participating online to submit your questions or comments now.

Further details about how to ask questions and make comments using the platform or the phone line are contained in the online AGM guide. You can access the guide through a link at the bottom of your screen or on the Suncorp website. If you encounter any technical difficulties with the platform at any time during the meeting, please contact the share registry's online AGM support team on 1 (800) 990-363. This phone number will remain visible on your screen throughout the meeting. In the unlikely event that technical issues prevent the AGM from proceeding as planned, Suncorp will make announcements by the ASX and our website.

I would now like to briefly cover the meeting procedures that the Chairman will follow today. Firstly, this is a meeting of Suncorp shareholders. As set out in the Notice of Meeting, only shareholders or proxyholders are entitled to vote on the resolutions, ask questions or make comments. The Chairman will allow a reasonable opportunity to address questions and comments as each item of business is considered. Please ensure that your question or comment is relevant to an item of business and to shareholders as a whole.

If there are a large number of shareholders who wish to ask questions, the Chairman may consider introducing a question limit to ensure that all interested shareholders have the opportunity to speak. Where there are similar questions, the Chairman will aim to acknowledge those who have asked the question. However, the Chairman will provide a single response in order to streamline today's proceedings.

If you have a matter you'd like to raise as a customer and you are participating at the physical AGM venue, members of our customer advocate team as well as customer representatives from the now ANZ-owned Suncorp Bank are here today with us, and will able to assist you in the foyer. If you're participating online, please contact our customer relations team using the contact details on the last page of the Notice of Meeting. Any customer-related questions specific to an individual will be referred to our customer relations team for response and will not be addressed during the AGM.

Share Registry and Suncorp representatives are also available in the foyer to assist with any shareholder related questions that do not relate to the business of today's meeting. When taking questions and comments for each item of business, the Chairman will first cover a number of relevant questions received prior to the meeting. The Chairman will then invite shareholders and proxyholders participating here at the physical venue to speak. We will then address any questions received through the phone line and online platform. The Chairman will retain full authority to conduct an orderly AGM. In particular, questions or comments that are offensive in any way will be taken as being out of order, and will not be acknowledged at all during or following the meeting. Other offensive or disruptive conduct by those who are participating here in Brisbane will also be taken as being out of order and the relevant participant will be asked to leave the meeting.

If you are voting today and need to leave the AGM early, please remember to submit your voting card before you leave.

I'll now hand you back to the Chairman.

Thank you, Belinda. I'm getting my steps up. I'll stand here for a while now. Thank you also to those who have already voted or pre-submitted questions relating to the business to be covered at today's meeting. As previously requested, the direct and proxy votes that have been received prior to the AGM were released on the ASX platform this morning and will be shown on the screen before we vote on each resolution.

I would now like to introduce your Board of Directors who are here in Brisbane today. In addition to their significant Board experience, each Director brings a mix of financial services and other relevant business experience and expertise that enables your Board to be effective in governing Suncorp. From your right, Lindsay Tanner. Lindsay, you can wave or stand or something. So the rest of you are now warned.

Lindsay has worked at the highest levels of government and business for almost 4 decades and is a recognized authority on corporate governance, economics and finance. He is a member of the Risk Committee and also serves on our New Zealand subsidiary Boards. Lindsay's current board roles outside Suncorp includes superannuation and investment management companies.

Sylvia Falzon. Sylvia chairs the Board People and Remuneration Committee and is a member of the Risk Committee. Sylvia brings to Suncorp valuable experience in a range of regulated and customer-facing industries, including financial services, health care, retail and aged care.

Simon Machell. Good wave. Simon is based in Singapore and serves on a number of international Boards. He has deep strategic and operational knowledge of the insurance industry and brings to Suncorp an international perspective on current industry trends in insurance. Together with insights into the risk and opportunities associated with emerging technologies and new business models. Simon is currently a member of the Board People and Remuneration Committee.

Duncan West. As you are aware, your Board has chosen Duncan to succeed me as Chairman following my retirement at the end of today's AGM. Duncan has served on your board since 2021, including as Chairman of the Board Risk Committee. He has 40 years of experience in the general insurance and financial services sectors, both in Australia and overseas. I will invite Duncan to make some comments later during the meeting.

And Steve Johnston, needs little introduction in Queensland. Steve continues to capably lead Suncorp since his appointment as CEO and Managing Director in 2019. I will invite Steve to address you later during the meeting. And I will also ask him to respond to some shareholder questions.

Elmer Funke Kupper. Elmer has significant financial services experience as well as experience in navigating demanding regulatory sectors and transforming business models through the adoption of technology and digital services. He has served as CEO of 2 ASX-listed companies and is currently the member of the Board Audit and People and Remuneration Committees and will now succeed Duncan as Chairman of the Risk Committee once Duncan becomes Chairman. So maybe you should be on notice again some questions today too, Elmer.

Gillian Brown. Gillian has developed broad skills and experiences in financial services, law, infrastructure, investments, finance and ESG initiatives over her 40-year career. Gillian is a member of the Board Audit Committee and like myself, is passionate about the State of Queensland.

David Whiteing is our newest appointment to the Board being appointed in February of this year. David brings to the Board more than 30 years' experience leading innovative technology programs in a range of sectors, including professional and financial services. David will seek your support to continue as a director through the usual election process later during the meeting. And I will speak more about David from then, and you will hear from him as well.

Ian Hammond. Ian chairs the Board Audit Committee and is a member of the Risk Committee. Ian brings to Suncorp extensive knowledge of the financial services industry as well as expertise in financial reporting and risk management. Ian is seeking reelection today.

And Sally Herman. Sally is currently a member of the Board Risk Committee and previously chaired our Customer Committee. Sally has strong expertise in running retail banking and insurance products, setting strategy for financial services businesses and working with customers, shareholders and regulators as well as government. And Sally is also seeking reelection today. So you will hear from her as well.

You've already heard from Belinda Speirs, who is supporting me in running today's meeting. And Belinda has quite a long title, as you heard, Chief Executive of People, Legal and Corporate Services and joined Suncorp in 2013. Belinda will moderate the online questions from shareholders and proxyholders during today's meeting. In addition to Belinda, other members of Suncorp's executive leadership are also with us today, and I am going to ask you to stand and face our guests as I introduce you.

First and foremost, we have Jeremy Robson. Jeremy is our Chief Financial Officer and has been with Suncorp since 2013. Lisa Harrison. Lisa is our Chief Executive Consumer Insurance and joined Suncorp in 2004. Jimmy Higgins. Jimmy is the CEO of Suncorp New Zealand and has been with Suncorp since 2008. Michael Miller. Michael is our Chief Executive Commercial and Personal Injury Insurance and has been with Suncorp since 2011. Adam Bennett. Adam is our Chief Information Officer and joined Suncorp in 2020. And Bridget Messer is our Chief Risk Officer and joined us in 2022.

We're also delighted that Robert McDonald is joining us today. Rob became Chairman of our New Zealand Board in September. In welcoming Rob, the Board also wishes to formally record our thanks to the outgoing New Zealand Chair, David Flacks. David made a valued contribution to the governance of our New Zealand subsidiaries during his 6 years as a director, followed then by his 6 years as Chair. It was a privilege to recently visit the New Zealand Board leadership team in Auckland to farewell David and to welcome Rob.

In addition, we have Bernadette Norrie. Bernadette is Suncorp's customer advocate and he's with us today to answer any questions that customers may have.

Before I invite Steve Johnston to speak, I will begin today's proceedings with my address.

As I stand before you today approaching the close of my decade-long service on the Suncorp Board the last 7 years as your Chairman, I'm filled with immense pride. Over these years, our company and indeed the broader environment in which we operate has experienced a tremendous amount of change.

We've navigated rapid technological advancements, widespread digitization, shift in customer and regulatory expectations and the disruptions arising from the global pandemic. Added to this are the challenges posed by climate change and the ongoing energy transition, each shaping the fabric of our society, industry and business.

Through all of this, Suncorp has demonstrated remarkable adaptability, and I'm proud to say we've emerged a stronger more resilient and purpose-led organization. Today, Suncorp stands well positioned to embrace the opportunities of the future as a digital first pure-play insurer and to deliver improved outcomes for our customers across Australia and New Zealand and value for you, our shareholders.

The 2025 financial year marked the culmination of a significant simplification journey for Suncorp, which did see Suncorp emerge as a stand-alone general insurer.

In July last year, we finalized the sale of Suncorp Bank, and in January this year, concluded the sale of our New Zealand life insurance business. Following this, we also worked through outstanding approvals relating to the return of capital to you, shareholders, changes to the Suncorp constitution, which you approved last year and implementation of transitional services arrangements and brand licensing of the Suncorp Bank brand to the ANZ Banking Group.

Suncorp Bank is now owned by the ANZ Banking Group. And like many of you, I continue to be a customer of Suncorp Bank, which in effect, means I am a customer of ANZ Bank. The Suncorp Group as a dedicated insurer remains proudly headquartered in Queensland. And like many of you, I hold Suncorp insurance policies. Suncorp continues to offer valued products and services through our well known insurance brands, as you can see on the screen, including AAMI, APIA, Bingle, CIL, GIO, Suncorp, Shannons, Terri Scheer and Vero in Australia, and AA Insurance and Vero in New Zealand. This strategic decision to sell the bank was made with a clear goal to focus our efforts and resources on our core general insurance business and deliver the benefits of being a strong, profitable, reliable and trusted insurer for Australia and New Zealand.

Your Board was pleased to return to shareholders $4.1 billion in net proceeds from the bank sale in March of this year, noting this was in line with our commitment at the time of announcing the sale in 2022. For retail shareholders, those in this room, this translated to a capital return of $3 per share and a fully franked special dividend of $0.22 per share. Through our strong retail shareholder base in Queensland, it also meant an injection into the state economy of around $0.5 billion.

The Board's determination to pay a fully franked final ordinary dividend of $0.49 per share, which was paid to shareholders yesterday is another tangible reflection of our commitment to delivering these benefits to you, our shareholders.

Our CEO, Steve Johnston, will cover the financial year '25 business performance in more detail, including the drivers of the strong net profit and tax after earnings result, which was delivered. I would, however, like to note the Board's ongoing disciplined approach to the management of capital through the year, as always, factoring in our external operating environment.

Our announcement last month of an on-market buyback of up to $400 million reflects our robust capital position and importantly, provides additional flexibility in how and when Suncorp facilitates the return of capital in excess of the needs of the business going forward.

This year, Suncorp supported customers through 17 declared natural hazard events. And while the financial cost of these events were more than $200 million below our allowance for such events this year, the enormity of what was faced by those impacted by extreme weather cannot be underestimated. Our CEO will talk through dynamics of our natural hazard allowances which have increased year-on-year given the frequency and severity of such events.

Your Board, executive team and I have spent considerable time visiting customers and communities impacted by severe weather through the year, including flooding across Queensland's North particularly the towns of Ingham and Cardwell, intense rain and flooding across the Mid North Coast and Hunter regions of New South Wales, and just on our doorstep here in Brisbane, the Gold Coast and surrounds, following ex-Tropical Cyclone Alfred.

During my time at Suncorp, I have visited a number of communities following bushfires, drought, floods, earthquakes and cyclones. Notwithstanding the immense hardship and devastation experienced, I've personally been inspired by the courage and resilience shown by all the people and communities that I have met over this time. This admiration and appreciation extends to each of the emergency services we work closely with, including our police and fire services and SES representatives and volunteers, who regularly risk their own lives to help others in need.

What has been evident through each of my visits is the Suncorp's team's unwavering commitment to supporting our customers before, during and after these events. The team's efforts to get every customer back into their home or their business, working in partnership with builders, repairers remains an absolute priority. This year, your Board also spent some time visiting a number of home and motor suppliers to gain a deeper understanding of the market trends they are observing and how they are driving innovation and efficiency to deliver better outcomes for our customers.

It's been particularly rewarding to see our significant jobs and investment commitments made to Queensland through the sale of the bank already making such a difference to the way we manage disasters. As you can see on the screen, this includes the launch of our state-of-the-art disaster management center, located in our Brisbane headquarters, a fleet of mobile disaster response hubs that can be deployed into affected communities to provide face-to-face customer support and the opening of a new regional office hub in Townsville, which is set to employ more than 100 additional local people. These investments are truly enhancing the way we prepare for and respond to major weather events, not just across Queensland, but right across the Tasman.

The insights we gain through leading technology and capabilities we've invested in are critical in supporting our long-term -- long-standing advocacy agenda, aimed at creating a more resilient Australia and New Zealand that can better withstand the impacts of natural disasters.

We continue to work with governments at all levels, industry and community stakeholders to argue for greater investments in mitigation and resilience measures. We've welcomed more than 200 government regulator and industry stakeholders to our Disaster Management Centre and Suncorp Control Centre. These visits provide an opportunity to showcase our leadership in disaster readiness, customer support and resilience innovation. But as importantly, these visits are helpful in driving meaningful collaboration and a genuine national conversation on infrastructure and resilience investment, the importance of modern disaster codes and data sharing frameworks.

There does continue to be a need for local councils to proactively take action to help protect the communities they are closest to. There are 537 local councils across Australia with different levels of rigor around zoning and land development and ensuring local infrastructure supports risk reduction for the community. While good progress has been made, there remains a very long way to go.

I know this ongoing stakeholder collaboration and important advocacy agenda will continue to be a priority of your Board and management team in a bid to better protect people and address the growing challenge around access and affordable quality insurance.

It's important to note that tackling these challenges is at the very heart of Suncorp's refreshed strategic plan which your Board was pleased to endorse in May of this year. Steve will cover Suncorp's strategic priorities in more detail. However, I'll point out that Suncorp's focus on modernizing and transforming the experience for customers through a responsible deployment of technology, including generative artificial intelligence, has remained front and center in the Board -- for the Board in considering the relevant skills and experience required to guide Suncorp through the next phase.

The role of the Board is to ensure the interest of shareholders are considered. That is why maintaining optimal board composition to support Suncorp's priorities has remained a key focus during my tenure as Chairman. Board renewal remains ongoing. This year, we were pleased to welcome David Whiteing to the Board. David brings extensive financial services and business transformation experience as well as a sharp focus on the contemporary technology landscape relevant for Suncorp's next chapter as a dedicated general insurer. David is well connected into the global tech community, which is invaluable for Suncorp. As I mentioned earlier, David is standing for election today, and you will hear from him shortly.

I'm equally pleased that Sally Herman and Ian Hammond will stand for reelection, providing important continuity for the Board as it undertakes renewal, and you will also hear from Ian and Sally shortly.

I would like to take this opportunity to congratulate and welcome Robert McDonald, who, as I mentioned, assumed the role of Chairman of the Suncorp New Zealand Board following David Flacks' retirement. Our New Zealand business remains an important part of Suncorp as a trans-Tasman insurer, and I wish Rob all the best in his new role.

As Board members, we understand the importance of continuously educating and upskilling ourselves, staying abreast of advancements in emerging technologies and the evolving cyber and data security landscape. This has remained a key priority through focused overseas study tours, regular sessions on emerging risks and formal courses undertaken by the Board during the year. Ensuring proficiency in emerging areas is more critical than ever, and the responsibility I know that each of us take seriously.

I will point out that having owned a bank for a number of years, Suncorp had to be an early adopter of building cyber resilience into our operations, and our focus on this -- embedding this across our business as an insurer has continued. Over my tenure, I have observed a tenfold increase in the sophistication and prevalence of cyber threats, scams and fraud. Combating this challenge and mitigating the risk of harm for our communities and businesses will continue to require a joint effort across all sectors, and I urge ongoing personal vigilance by our customers and by you, our retail shareholders.

I'd like to close by saying what a huge privilege and deep honor it has been to serve Suncorp and your Board over the past 10 years. Having successfully completed the return of capital from the sale of the bank while also bedding down our operating plans as a pure-play insurer, I'm confident that now is a logical point in Suncorp's evolution to hand the baton over to a new Chairman to steward the company through its next chapter. And as I mentioned, we're really fortunate that Duncan West, who served on our Board for the past 4 years has agreed to take on the role of Chairman. And as you've heard, Duncan is a highly experienced and well-respected director whose knowledge and expertise has been gained over 40 years, both in Australia and overseas.

During his time on the Board, Duncan has served as Chairman of the Risk Committee and a member of the Audit Committee, and I will take this opportunity to congratulate Duncan on your appointment and wish you well. Duncan will address you later today.

Thank you to each of my fellow Board members and those I've worked with over the year for your counsel, diligence and camaraderie. We've certainly navigated some testing times together, and I value your support. I wish each of you the very best. I know Suncorp is well placed to meet the challenges and seize the opportunities ahead under your stewardship.

The role of a CEO in an organization like Suncorp is critical to our success, and I'd like to acknowledge Suncorp CEO, Steve Johnston, for your outstanding leadership, vision and efforts to deliver outcomes for Suncorp and our stakeholders. I wish Steve and your talented executive team, who have also led with determination and resilience, the very best as you forge the path forward as a leading trans-Tasman insurer.

To all of our Suncorp people, my sincere thanks to each and every one of you for your hard work and dedication to our customers, partners and communities. Suncorp is a business defined by resilience, adaptability and a steadfast commitment to our purpose. You are at the absolute heart of that.

Finally, to you, our shareholders. I'm deeply grateful for your trust and support during my tenure and a special call out to those of you who have come along to our AGMs each year here in Brisbane. Thank you for your loyalty, and I look forward to having a chat over a sandwich and a cup of tea a bit later.

I do look forward to seeing Suncorp continue to grow, adapt and deliver lasting value in the years to come as both a shareholder and a customer.

Before handing over to our CEO, Steve Johnston, to address the meeting, I'd also like to thank the team of people who helped bring our AGM event together. There are many of you in the room and maybe I'm running too early. I should wait to see if we get through glitch-free. But the acoustics and everything you see in front of you is possible because of this very talented team.

So I'll now hand over to Steve Johnston to address the meeting.

Well, thank you, Chairman, and good morning, everyone. It is, as always, a pleasure to be here to report on Suncorp's performance over the 2025 financial year, but also to update you on our strategic priorities, particularly now that our simplification program is complete, and we now move forward very confidently as a pure-play general insurer.

But before I go into the detailed financial results and our strategy, I just want to talk for a moment about something that doesn't form part of our P&L or our balance sheet, but it is fundamentally at the core of everything we do here at Suncorp.

Now this is a slide I start with every results presentation. I can see analysts, investors sometimes rolling their eyes. But I believe it describes very succinctly how we believe value is created at Suncorp. Our purpose, which is to build futures and protect what matters when delivered through our people in support of our customers, in that order will always deliver superior financial returns for you, our shareholders.

Delivering to our purpose is more vital than ever. Given each year that goes by, we see more individuals, families and businesses depending upon us to deliver in their time of need. And again, this year, like many others before, I've seen the trauma that's etched on the faces of those who have unfortunately experienced and been displaced by extreme weather events. Now close to home here in Southeast Queensland, we felt the full force of Cyclone Alfred while families in towns like Taree, Port Macquarie, Northern Townsville, Ingham and other areas around Far North Queensland and North Queensland experienced their major flooding events in some cases, 3 in the past 5 years.

Now the financial cost of these events seriously underestimate, seriously underestimates their true impact on our communities. How could you possibly put a dollar value on the trauma associated with being woken at night by the sound of an enormous gumtree punching through your roof or the insidious march of muddy water through your home swallowing up your valuable possessions.

Every one of the 120,000 natural hazard clients that we dealt with this year has its own story. From a fridge full of spoiled food to the quick destruction of property, our customers rely on us to get them back on their feet and back in their homes, their cars and their businesses.

We know our actions in these critical moments can have a profound impact on their futures. When we get it right, as we do in the vast majority of cases, we make such a huge difference. But if we get it wrong, we're just compounding the challenges our customers already face. It's a responsibility I, my team and the whole of Suncorp take very seriously, and that's why we continue to challenge ourselves to do better to uplift the customer experience and to better equip our people and to improve the way we work with our repair networks and our suppliers alongside investing in leading disaster management technology and capability.

Now it's a sobering statistic that over the past 5 years, we have managed more than 660,000 natural hazard claims. And we've increased our allowance for such events by around $820 million, that's $820 million since FY '21 financial year '21. This experience not just the financial costs, but the insurmountable human toll underscores the ongoing importance of accessible and affordable insurance for all Australians and New Zealanders, but particularly those in high-risk areas. Now these topics remain core pillars of our advocacy agenda with all of our stakeholders.

Unfortunately, too many people across our communities have built homes where they should never have been allowed to build. At the same time, as a society, we haven't invested enough in resilience and mitigation projects that reduce risk. As I've said many, many times, we know the best way to reduce the premiums we all pay is to reduce the risk of a claim in the first place. And that's a key element of the advocacy agenda that we at Suncorp take to all levels of the government and consistently take to all levels of government.

So turning now to our FY '25 financial performance. As you can see on the screen, Suncorp has delivered a net profit after tax of $1.8 billion. This was supported by one-off profits from the sale of Suncorp Bank and the New Zealand Life of $252 million and $99 million, respectively. Cash earnings were almost $1.5 billion. They benefited from higher net investment income of around $760 million and supported by natural hazard claims cost, which came in, as Christine mentioned, $205 million below our allowance for the year.

Our general insurance underlying insurance trading ratio is the fundamental core measure of success in an insurance business. That ratio was 11.9%, which is right at the top of our target range, and that reflects our strong operational performance.

Now on the bottom of the graph there on the slide, you can see our Australia and New Zealand business has performed strongly, achieving top line growth across all of our portfolios. Gross written premium for general insurance increased by 6.3% over the year, and that underscores the strength of our brands and the quality of our products and what has become and continues to be a highly competitive market.

More favorable reinsurance conditions allowed us to successfully place our reinsurance program for the financial year that we're now in FY '26 at a reduced cost and with improved outcomes for both us, our shareholders and also our customers. And we're pleased that our strong capital position has enabled us the flexibility to commence soon after this AGM an on-market share buyback of up to $400 million, and that will continue through to the end of the financial year.

Suncorp's performance this year demonstrates the strength and resilience of our business, built through a dedicated focus and targeted programs over more than 5 years, and we've talked to you about them every year. Our aim 5 or 6 years ago was to create a simplified, resilient and growing Suncorp that delivers value for our customers, for the communities we serve and the shareholders such as many of you in the room today. The slide here displays a summary of our progress against these objectives over this time.

Now with the sale of the bank and most recently, Asteron Life in New Zealand, we have completed that simplification journey. We have built significant resilience into our financial metrics, and we now are consistently delivering margin outcomes to the top of our guidance range. Alongside that, we've invested strongly in data, pricing and claim systems and an improved digital offering through automation and targeted AI deployment. More than 78% of our customers are now purchasing their products digitally, which is up from 54% 5 years ago, while almost 60% are servicing both their claims and their policies via digital channels.

The strong platform that we've built and our track record of delivering on our commitments has provided us with the opportunity to now accelerate our ambition and to invest in our business but without compromising margins and importantly, shareholder returns.

Our investors focused on further modernizing our platforms and advancing our deployment of technologies such as AI, but at scale to transform our operations and to create seamless end-to-end digital experiences and importantly, more personalized products.

We will continue to invest in our suite of respected brands. We'll continue to invest in the capability of our people. We will include dedicated reskilling programs to support them as the world of work continues to evolve.

We know that building greater efficiency, effectiveness into the way we do things at Suncorp will have the dual effect of delivering better customer outcomes and a greater ability to tackle the complex challenges that are faced around insurance affordability. Our achievements this year are a testament to the commitment of our people, the loyalty of our customers and the support of you, our shareholders.

So in closing, I'd like to say thank you to our Suncorp teams, to our customers and to our partners. I also thank and acknowledge our outgoing Chairman, Christine, for her significant contribution to Suncorp over the past decade, but particularly her outstanding leadership as Chairman over the past 7 years. Those 7 years have included some periods of great uncertainty, but her tireless efforts and her commitment to continually raise the bar and to create value for all of our stakeholders has been evident throughout her tenure. She's been a great support to me personally and to the members of my executive team. But more importantly, she has cared for and shown great interest in every member of the Suncorp team.

Christine leaves Suncorp in a very strong position, and we all wish her well in the future. Also I congratulate Duncan on his appointment as Christine's successor and I and the whole team look forward to working with him as we continue our journey as a pure-play insurance company.

With that, I thank you for your continued confidence and support in Suncorp, and I'll hand now back to Christine.

Thank you, Steve. And now to the full part of the meeting. For those of you who were here 6 years ago when I made the mistake of standing for the Q&A session, I almost collapsed by the end. So if you're comfortable, Belinda and I will remain seated while we work through the Q&As.

All resolutions for consideration today will be put to a poll, which I now declare open. As I mentioned earlier, the direct and proxy votes that have been received prior to the AGM were released on the ASX platform this morning and will be shown on the screen before we vote on each resolution. I would just like to update you also on the number of people participating. I'm advised that we now have 475 shareholders participating online and around 220 in person. So I think that reinforces the case for hybrid meetings.

As set out in the notice of meeting, I intend to vote all undirected proxies held by me as Chairman of the meeting in favor of each resolution. The first item of business today is to receive and consider the financial report, directors' report and auditors' report for the Suncorp Group Limited and its controlled entities for the year ended 30 June 2025.

Representatives from KPMG, Suncorp's external auditor, are joining us here in Brisbane today. Scott Guse, on my left, on your right, who is a lead partner for the financial year '25 audit and David Kells, also on your right, who will be lead partner, audit partner commencing from this financial year. And Scott and David are available to answer any questions you may have about the auditors' report or the conduct of the audit.

And Scott, on behalf of the Board and Suncorp, you have our thanks, for the professionalism and commitment with which you've undertaken your Suncorp audit role. And we wish you well in your new role, and we welcome David.

I will now address questions and comments about the reports or Suncorp's performance generally. As Belinda mentioned earlier, I will first address a number of relevant questions received from shareholders prior to the meeting.

In the meantime, if you are here in Brisbane and wish to ask a question about these matters, please move to your nearest microphone. Microphone 1 is on straight on my left, your right, where Rupel will -- or Louisa will assist you. And if you are participating online, please submit your questions or comments now or register your question via the phone line. We've also got a second microphone. I'm sorry, over here on my right where Louisa will be. Sorry, Louisa.

Belinda, could you please read our first pre-submitted shareholder question?

Thank you, Chairman. Shareholder, Mr. Stuart Campbell asks what insurance businesses have been sold or disposed of by Suncorp over the last 15 years? And what insurance businesses are now transacted by Suncorp?

Thank you, Mr. Campbell. And those in the room would have seen this slide that Steve showed before about the transformation journey, which I think tells a very big story. Suncorp has recently undertaken a portfolio review, which led to Suncorp selling some of our businesses to simplify our operations and sharpen our focus on core insurance activities. Suncorp's simplification program has been a key focus, particularly over the last 7 years. However, as per your question, over the past 15 years, this includes the sale of New Zealand Life insurance business, Asteron Life to Resolution Life, which was finalized in 2025, the sale of Suncorp Bank to ANZ completed in July 2024, divestment of our Wealth business in 2022, exit from the RACTI joint venture in 2021, cessation of the underwriting and selling of travel insurance in February 2021, divestment of the Capital SMART Cash Repair and ACM Parts businesses in 2019, the sale of Resilient distribution businesses in 2019, the sale of our Australian Life insurance business in 2018. Now you can see why the Audit Committee Chair role is so important.

These divestments reflect Suncorp's strategic intent to streamline our portfolios and concentrate on the general insurance business. Today, Suncorp operates as a pure-play general insurer with a strong presence across Australia and New Zealand.

Our business is structured around 5 key portfolios, home, motor, commercial, personal injury and New Zealand. And as I mentioned in my opening address, Suncorp operates well-known brands that include AAMI, APIA and Shannons in Australia as well as Vero in New Zealand.

Is there another question, please pre-submitted Belinda?

Thank you, Chairman. We have received a question from shareholder, Mr. Nick Wickham, who asks why did the company wait so long to return the bank sell capital to shareholders? How much interest was earned on those billions during the period? It was not returned to shareholders. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Wickham. As mentioned in my address, the sale of Suncorp Bank was completed on 31 July 2024 following the receipt of several regulatory and legislative approvals. However, after completion, a number of key steps were required before the capital return could proceed. And this included seeking shareholder approval at last year's Annual General Meeting, which was held in October of last year, and I see many familiar faces here from that meeting. Finalizing the completion accounts with ANZ which determined the final sale proceeds, obtaining a draft class ruling from the Australian Taxation Office to confirm the tax outcomes, obtaining APRA approval. And as most of you know, APRA is our prudential regulator and then the Board making a final determination to proceed with the return of capital.

So when we assess the net proceeds from the transaction, the interest earned on the surplus capital was considered in arriving at the $4.1 billion, which was returned to shareholders in March 2025, through a $3 per share capital return payment and a $0.22 special dividend payments.

Next question, please, Belinda.

Thank you, Chairman. Next question is from shareholder, Mr. Lachlan Wells, who asks, according to Suncorp's Climate Disclosure report, the company's climate plan is based on leading frameworks from the net zero asset owner alliance and Climate Action 100. However, Suncorp is not a signatory either of these frameworks. Can investors rely on you to meet these standards? Or should we assume that you will not, given the lack of formal commitment?

Thank you, Mr. Wells. Aspects of our climate transition commitments are guided by the globally recognized external target setting frameworks such as the science-based targets initiative and the Net-Zero Asset Owner Alliance, where guidance has been used, it's been explicitly and transparently stated in our climate disclosures. For business reasons, we've made a strategic decision not to pursue formal membership or endorsement by these organizations at this time.

To provide confidence in the integrity and robustness of our climate-rated metrics, we engage independent assurance firms to assess our selected metrics. And I can assure you that Suncorp is deeply committed to climate action, and we welcome the National Climate Risk Assessment 2025 that was released earlier this month.

Suncorp is now preparing itself for mandatory climate reporting next year. And under the mandatory reporting requirements, the contents that we are subject to limited in -- all of the contents to be subject to limited assurance, and that will expand to include governance and aspects of our climate-related strategy to reinforce the confidence in quality and accuracy of our climate reporting.

Are there any more questions pre-submitted, Belinda?

[indiscernible]. Sorry for the interruption.

No, no. Thanks for letting me know.

Thank you, Chairman. There are indeed additional questions, and there are 4 that have been submitted by a shareholder, Ms. Natasha Lee. The first question is, while there has been a lot of investment in AI technology and upgrading of staff skills in AI, what safeguards have been put in place to guide against bias, AI hallucinations and other issues that can arise from using AI?

Thank you, Ms. Lee. We had a Board meeting yesterday, and this is a topic we discussed a lot. For the benefit of shareholders present today, our investment in artificial intelligence, or AI, is seen as a significant enabler to Suncorp's strategy. It's my personal belief that we all need to educate ourselves and better understand AI.

At Suncorp, we provided employees with a number of educational offerings and upskilling programs and this will be an ongoing journey, as AI continues to evolve rapidly. Suncorp's risk appetite statement specifically requires that all material models, including artificial intelligence be designed in an ethical manner in alignment with Suncorp's data ethic commitments, which are aligned with Australia's AI ethics principles. These data ethics commitments include reliability, safety and fairness, which incorporates the risk of bias, AI hallucinations and other issues that can arise from using AI.

Suncorp has operationalized our data ethics commitments using a specialist AI risk and control library, which is applied to all material AI use cases. Some of the specific AI controls being implemented include comprehensive testing, preventative and detective monitoring by our people and independent AI models, former model reviews and use the feedback mechanisms.

We continue to invest in developing our AI governance and risk management capabilities, and it's important we continue to be at the forefront of managing any new risks associated with AI.

Next question, please, Belinda.

Thank you, Chairman. Ms. Lee's next question is, while we have reported increases in customers using conversational AI, how has the experience been for those whose language is not English or Australian for that matter?

Thank you again, Ms. Lee. Like most large organizations, Suncorp is experiencing a growing demand from multilingual -- for multilingual support from our customers, and the rapid growth of powerful generative AI technologies has really improved how we can communicate with our customers, and we are continuing to explore opportunities to further assist our customers from non-English-speaking backgrounds to transact with us. For example, we're expanding our chatbot capabilities through Bingle Buddy, which will soon support 8 of the most spoken languages in Australia. And this enhancement will allow customers to interact in their preferred language while receiving responses in English. Personally, I find this very exciting and it's also a passion project for Director Tanner, on your right, my left. We're fast reaching a point where we'll be able to converse with our customers in any language, which is just wonderful. Next question, please, Belinda.

Thank you, Chairman. Ms. Lee's next question is, while investment income has increased, this has largely come from interest earnings and net gains on financial instruments. However, given the interest rates are being cut, this result will be difficult to sustain, especially if there's a bad weather event. Are there strategies in place to maintain good interest rate returns in this market.

Thank you again, Ms. Lee. We do have a clear strategy in place that balances risk and returns appropriately considering both the needs of our policyholders and our shareholders. While declining interest rates impact interest income, obviously, we can maintain an appropriate interest income by diversifying into other asset classes. And we do this carefully by carefully evaluating the potential benefits, the market risks and the capital considerations. And we also assess our asset allocation and identify opportunities that offer strong risk and return rewards to maximize returns with our well-defined risk appetite. Next question, Belinda.

Thank you, Chairman. Shareholder, Mr. Stuart Campbell asks, what insurance businesses -- I'm sorry, that one was already asked and answered, I apologize. Ms. Lee's final general question is, on know our dividend and trust income is flat to $57 million, but your equity holdings increased from $701 million to $932 million, while Unit Trusts have decreased slightly. Can you advise why that dividend income was flat?

Thank you again, Ms. Lee. Dividends and unit trust distributions can fluctuate depending on the earnings and dividend policies of the underlying companies that Suncorp hold its investment portfolios in, and increases in equity values driven by capital gains will not necessarily lead to higher dividend distributions. And it's important to consider both dividend income and capital appreciation when assessing the return on equities. However, what is clear is that the equity returns were strong for the financial year '25 with our equity exposures delivering above benchmark performance. Are there any questions received prior to the meeting, Belinda?

Thank you, Chairman. That concludes the general questions received in advance, and we can now move to questions in the room.

The waiting shareholders.

Shareholders, please hold any questions relating to specific resolutions until the time those resolutions are considered. And please let the team member at the microphone know who you are, so that they can introduce you to the meeting.

Chairman, may I please introduce John Whittington, ASA, who is a proxy shareholder.

Welcome, Mr. Whittington. You're very fast out of the seat there.

Good morning, Madam Chair. My name is John Whittington, and I'm a volunteer for the Australian Shareholders' Association. Today, we hold proxies from 191 ASA members and non-members for over 0.75 million Suncorp shares. Our thanks go to you, the Board and all Suncorp employees for producing such a strong result.

I'd also like to take the opportunity to thank you, Madam Chair, for your considerable commitment and achievements over the past decade as Chair and director of the company and wish you all the best for your post Suncorp future.

Thank you.

I've got two questions here, one at a time or both together?

One at a time might be better for the people in the room, I think.

Okay. Madam Chair, on Page 9 and 13 of the annual report, it indicates that the natural hazard cost of $1.355 million -- sorry, $1.355 billion with $205 million below the annual allowance of $1,560 million. And that adds a lot to the bottom line. Was this due to specific industry -- specific initiatives undertaken by Suncorp or natural year-on-year variation? And how sustainable are those outcomes in future years?

Thanks. Mr. Whittington. Which page were you referring to in the annual report?

Page 9 and 13.

Page 9 and 13. I think I made some comments in my opening remarks as did Steve, but I might get Steve to speak to the annual report.

Thank you, Mr. Wittington. And obviously, the favorability to the natural hazard allowance in the financial year does flow through to the bottom line. I would like to point that over the past 5 years or so, we have significantly increased that allowance, and that's a reflection of both severity of weather and events and frequency of weather and events. I think everyone in the room here would have heard and experienced some of that.

One of the other elements that has supported that actual outcome in FY '25 has been the cyclone reinsurance pool. So obviously, we had the Cyclone Alfred event and about 3 or 4 years ago, the federal government created the cyclone reinsurance pool that all the insurers contribute into and all the policyholders contribute into. And so that obviously took a fair element of the financial cost to the Cyclone Alfred event, bearing in mind that we still hold the operational accountability of managing around about 35,000 claims. So it's a very big operational load that the organization is carrying at the moment.

In terms of the future in the hands of the gods to some extent, I would call to the point that the favorable reinsurance renewal that we just completed, we have taken the opportunity to further increase that allowance, build more resilience into it, prepare ourselves, obviously, in a world where these events are increasing so that we can absorb the financial cost within the allowance not exceed the allowance at the expense of our shareholders. So very hard to predict what FY '26 is going to be in the future. But the overarching point to make is that the resilience that's built into that allowance now is significantly greater than it was 5 years ago. And we think it puts us in a good position to be able to deal with any of the elements of weather and natural hazard events into the future.

Your second question, Mr. Whittington.

Madam Chair, your report acknowledges the ongoing affordability challenge of insurance. The insurance industry as a whole has a reputation for charging loyalty premiums where loyal retail customers have created much higher prices than new customers. Not only does this make affordability worse, it creates extra customer service and churn costs and is likely to reduce Net Promoter Score, one of your key performance metrics. What is Suncorp doing to eliminate loyalty premiums across the industry?

I'd just like to make a couple of comments in the first instance just around affordability because it is such an important topic, and Steve might wish to add, but we absolutely recognize the cost pressures that households continue to experience, and we really are committed to tackling the drivers that put pressure on insurance premiums. And I think the investment we referenced before that we'll be making in technology and using artificial intelligence can reduce our own costs and improve our overall customer satisfaction.

But there's definitely a need, as I mentioned in my opening remarks, for investment by this country in mitigation projects just to better mitigate the risk for communities, and that includes incentivizing customers to protect their own homes, their own home resilience. Certainly, better land use planning. As I mentioned in my opening remarks, counsel is really on that. And really also lowering taxes, I have a slide, which is one of my favorite slides, which I'll show later, which basically shows -- well, it's up now, the impost of state and territory taxes on insurance premiums. All of these issues have to be addressed if we're really going to tackle the affordability challenge. Do you want to add anything, Steve?

I think the only other point to make, Mr. Wittington is that the fundamental tool of pricing and insurance is risk. And as insurance companies here in Australia, Suncorp particularly and around the world become more granular in the way that they can price, we are able now to identify a number of different payrolls that go into a home insurance medium for example. So obviously, flood risk is one of those, various working claim perils like burglary and other risks, but we can model very clearly now the impact on an insurance premium of natural hazard costs. And obviously, those people who, as I made the point in my address, who are unfortunate enough to have built or bought in areas that they should never have been a layer to have built or bought in areas that should never been allowed to build the volume dealing with some of the impacts of that high peril regime that flows obviously through the premium. Additional point I'd make on top of that is that the taxation system that we have around insurance means that those higher-risk -- unfortunate higher-risk customers pay more tax.

So on top of the home insurance premium is a GST on to the GST and the home insurance premium stamp duty and in New South Wales in particular on top of the home insurance premium with the GST and the stamp duty is a levy, emergency services levy. And so we've consistently, as an industry, been making the point that it is regressive to be imposing taxes of this nature on home insurance and to reform the tax system would be a fantastic initiative for improving affordability of insurance right across the board.

And just -- also just circling back, we do not offer a loyalty discount program.

You do not offer it.

Sorry, loyalty discount.

Loyalty tax.

Loyalty discounts or loyalty premiums because that's the thing that really upsets customers is where they quoted at a high price, where if they just came in as a new customer, they get a substantially lower price. And that's the question -- that's the fundamental part of the question I was asking, which I don't think has really been answered yet.

We will make the point. We do not offer -- we don't provide loyalty tax. The sources of pricing that we attribute to a home insurance premium or any interest premium are the underlying risk factors that emerge in the writing of that policy.

Thank you. We have a question from microphone #1.

Chairman, may I please to introduce Ben Galvan, shareholder from Finance Sector Union.

My name is Ben Galvan from the Finance Sector Union. And I'm here representing our members across Suncorp who are employed by Suncorp.

Suncorp has been a leader in adopting new technologies, including artificial intelligence models. As these tools are introduced, what is the broad goal of AI capability improvements at Suncorp? And in particular, are you going to ensure everyone benefits from these improvements, including your employees?

So including?

Including your employees.

Thanks, Mr. Galvan. And thank you also for your personal constructive engagement through our recent enterprise bargaining process, the team of advisers at the Board meeting.

As you know, artificial intelligence has been around at Suncorp for time because insurance is a data-rich business, and we actually have a very mature set of AI capabilities and indeed, experts in our organization. And we're building and integrating AI use cases across our business. And there's no doubt that it will transform the customer experience because we're getting rid of repetitive tasks for our people. There's still a lot to be worked through in the operational transformation. And there will be potential changes to roles in some circumstances. But it's quite extraordinary how much training Suncorp is all really doing of our general workforce around upskilling and reskilling so that people can actually use these tools in doing their job.

So obviously, we as a Board look closely at the commitment to continuous retraining, reskilling and helping our workforce do that transformation at the same time remaining true to delivering the best outcomes we have. So I'm sure that we'll continue to have this conversation with you as it evolves. And CEO at the recent results presentation did give investors some examples of some of the use cases and early days, but it's looking promising and a good experience for our employees. Thank you, Mr. Galvan. Microphone #2.

Chairman, may I please introduce Rod [indiscernible], who is a shareholder.

I'm pleased you got the ambulance here because I get a bit nervy and I won't stop midstream.

That's all right. You can just take your time. It's fine.

I'd like to compliment the management and the Board for putting forward the return of capital with consolidation because I don't know if you people took into account, but whether you took in account about the cost of living because when I looked at the shareholder here, 83,000 of them are shareholders with less than 1,000. And if we include up to 5,000, that's 130,000 shareholders that much probably could benefit.

The other point I want to point out investment relations can put a face to me now is all the promotion about on-market buyback and even the return of capital we consult, it's based on theoretical. The only guarantee outcome out of those two is the number of shareholders on the registry. The rest, it's basically I'm happy to go with the return of capital with consolidation because it is -- from a risk assessment point of view, but if it doesn't go right, at least all of us benefited in some way.

So -- and what I can see, I'm just a hobbyist investor, not a room serious investor is all the financial metrics that promotes for support for on-market buyback is very similar to what the return of capital consolidation achieved, the way I understand it.

And I'm a bit dubious. I don't know if Investor Relations reported to you about my question since what I'd like to ask you people is from the Board experience, and I imagine you have been in a number of years, with on-market buybacks, who predominantly gets that pool of $400 million -- are likely to get the $400 million. My suspicion is it's probably the big end of tail. Can you confirm that?

Thanks, Mr. [indiscernible]. I'll make a couple of comments, then I can ask the CEO to comment or even the CFO, who's in the front row. So firstly, the Board is really active in looking at how we manage our capital and very disciplined, and we have to be very disciplined because we have to be here for the long term. And the return of capital as a result of the bank sale was considered through the lens of both retail shareholders and institutional shareholders. And we are very mindful of the fact that we have such a significant retail shareholder base well represented here today, including by the Australian Shareholders' Association. And the Board always will have regard to the totality of our shareholder base.

So in the buyback, shares are purchased on market from existing shareholders who choose to sell their shares at the prevailing price. So we don't -- there's no disclosure of the counterparty selling their shares but updated distribution of holdings will be included in our 26th annual report.

Just asking probably a broader experience, just a general remark, who ends up with most of the money in a number of companies or buybacks?

I mean I might just take a step back, and I'll have a shot at this because I was the former CFO and quite excited about this topic. But if we had our druthers, and we had no limitation around franking credits, our disposition would be to return capital through a special dividend. Now obviously, with the sale of the bank and the business now having a significantly higher contribution of its earnings coming out of New Zealand, our ability to generate franking credits has been reduced over the sale process. So we would love to distribute through special dividends. I don't think we want to put at risk at any point, the ordinary dividend being partially franked because I think everyone in this room benefits from the franking credit distribution. So that's the first thing. If we could do it through a special dividend, we would do it.

Undertaking a capital return through an off-market buyback really is not effective anymore and you won't -- you really don't see them in Australia. So you come back to an on-market buyback. Now whoever participates in an on-market buyback, the principles of it are very similar to what we did with the bank sale. In other words, the shares on issue reduce, the returns stay the same and grow, the EPS improves and the return on capital improves. And so while the shareholder doesn't necessarily get in a form of a special dividend, they get it through the capital growth of their ordinary shares.

But you treat that through the return of capital with consolidation, the metrics are pretty similar.

It's a similar principle, but typically, consolidation of shares and that process is a very heavily administrative process and it takes a long time. As you saw in the bank, you have to get the tax office, you have to get other approvals, and that takes some time. So I think -- and we look at all of the options, the principles of a share consolidation and on-market buyback are broadly the same. It's more efficient, faster and easier to do an on-market buyback, and the benefits of it, I believe, whoever participates in it flow through to all of our shareholders.

But I'm trying to get out of your people. Who are the greatest participants in the on-market buyback?

It depends.

Well, it will be the largest shareholders.

And thank you for saying that because a lot of people won't admit it. I've asked them.

Well, I mean, I think that's just the nature of on-market buybacks, but my point is that the share count reduces, the EPS increases, you're benefited.

Because something happened with the return on capital with consolidation. Then the next question I'm going to ask is I've been known to. You might not like this, but I've been known and like I won't say it. So why do the top end of town like on-market buybacks. They seem to be of this -- with AMP and all those places before we get into and even David did -- the top of the town ask you for the on-market buyback or company as a whole consider those on-market buyback.

We don't talk to the top end of town and run the company through the top end of town. The top end of town, as you described it, would prefer a special dividend because they get the franking credits.

I doubt it very much.

No, they do. They like the special dividend. They like the franking credits because they can distribute those franking credits ultimately through to their end custodian through the custodian to the end shareholders. So I think the hierarchy of capital return for all shareholders, irrespective of the big or small is special dividend, fully franked on-market buyback, and obviously, off-market buybacks are not possible, and yes, if you are selling a business off scale and you have a significant capital return like we did with the Australian Life business sale and the bank, then the most efficient way to do that is to go through the longer administrative process with all the authorities and do a share consolidation, which is what we did with those asset sales. But for ongoing capital return. And we are hopeful that the on-market buyback process will be ongoing because we still remain with excess capital after the $400 million that we're proposing in FY '26. And we believe that over time, we will continue to accrete capital into our balance that the on-market buyback is the most efficient and effective way for us to continue to return capital to shareholders.

Thanks, Steve. Thanks, Mr. [indiscernible]. I might allow some other shareholders to ask a question, if that's okay. And I assure you, the CFO will meet you after the meeting and dig further into this. Jeremy, got that? Thanks, Jeremy. Thanks, Mr. [indiscernible].

The next question is from microphone #1, I believe. We'll go with microphone #2.

So Chairman, may I please introduce George Bomber, who's a shareholder.

Welcome, George. It was nice to speak with you earlier this morning.

Madam Chairman, I must say you did a great job over the previous years, and thank you for your services.

Thank you.

I think what the gentleman prior was trying to ascertain was he felt that minority shareholders weren't looked after. If you're doing a share buyback, it's quite possible that you could write to all the shareholders and say we're doing a share buyback at x number of dollars, if you'd like to participate, send the form in, and you can participate in that. And that might solve the problem that gentleman is talking about the minor shareholders not being as well looked after some major shareholders. I just wanted to clarify that point.

My other question was how long does ANZ have to keep the Suncorp name. And if it's a long-term project, maybe we should now be Suncorp insurance. Some of the things that the ANZ Bank have done since they've taken over to the banking haven't been very good for customers. And I think that the association of the 2 names, if they're going to keep it for a long time, should be clarified in that regard.

The other thing you were talking about before was the income that you've got and you -- one of the things that you mentioned was the advantage of capital gains. Now we have a government in Australia that is silly enough to think that they are going to tax unrealized capital gains. And if that's the case, that is going to have a major pullback in your income because you've got less money than working to produce the income because you pay tax on the capital gains and you don't have that money keep growing.

Thanks, George. I'll just make a comment on the brand sharing arrangements. And then Steve, you can talk about taxes. So when we agreed the sale of Suncorp Bank with ANZ, we did agree with a brand-sharing arrangement of the Suncorp brand for a period of up to 5 years. We're now just past 1 year on that brand-sharing arrangement. I can assure you, again, at our Board meeting yesterday, we keep an eagle eye on our brand health and our reputation. And in fact, in our long-term incentives, we have a reputation metric, which needs to be satisfied. So this is something the Board thinks about. But it's certainly not expected to go any longer than 5 years, the brand sharing, may be shorter. And the people responsible for our brand also here today and heard your comments around Suncorp insurance.

Look, I don't think I'll buy into the capital gains. I'm not an expert on capital gains tax necessarily. I am very much focused on tax reform and insurance. GST, as I mentioned, stamp duty and emergency services levies. And I think the only way to really fundamentally reform those taxes and the impact on insurance policies and pricing is to have broad tax reform, and if they have broad tax reform, I can pick that up and they can also pick up your capital gains tax issue.

Can I continue?

I just need to -- I've got someone in the queue, Mr. [indiscernible] from microphone #1. So if you just let Louisa know, she'll put you in the queue. Thanks.

Chairman, may I please introduce Lana [indiscernible], who is a shareholder.

Welcome, Ms. [indiscernible].

My first question -- I have two questions. My first question, impinges on previous speaker. And that is in view of the recent disturbing allegations against ANZ. Have we autonomy to be able to maintain the ethical standards that have been discussed earlier today, especially given we've only got 4 years as us. And after that, we sort of ANZ. Can we go on being ethical in the way we should?

And your second question, I'll take them both at ones if that's okay.

Well, the second question is more about the people aspect of policy. I suspect there are many others like me who are old and who like having people at bank branches. Now we're more and more being steered into using machines, ATMs. And they're all very good and convenient at times, but they can't answer questions. They can't help us sort out a difficult question, for example, what to do about a term deposit. There are various things that machines just can't do. Even AI, let us not forget, is artificial intelligence, and it can't quite rack up with the memory and experience of a banker who has been in the business long enough to remember previous trends, previous outcomes that AI might not be able to compute.

Thank you, Ms. [indiscernible]. In terms of our own operations, I assure you that ethical conduct and imposing -- enforcing our code of conduct is something that the Board and the People Committee looks at regularly. In terms of the bank, the bank is now owned by ANZ, and it's actually not appropriate for me to answer questions that really should be addressed to ANZ as I'm not in their boardroom. But we do have -- Ms. [indiscernible] we have 4 people from ANZ who are outside today. Mr. Bush, Ms. Hasse, Ms. Irving and Mr. McFadden, and they have been asked to join us here today outside to really give shareholders like yourself an opportunity to ask those questions around banking, whether that be the availability of people in branches, how to use technology, et cetera. So I'm going to ask the lady sitting in front of you, [indiscernible] guide you out at the end of the meeting to meet with the ANZ team. Thanks, [indiscernible]. Microphone #2, Louisa.

Chairman, may I please introduce John Whittington, ASA, who is a proxy shareholder.

We haven't got passed the first matter at Mr. Whittington, you're up twice.

Madam Chair I've got two questions for the Chair-Elect. So again, do you want to one at a time or...?

Yes, give us -- I mean, we need to get this meeting done before dinner. So you can give us -- give them to me both, and I'll decide whether or not to give them to the Chair-Elect because I am still the Chair.

Okay. Well, it is -- for Mr. West, one of the basics of retail shareholders is being diluted without combination in capital raisings. Will the Chair-Elect commit to retail shareholders today that if Suncorp was to raise capital during his tenure that the preferred method of capital raising will be a by a renounceable offers such as [indiscernible], such offers as the only that treat retail shareholders fairly and equally?

The second question?

And the second question is, despite our requests over recent years, Suncorp is in the minority of its peers by not providing an AX release between 1 and 2 weeks before all analyst briefings given -- giving retail shareholders the details of how to participate in such briefings and in listen-only mode, and therefore, be on an equal information footing to institutional shareholders. Will Mr. West commit to ensuring retail shareholders are treated equally and such ASX releases are made during his tenure?

Thanks, Mr. Whittington. And just for the benefit of other shareholders in the room, Duncan West and myself did meet with Mr. Whittington and others from the Australian Shareholders' Association Head of this meeting. And we have previously answered this question, but I think Mr. Whittington, Duncan speak very briefly to that, but you do know the answer, sir.

Yes. So to your -- thank you for your questions, and I look forward to many more in the future. On the second question, the answer to that is yes, we will commit to that. On the first question about capital raising, I can't commit to the future approach to capital raisings. Obviously, at the time of any potential capital raising, we will look at all of the factors that are around at that point in time and choose the most appropriate approach depending on the circumstances. Obviously, as a Board, we are, have been and will continue to be very mindful of all shareholder outcomes, including but not limited to the fairness of those outcomes, and I think we have a strong track record, as a Board of taking into account all shareholders, including retail shareholders when making capital decisions.

Thanks, Duncan. Steve, perhaps...

Yes. I just want to make an additional point, and we've talked a lot about capital returns and, now we're talking about potential capital raisings, which figures costs we don't need to do other than for something that we would acquire at some time down the track. But I would make the point that through Christine's tenure, the Chairman's tenure, we were probably one of the very few financial services companies that didn't need to raise capital through COVID. We never diluted our current shareholder base with dilutive capital raisings. And I think that's a very proud statement to make. We were one of the few. So I thought I'd make that point in addition to the discussion on capital returns and raisings.

Thanks, Steve. Thanks, Duncan, and thanks, Mr. Wittington. I might -- doesn't look like we've got more questions in the room on this.

Sorry, we've got a couple more questions. Chairman, may I please introduce Gary Bilby, who's a shareholder.

Thanks, Louisa. Good morning, Mr. Bilby.

Chair, during your presentation, you indicated the focus is going to be on the insurance business. I'm confused because then you sell off the New Zealand Life Insurance. So my question, I've got two questions, this is one of them, is the focus now on insurance business only in Australia? The second question is, I have real concerns concerning about cybersecurity, does Suncorp have insurance if things go pear shape?

Two good questions. Thank you. The first one is, as I mentioned in my opening remarks, we have general insurance businesses in Australia and in New Zealand. We have divested of our life insurance businesses, but we have a range of different insurance. We have our commercial insurance portfolio in Australia, in New Zealand and our personal loans portfolios. And obviously, it includes personal injury insurance, CTP insurance, but we do not have a life insurance business anymore. We -- as part of the simplification program, as Steve put up on his slide, that was definitely a decision by the Board that we would no longer participate.

The second question in relation to cybersecurity. Yes, we do have lines of cyber insurance. But for myself and the Board and certainly the Risk Committee is a far deeper look than just what insurance is available. So we have -- we run a number of different simulations and scenarios during the course of the year with the team to look at our own cyber resilience. We bring external experts into this because this has been a growing phenomenon. As I've said during my tenure, I've seen a tenfold increase in the number of scams and frauds. And cyber criminals are at the forefront of using generative AI and artificial intelligence tools. So this is something we constantly look at. But yes, we do have lines of so overall insurance cover. Thank you.

And we have another question from microphone #2, and then we might go to the next agenda item, I think.

I think we've got two more questions here. Chairman, may I please introduce Rob [indiscernible], who's a shareholder.

Am I committed to continue on the same theme as before?

No, sorry, Mr. [indiscernible] because we've got other people -- we've got a lot of business to get to. And I did say to you that our CFO, Jeremy Robson will talk with you offline at the end of the meeting on that topic. And...

But I'd just like to make one statement. The way I understand here is, I'm trying to make it a clinical, the way I see it, the on-market buyback is basically used in everyone's entitlement theoretically. And the 220, they seem to love it for some reason, this on-market buyback, and then they would claim that what you, as a company, is doing a good job, yet I consider them if you're doing a good job, and they go on the on-market buyback, they basically deserted us. They're deserting the company, which we -- possibly you people are artificially pushing the price up of the share market, the price of Suncorp to the market. I'm staying loyal to you. Why don't I know I can buy, get on market, but don't have faith in the company. But obviously, people who utilize the on-market pace, especially the top 220 and so on, I consider deserting the company.

Okay. Thanks, Mr. [indiscernible], and our CFO, Jeremy Robson, will catch up with you at the end of the meeting. I think the CEO did speak well to that topic.

I'm actually now going to go to online questions. I'm sorry -- I have one more at microphone #1.

And one more, and one more at 2.

At one more microphone #2. Okay. Well, go online while we're waiting for those details.

Thank you, Chairman. We have received some questions online for this item of business. The first question is asked by Mr. Stephen Mayne. The retirement of Christine McLoughlin after today's meeting will mean that the largest 30 companies on the ASX by market capitalization will all be chaired by a man. Having just successfully chaired an ASX 30 company, could Christine, please comment on why Australia has one of the worst records globally in terms of women rising to chair are largest public companies? Also, thank you for pioneering AGM best practice with hybrid meetings, early proxy disclosure and extra voting data. Does Duncan commit to continuing this next year?

Well, I'll take all of that. Thank you. Stephen, I would love to be able to change the world. I'd even love to be able to change something in this country. I can assure you around this Board table, there is a genuine commitment to diversity in the broader sense. And I can hope you can see that from people in front of you today. And I know that the Chair Elect and the Board will continue to have that focus and Steve, in leading his -- building his own team has committed to diversity. Our women in leadership rate is around 49% at the moment.

Thank you for your feedback, and we will certainly continue with the best practice that we've adopted at this meeting. And when I leave this role, I'll see if I can change the world. I've just got a couple of more questions in the room. So I might go back to the room before we finish online. So then we have George again.

Yes, just the final question from this microphone. May I please introduce George [indiscernible], who is a shareholder.

Madam Chairman, thank you. One of the considerations today and you look at the Board in the top 200 companies and most of them have between 5 and 9 members. We have 11 members on the Board here. I think sometimes you've got a -- say, a number of people contributing to the same factors and their knowledge. And I think sometimes a Board of that number starts to become unwieldy, and it makes it harder to operate. And I think that as some of these people retire from the Board, maybe you should consider not replacing them because I think that sometimes a smaller number can work quicker and make decisions better because they're more concise.

The other thing that I'd like to inquire about was recently, Suncorp made -- gave some shares to people that worked in their branches. I would like to know were those shares were acquired? Were they acquired on market? What details were given to the people who received those shares. I spoke to people at my local brands. They had no idea what to do with them. They said, "George, what should I do with them?" I gave them some advice, and I said you can sell them on market, if you like. But I don't know whether they were given a cost base and then if they sold them. If they were given them as a free gift, were they advise that the cost of -- the value of those shares was taxable. Were they given that information that they could include that on their tax return? And so I think that if you're going to give shares to employees that are unfamiliar with shares, you need to be very precise and give them all the information that is required so that they don't finish up getting in strife with the tax department. Thank you.

Thanks, George. I'll speak quickly to Board size and then Belinda, who in her many different roles is also responsible for the people function. So you can perhaps speak to the second question about people in branches who received shares.

In terms of Board size, we remain -- Suncorp remains a highly regulated company post the sale of the bank. And we do look at the size and composition of the Board through the lens of issues we are addressing at any point in time. And there's an incredible pace of change at the moment, as I mentioned in my opening remarks, whether that's technology, cyber resilience, energy transition, geopolitical issues, supply chain, climate. So it's really important that we have a board that is contemporary. And I think what will happen over time is that the Board led by Duncan will continue to address what is the appropriate size, but really, even more importantly, what is the appropriate skill set. And that will include an orderly runoff as directors retire. So we certainly discussed this in the last couple of months as a Board and the entire Board is committed to making sure we have the right skills and the right size. So thank you for asking that question. Belinda, perhaps on the guidance of shares to employees.

Thank you. Firstly, the question, the shares are acquired on market, and I think we've covered how that occurs already. In terms of advice, a generic tax summary is provided to employees at the time. However, we do not provide personal tax advice to any individual employees.

Our CEO will make a couple of comments.

Just to add one point. Isn't it a great thing for all our employees to be shareholders, and I'd like them all to be customers too. And so I take your point for people who are unfamiliar with shareholding, then it can be a bit daunting and there are tools available to them and obviously, advice that they can get. But the concept here is we want all of our share -- all of our employees to be shareholders just like everyone in this room. So that's the goal. This year, we have provided gift shares to our employees. It's around $750 worth of gift shares, and I think overwhelmingly, the team enjoy that, and they like to be linked into the success of the organization, just like all of us in the room here.

Thanks. Thanks, Steve. Thanks.

[indiscernible].

Well, as I mentioned, there's material available for the employees to undertake all of that analysis with their tax returns.

I think we'll keep moving, if that's okay. We've got another question in the room, and then I'm going to go online.

Chairman, may I please introduce Clyde Ashton with a shareholder.

I noted the financial returns suggestion to the Nomination Committee. Due to its important role in relation to the Board, can you please advise the make up of the this committee?

The Nomination Committee at Suncorp is the entire Board. So I chair the Board and I chair the Nominations Committee, but in the context of chair succession, Lindsay Tanner has took the role of independent director, and he led the chair succession process, which is another part of the role of the Nominations Committee. Thank you for the question.

I'll just go back online. I think we have another question online.

We do. Thank you, Chairman. We have another question from Mr. Stephen Mayne, who asks, how long has KPMG been our external auditor? When did their last phase to full competitive tender? And how many competitive tenders run during Christine's time on the Board? When is the external audit next scheduled to be tendered?

Thanks, Mr. Mayne. We can't comment on when the next audit tender will be, but the Board is committed to regularly reviewing the quality and independence of our external audit arrangement. That's just part of good governance. Obviously, when we do go through a process, I won't be chairing the Board, but that will be advised in the appropriate way, shareholders will be informed.

KPMG were first appointed as Suncorp auditors in 1996. The last competitive tender was held in 2017, '18, and I was on the Board, and that information is publicly available. And that is the only competitive tender during my tenure on the Board. But KPMG importantly does have a partner rotation policy, and that does require the signing and engagement partners who change every 5 years in accordance with the Corporations Act. And as I mentioned earlier today, Scott Guse is retiring as he has reached his tenure, and David Kells will be taking his place as the lead partner. Another question online?

Thank you, Chairman. Mr. Mayne asks another question. What process did we run to select Duncan West as our next Chair? Was a headhunting them involved? And did we interview any external candidates? Were multiple internal candidates competing for the physician with a formal pitch and vote or was this a long-term succession plan which was only subject to Duncan winning the trust of his colleagues since joining the Board 4 years ago? Was it recruited at the time as a potential future Chair?

Thank you, Mr. Mayne. So for all new Director appointments, we do have an external search process using an external firm, and we do have searches in the market at the moment. However, before the Board succession, as I mentioned earlier, Director Tanner led a process and one of the first questions that was put to the Board was whether it was appropriate to go externally as well as internally. And the unanimous view of the Board was that it is preferable to have an internal candidate. If we had people who would be willing to take on the role, they're not easy roles and they're quite demanding. And we were fortunate in that we did have people around the Board table who more than able to chair this company.

Duncan was unanimously identified by his colleagues as the preferred or an outstanding candidate. He did not say that about himself, obviously. And there was then a process which -- with the Board when Duncan addressed the Board about how he would take on the stewardship role and his beliefs around the future strategy for the company and other matters that one would expect to Chairman Elect to turn them on to. Lindsay, do you want to add anything? No. So it was very much conducted in a robust way, Mr. Mayne.

Thank you, Chairman. That appears to conclude the questions received via the online platform. And I can confirm that there were no questions received on the phone lines.

Thank you, Belinda. For the information of everyone participating, I can update you that we now have a total of 526 shareholders, proxyholders and other attendees joining the meeting must be selling tickets, and they're not getting sandwiches if they're coming in online. So having now addressed general questions and comments, we'll move to two remuneration-related items of business.

If you're here with us in Brisbane and you'd like to ask a question on these resolutions, please move to a microphone now. First, I'd like to introduce the advisory vote on the financial year '25 remuneration report, which all shareholders have had the opportunity to review. Your Board believes the remuneration arrangements, as outlined in the remuneration report are strategically aligned and drive high performance. The Board also believes it's awarded fair and reasonable incentive outcomes to the CEO and executive leadership team, having regard to the overall performance of Suncorp.

In setting our remuneration arrangements, we have a program of active engagement with institutional investors, proxy advisers and the Australian Shareholders' Association who are here today. And we also take into account informative feedback from shareholders more generally. We note that each director has a personal interest in their own remuneration from the company, as described in the remuneration report and the Board recommends shareholders vote in favor of this resolution.

I'm now going to put up on the screen, direct -- details of direct votes and proxies lodged prior to the AGM. People in the room should be able to see that, please? Belinda, are there any remuneration questions we received in advance of the meeting.

Thank you, Chairman. Yes, we have received a question from shareholder, Mr. Stuart Campbell, who asks, given the reduction in activities now transacted by Suncorp following the sale of the Banking and Life businesses, how does the Board support the level of remuneration paid the CEO given the reduced level of responsibility?

Thank you, Mr. Campbell. CEO roles in companies that are the size of Suncorp require an incredibly significant commitment. And the complexity of CEO roles has also increased more generally driven by the factors that was mentioned earlier today, economic pressures, technological disruption. And our CEO's remuneration is externally benchmarked each year to ensure that it's reasonable and competitive. Our People and Remuneration Committee, chaired by Sylvia Falzon on your right, determines the CEO's remuneration, having regard to the CEO's accountabilities and performance. And that Suncorp remains a large ASX-listed, highly-regulated organization. In fact, this year, we became subject to the financial accountability regime for our insurance business.

For the financial year '26, the CEO received no increase in fixed pay and there was no change to his target short-term incentive or long-term incentive opportunity. The CEO's maximum short-term incentive was adjusted to reflect maximum potential, what was happening at other companies post the introduction of CPS 511 and to drive -- further drive performance noting that any STI award above target will only be realized if the CEO outperforms challenging STI measures. Because of the application of CPS 511, which is a regulatory guidance note issued by APRA, 60% of any STI earned above target will be deferred over a 4- to 6-year period. Next question please, Belinda.

Thank you, Chairman. That concludes the questions received in advance for this item of business and we can now move to questions in the room.

Thank you. I think, Louisa, you have a question at microphone #2.

Yes. Chairman, may I please introduce John Wittington ASA, who is a proxy shareholder.

Madam Chair, it's John Wittington for the Shareholders' Association. As in previous years, the report is one of the better I have read and to a large degree, communicates the structure and outcome very well, uses good graphics and doesn't take interminable internal number of pages on unnecessary detail. We also commend you for this year, providing the history of short- and long-term incentive payout percentages on Page 64, as this is very helpful to retail shareholders to determine whether you're an easy or a hard marker. Well done to all of those involved.

I just want to pick up slightly on your last response. Last year, as part of APRA requirements, you reduced the CEO's short-term incentive from 150% of fixed pay to 100%. But at the same time, you offset it by increasing his long-term incentive from 100% of fixed pay to 150%. So even result. Next year, you'll be increasing, as you mentioned, the short-term incentive to 125% maximum.

Maximum opportunity.

But there is no offset reduction in the long-term incentive. This means that the CEO is getting a potential 25% pay increase. And I can understand your relativeness to the other, but that's a pretty substantial pay upside. What justified that?

Thanks, Mr. Whittington. And again, we did have the benefit of meeting with you and your colleagues ahead of the meeting. But for other shareholders, last year, when the CPS 511 requirements had to be met dictated by APRA, our regulator, we, like other companies, were looking at what we would need to do to our remuneration structure to enable us to comply with that. And there is a significant deferral component required in total remuneration to satisfy CPS 511.

We spun the pendulum, I think, a bit too far in relation to STI target and maximum and the feedback we got from certainly institutional shareholders and yourselves after that was where was the incentive for the upside. And so the People and Remuneration Committee, and I'll give Sylvia a chance to comment, did consider this and believe it's in the best interest of shareholders and fair given where our peers are to create a maximum STI opportunity of up to 125%, but target will remain at 100%. Sylvia, did you want to add anything? I probably said it all.

Thank you for the question. And to Christine's point, when we engaged with various shareholders, this was a question that they asked us, and in particular, when you look at the executive team that report through to Steve, their maximum potential is at 150. So the question was, will you have a CEO whose maximum potential is at 100, that it didn't seem that it was aligned in terms of outperformance.

So to Christine's point, we did overreach in making that decision in the first year, we had the benefit of also seeing what other organizations have done. And in relation to that, we were reflected on what is more appropriate and fair in terms of the remuneration arrangements for the CEO, hence the change.

Thanks, Sylvia. And also, Mr. Whittington, your comments on the quality of the Remuneration Report. Sylvia as Chair of the People and Remuneration Committee has been committed to that. So that was welcome feedback. Thank you.

Other questions in the room in relation to the Remuneration Report? We'll go on -- yes, Mr. [indiscernible]. You need to use the microphone. Is it in relation to the Remuneration Report?

Yes. I just going back to return of capital, which are obviously adjust some of the metrics? How do you compensate that took -- taken out of the remuneration part? Did I make myself clear or mumbling? What I'm trying to say is if we go by EPS, it would push it up and people use that to advantage their remuneration, how do you compensate for the effect it would have towards a remuneration?

We take account when we're setting our targets of what our capital strategies are. And you'll recall when we were selling the bank, we actually changed the metrics to...

It doesn't have any impact.

There's no impact.

There's no impact.

The capital had no impact on deciding what to reward Steve.

Right. Okay. I'm now going to go online.

Thank you, Chairman. We can confirm there are no questions on the phone lines, but we will have received some questions online, and we will now go there. We have received the first question from shareholder Louis Gomez, regarding remuneration question one. He asks, with regard to the STI metric cash return on tangible equity, why are the targets not released in advance? Most other companies of similar metrics do release their targets. Sun has only one serious competitor, which has its own metrics. This information is hardly commercially sensitive, and after releasing these targets, prevents shareholders from assessing progress in this metric and limits transparency in the assessment of this metric. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Gomez. We actually do believe this is commercially sensitive because it's a target that's set for something that's to occur 3 years out. And there's certainly sensitivity around actual and stretch targets. The threshold and stretch for the LTI having -- determined having regard for the 3-year business plan, cost of capital and investor expectations. And we do have a view that we will retrospectively disclose. And so you'll see what it was we set after the event, but we've taken the decision as a Board not to prospectively disclose. Other questions online?

That appears to complete the questions that we have received online.

As that addresses all the questions and comments on the remuneration report. I think, Sylvia, again, for your hard work in chairing that committee and producing that report. Would you please now vote using the voting card in the online portal, the Vote+ app or your paper voting card. If anyone needs any help with us, just put your hand up, we've got people here from the registry that can help you. There's one down here.

Details of direct votes and proxies lodged prior to the AGM in relation to this resolution are again on the screen. Taking into account the direct and proxy votes shown on the screen and the total number of shares being voted today, it appears resolution 1 will be passed.

I thank Sylvia for all of your efforts in the report. And now I'm going to go on to the next item of business, which is to seek shareholder approval for the grant of 149,024 performance rights to your CEO and Managing Director, Steve Johnston.

These performance rights will represent the CEO's long-term incentive remuneration for the financial year '26. The purpose of the long-term incentive allocation is to focus your CEO on Suncorp's long-term business strategy, align his interest with those of shareholders and support the creation of long-term shareholder value. As I mentioned earlier, CPS 511 requires long-term incentives to have both financial and nonfinancial measures. And as set out in the Notice of Meeting, Suncorp's performance measures are based on relative total shareholder return, cash return on tangible equity, relative customer Net Promoter Score, and relative trust and reputation. Further details are included in the Notice of Meeting, and the Board with Steve Johnston abstaining, recommends shareholders vote in favor of this resolution.

[Voting]

I'll now put up the details of direct votes and proxies lodged prior to the AGM in relation to this resolution and now on the screen. Would any shareholder here in Brisbane, who wishes to ask a question on this resolution. Now move to the nearest microphone. I don't think we have any questions in the room. So we'll see if there are any questions online on this matter.

Chairman, I can confirm there are no online or phone questions for this item of business.

Thank you. So given there are no questions on this resolution, we will now confirm that we can vote. So you have your voting cards. In the online portal, the Vote+ app or your paper voting guard. And as I mentioned, details of the direct votes and proxies lodged prior to the AGM in relation to this resolution are again shown on the screen.

Taking into account the direct and proxy votes on the screen, our total number of shares being voted today, it appears that resolution 2 will be passed.

The next 3 items of business are to consider the election and reelection of 3 members of your Board. If you're in the room and would like to ask a question on any of these items, please move to your nearest microphone.

First, as I mentioned earlier, David Whiteing seeks confirmation of his appointment to the Board through seeking election by shareholders today. To add to my earlier comments, David's technology-related experience is relevant for Suncorp's next chapter as a dedicated general insurer, enabled by significant technology investments and a major transformation program.

In addition, David's perspectives in relation to increasingly important matters such as cyber risk and data security, complement the existing skills of the Board. This includes helping Suncorp to respond to the requirements of CPS 230, another APRA regulatory guideline, as they relate to managing operational risks arising from Suncorp's outsourcing and supplier arrangements as well as David's strong connections to global technology providers. Additional detail is set out in the Notice of Meeting, including that the Board satisfied that David is an independent Non-Executive Director and we fully support his election today.

I'd now like to introduce David to speak further about his experience and commitment to Suncorp before inviting any questions on your election. Thanks, David.

Thank you, Chairman, and good afternoon, shareholders. This is my first Suncorp AGM, and I'm honored to be here seeking election to the Suncorp Group Board. It is an exciting time to be joining the company, particularly as we embark on this new chapter as a stand-alone trans-Tasman general insurer. Since joining the Board in February, I've been incredibly impressed by the way in which Suncorp has approached and prepared for this period of significant change.

During this time, I've also been able to contribute to the Board's consideration of the full set of capabilities required to successfully make its transition to be as prepared as possible for the future that will continue to be up by rapid change and uncertainty and to realize Suncorp's full growth potential.

I believe my experience gained over more than 30 years leading complex business and technology across multiple geographies and industry sectors, including financial services positions me well to deliver ongoing value to the Board and Suncorp's strategic direction, which is underpinned by key technology investments.

The global nature of my experience also allows me to bring diverse insights on emerging innovations in other markets and perspectives relevant to Suncorp's strategy and ambition. I have a strong understanding of the regulatory landscape and the constraints and challenges of the dynamic environment in which we operate. I take great pride in my forward-thinking leadership approach and ability to flex and adapt on any given agenda as required.

Given the pace of change we are dealing with, my expertise in large-scale business and technology transformation provides me a strong grounding on how technology can accelerate and underwrite strategic intent. And I believe my exposure to important matters such as cyber risk and data security, brings additional value to your board.

Finally, my holistic systems thinking approach that considers people, culture, policy and process continues to serve me well and underpins my strong track record in responsible decision making and governance. I believe that if reelected, these complementary skills and experience will assist the Board in providing effective oversight of Suncorp's growth aspirations in such a rapidly evolving landscape, and I trust I will have your support from my nomination to the Board. Thank you.

Details of direct votes and proxies lodged prior to the AGM in relation to David's election now appear on the screen. Belinda, did we have any questions received in advance related to David's reelection?

Thank you, Chairman. We have received a question in advance from a shareholder, Ms. Natasha Lee, who asks, while you have almost achieved your target of 40% women on the board, Overall, the Board seems lacking in other forms of diversity, and the focus should be not only on women on the Board, but having a board that better reflects the diversity of the community. Will the Board commit to ensuring greater diversity on Board?

Thank you, Ms. Lee. I think you can see that we have a track record of commitment to diversity. So perhaps given that I'm vacating the chair, I might give the incoming Chairman, Duncan West, an opportunity to comment on this. Your personal commitments.

Thanks, Christine. Certainly, I and the Board acknowledge that diversity extends beyond gender and includes a broad spectrum of attributes such as cultural background, age, and professional experience. Suncorp has a strong and long-standing commitment to diversity and inclusion, both at Board level and across the organization, and this is something I am committed to too. While gender balance remains a key focus reflected in our current female representative -- representation on the board and in senior leadership roles, we also recognize the importance of broader diversity in shaping effective governance and decision-making.

Board renewal, as we've mentioned earlier, is an ongoing process, and the appointment of future directors requires consideration of a range of factors to ensure that the collective composition of the Board is balanced with appropriate skills to effectively govern management's execution of Suncorp's strategic priorities.

Thanks, Duncan. Next question, please, Belinda.

Thank you, Chairman. Shareholder, Mr. Stuart Campbell asks, given the reduction in activities now transacted by Suncorp following the sale of the Banking and Life businesses, how does the Board support the current level of Board members and substantiate the increased quantum if director's fees being paid. Surely reduced size business requires less oversight and governance.

Thanks, Mr. Campbell. I think I did address this question earlier, but just to reconfirm that Suncorp has undergone a significant transformation journey over the past 5 years. But the environment we continue to operate in has significantly grown in complexity, from both an operating and a regulatory perspective. And this has added to the Board's workload despite the divestments that yesterday, I chaired my 112th Board meeting of Suncorp. So in addition to the introduction of the financial accountability regime, which comes with an increase in personal accountability on directors in financial services, there are challenges in attracting suitably qualified directors into the financial services industry.

So we must remain competitive on our fees. But I will highlight that our directors fees have remained unchanged since 2016, apart from the legislated increases in superannuation, although we did seek an increase in the potential fee pool last year so that we could facilitate an orderly renewal. When we look at Board composition, we really look through the lens of what the issues that we're addressing at the time. And I think I mentioned this in my earlier answer. So thank you. Is there any more questions Belinda?

Thank you, Chairman. That concludes the questions received in advance for this item of business, and we can now move to questions in the room.

Louisa, microphone #2.

Chairman, may I please introduce John Whittington, ASA, who is a proxy shareholder.

Madam Chair. The last one for your tenure.

Thank you, Mr. Whittington. That's good. [indiscernible].

The earlier question Ms. Lee sort of half took my first question, but I just wanted to clarify one thing is she suggested that gender diversity was a and not according to my calculations with the appointment of Mr. Whiteing, it no longer meets the 40% female target, and in fact, that's, we look for 40% female and 40% male. And we feel our departure is going to get worse. So certainly, I appreciate Mr. West's comments, and we'll be holding him to go in the future with keeping gender and other diversity moving forward.

Thanks, Mr. Whittington, and I can assure you, this entire Board is committed to ensuring that we maintain diversity. We've got 2 searches that are current in the market at the moment, and we will ensure that we -- by the time we're sitting in front of you at next year's AGM, we have achieved the back of the 40% target.

Okay. Madam Chair, it seems that Mr. Whiteing...

You said that was my last question.

Well, my last time up.

You last time up. How many questions Mr. Whittington?

Madam Chair, it seems that Mr. Whiteing has not yet acquired any Suncorp shares and Ms. Brown has not added to the taken shareholding she had last year. We would encourage both to increase their stake in the company earlier rather than leave it to the last minute. Indeed, if the company's growth prospects are set as described in the annual report, it would be better financially for them to do so sooner rather than later.

Well, Mr. Whittington, as I discussed with you when we met, our directors have up to 4 years to satisfy the minimum shareholding requirements. And David joined the Board in February and Gillian has only been here for, I think, coming up 2 years. But the -- to prescribe when people have to buy shares makes an assumption about two things. One is whether there's any sensitive information that they're privy to and they're precluded from trading. And the second is people's personal circumstances. So our view is that it provided the non-executive director to satisfy the requirement within the 4 years from the October following their appointment and comply with our requirement, which is equivalent to 100% of their base net fee then that is that suffices.

I wasn't suggesting you prescribe when they buy, I was just encouraging them to do so sooner rather than later.

I suspect they've got their own financial plan, but thanks, Mr. Whittington. Other questions in the room?

We've just got one more from the floor. Chairman, may I please introduce Rob [indiscernible], who is a shareholder.

Thanks, Mr. [indiscernible]. Now we're not -- we're now talking about the election of Mr. Whiteing.

I'd like to put my position in first about how I feel about technology. I personally don't trust it. And I see values in it like on the land system and from Internet point of view, the advertising and stuff like that. But I don't have faith, I don't -- I'm pretty -- well -- I know a bit about technology because I used to sort of work in that area. And like a lot of mentioned at last slide, previously when technology was introduced, it never relied, it gained efficiency internally. It never relied on making its profit from the consumer. And what I wanted to say is, I notice you -- it says that your forward thinking. What do you think of this plain thing, and then they ask people to vote.

That's a different question to a technology question.

Well, it is technology because I made inquiries with Computershare and Link Market, MUFG and they said that I can interface with the display you've here. I think I mentioned it about 2 years ago to you, and all we need is for them to sit on a panel and there's no need for you people to know the votes at all. And when you put up your display, they can interface with the display of the vote. The only concession, I believe, when it comes with the resolution is possibly you need updated information during a merger and takeover. So I'll ask him whether David agrees that we have the skill, the technology to do that.

I might answer the question if I can because David is incredibly knowledgeable and experienced in technology, but just the issue with the display of the votes. It's actually best practice now, as Mr. Mayne pointed out before.

You people are pushing technology on the consumers and everyone and I'm trying to push technology on new people to use all the functionality that's available.

And we get the data that's put up, it's verified. So the data that's put up is for the benefit of shareholders in the room to know that those shareholders -- how those shareholders and proxyholders who are not in the room have voted. And the other thing with technology, Mr. [indiscernible] is we now have 549 people online participating in this AGM and that's 549 people who presumably couldn't travel to Brisbane. So this is something that's valued by many of our shareholders.

I'll go along with that technology. But I'm saying as far as I can for my better research on the technology capability, there is no need anymore for you people to be updated regularly during voting system. On my understanding, what I've researched is that you can bring up the registry company and ask them how the votes are coming in. And then it just improves transparency because from what I can understand, you can ring up someone and say, please change your vote, things aren't going along as we were hoping to.

Like I said, I'll make a concession for mergers and takeovers because you need to have a bit of an idea. So do you...

I would just note your comments, Mr. [indiscernible].

I'll ask do you agree that we have the technology to do what I suggested today but I am asking.

We have the technology. On how we use the technology is really a decision for the Board, and we note your comments.

So you do not like transparency, better transparency.

I think we are incredibly transparent. That's why we're putting the votes up, and they are -- all of the numbers are verified by our registry. Thank you.

Thank you, Chairman. I can confirm that there are no online or phone questions for this item of business.

Thank you, Belinda. As that addresses all questions and comments on David's election, would you please now vote using the voting card in the online portal, the Vote+ app or your paper voting card?

Details of direct votes and proxies lodged prior to the AGM in relation to David's election are now showing somewhat controversially it seems on the screen. Taking into account the direct and proxy vote shown on the screen and the total number of shares being voted today, it appears this resolution will be passed. Congratulations, David.

I'll now move to the reelection of Ian Hammond. As I mentioned earlier, Ian has an extensive knowledge of financial services industry and expertise in financial reporting and risk management. I'd particularly like to acknowledge his significant contribution as Chair of the Audit Committee. During his tenure, Ian has played a crucial role in the sale of Suncorp Bank in New Zealand Life, the business interruption response post-COVID and the introduction of IFRS 17. More detail is set out in the Notice of Meeting.

Ian joined your Board in 2018, and he is seeking reelection for his third and final term. I and Ian's fellow directors are fully supportive of him standing for reelection today. I'll now invite Ian to speak about his experience and continued commitment to Suncorp.

Thank you, Chairman, and good afternoon, fellow shareholders. Thank you for participating in the meeting. It has been a privilege to serve you since joining Suncorp's Board in 2018. And with my -- the support of my fellow directors, I'm pleased to offer myself for reelection for another term. I am both a shareholder and a customer of Suncorp, and I believe I make a valuable contribution through my extensive experience in financial services industry and my expertise in financial and risk management.

As Christine said, I'm currently the Chairman of the Board's Audit Committee and a member of the Risk Committee. I have spent a significant proportion of my career providing assurance and advisory services to a large number of Australian and international insurance companies, particularly during the 26 years I spent as a partner of PwC, which included leading the audit of some of Australia's largest financial institutions.

I have also held a number of non-executive director roles on the boards of both large ASX-listed companies as well as community organizations, exposing me to a broad range of perspectives across a diverse group of stakeholders. I am privileged to Chair Mission Australia, a role that brings me closer to the everyday challenges being faced by some of the most disadvantaged and vulnerable members of our communities.

Through the delivery of major social housing projects right across Australia, I'm also afforded key insights into the construction, home repair and home maintenance industries, which are important parts of Suncorp's supply chain, particularly as we support customers impacted by extreme weather. I'm only too aware of the critical nature of this work having visited Suncorp's customers, for example, in Brisbane and the Gold Coast impacted by ex-Tropical Cyclone Alfred.

Looking ahead, I am encouraged by the customer focus of Suncorp's strategy, which at its core aims to address the complex challenges of insurance affordability and accessibility. The measured adoption of technology will underpin Suncorp's future, and it is a responsibility, I don't take lightly as a member of your Board. On that front, I am keen I have a keen interest in digital and technology trends and spend considerable time both here and abroad gaining contemporary insights on advancements in this space.

I look forward to continuing to serve you, our shareholders and would appreciate your support today.

Thank you, Ian. I'll now put up the details of direct votes and proxies lodged prior to the AGM in relation to Ian's reelection, and you should now see them on the screen. Would any shareholder here in Brisbane, who wishes to ask a question on this resolution, please move to the nearest microphone? We have no questions in the room, Belinda on Ian's reelection. Do we have any questions on this resolution online or via the phone line?

Thank you, Chairman. We have no questions on the phone line. However, we have received a question via the online platform. The question comes from shareholder, Mr. Stephen Mayne. Ian Hammond reelection question. I am puzzled. While there was a modest 7.9% vote against in Hammond's reelections on the proxies, which were commendably disclosed early. So such a question can be asked. Did one of the proxy advisers recommend against Ian's reelection. And if so, what grounds did they cite? Did Ian or the chair engage directly with any of the owners of the $1 billion-plus worth of shares, which are voted against his reelection today in order to understand their concerns and persuade them to change their vote?

Thank you, Mr. Mayne. All proxy advisers recommended voting for the reelection of Ian Hammond, with almost 92% voting in favor, which is a resounding positive. And as I mentioned earlier, Ian has been an effective and committed director for Suncorp and conducts himself with the utmost professionalism. He's chaired the Audit Committee through a challenging period. One of the earlier questions today when I talked through the various simplification steps that we've gone through, Ian at the helm with the Audit Committee has been extraordinary.

The small number of votes against were for a variety of reasons. And we do meet with all institutional share -- or we offer to meet with many institutional shareholders ahead of the AGM. And where -- we don't seek to influence how investors vote, but we're giving investors the opportunity to ask questions as we indeed do with the Australian Shareholders' Association. Thank you.

Thank you, Chairman. That concludes the questions received by the online platform for this item of business.

Thanks, Belinda. As that addresses all the questions and comments on Ian's reelection, would you please now vote using the online voting card in the online portal, the Vote+ App or your paper voting card. Details of direct votes and proxies lodged prior to the AGM in relation to Ian's reelection are again shown on the screen.

Taking into account the direct and proxy votes shown on the screen and the total number of shares being voted here today, it appears this resolution will be passed. Congratulations, Ian and thank you for [indiscernible].

The final item of business, getting close to lunch, is to consider the reelection of Sally Herman. As I mentioned, when introducing Sally, she brings to Suncorp strong expertise in running retail banking and insurance products, setting strategy for financial services businesses and working customers, shareholders, regulators and government. Sally has been a director since 2015, was Chairman of the Risk Committee for 6 years and chaired Suncorp's Board Customer Committee when it was first established. Sally has invaluable corporate memory of the Board's deliberations and has been a tireless contribution to our Board and committee discussions. The Board and I can attest that she can conduct herself with clear independence of judgment. Sally is seeking reelection for her fourth and final term to facilitate measured Board renewal which, as I mentioned earlier, is extremely important. I and Sally's fellow directors are delighted to support her reelection and delighted that she has agreed to stand.

Sally, I'll now invite you to speak to your commitment to Suncorp.

Good afternoon, fellow shareholders. It's an honor to stand before you today seeking your continued support for my reelection at the Suncorp Group Board of Directors for as the Chair says my final term. Since joining the Board in October 2015, I've been privileged to serve our shareholders through one of the most transformative periods in our history. As part of a dedicated trans-Tasman insurer, I am more committed than ever to helping to guide this organization to continue to deliver sustainable long-term value creation. As the Chair said, I'm a current member of the Risk Committee and until the end of 2023, I had the privilege of chairing that committee during a period of unprecedented challenge and change.

In this role, I oversaw the risk management framework that guided us through the successful bank sale completion and the effective management of the transitional arrangements, major natural hazard events, including the devastating 2022 East Coast floods and subsequent extreme weather events, where strong risk management was critical to supporting our customers and communities. Our evolving regulatory landscape and rapidly changing digital environment, including strengthening our cybersecurity and defense against increasingly sophisticated cyber threats. And our approach to climate change adaptation, integrating climate risk considerations into our strategic planning and operational frameworks.

I do bring to Suncorp deep expertise gained over more than 3 decades in financial services, including over 15 years Board experience in financial services organizations with a particular focus on governance, regulation and compliance. 16 years with the Westpac Group, where I ran large business units across institutional and retail banking, wealth management and insurance and also executive experience in Australia and the United States which provided me with very diverse perspectives on financial services markets and exposure to leading complex transformations and navigating crisis periods, including the global financial crisis.

I do believe this experience supports my reelection and importantly, enables me to continue to provide continuity on the Board while we undertake Board renewal that the Chairman has talked about. This will ensure that your company maintains the highest standards of governance and strategy oversight as we execute our strategic plan.

I want to take a moment to thank Christine McLoughlin for her outstanding leadership of the Suncorp Board. She is the person of the highest integrity and with a deep commitment to our shareholders, employees and customers. She's led by example, always going into communities affected by natural disasters to support both our customers and the Suncorp team on the ground.

On a personal note, I have loved working with Christine and wish her every success.

Thank You, Sally.

I am energized by the opportunities ahead and will be honored to continue to serve shareholders in the next chapter for Suncorp. Thank you for your confidence, and I respectfully ask for your vote.

Thank you, Sally, and thank you also for your very generous, kind words. Details of direct votes and proxies lodged prior to the AGM in relation to Sally's reelection, now appear on the screen. Would any shareholder here in Brisbane, who wishes to ask a question on this resolution now I move to the nearest microphone. Belinda, that appears to show there are no questions in the room. So do we have any questions on this resolution online or via the phone?

Thank you, Chairman. We have no questions on the phone, but we do have an online question received. It comes from shareholder, Mr. Stephen Mayne. Sally Herman is the nominee director of premier investments on the Breville Board. Could Sally please comment whether she's in regrets about the way she and her colleagues on the Premier Board played the Myer situation as it all went to a pear shape at Myer this week? Please do so we can only talk about Suncorp matters today. Director CVs matter for shareholders, particularly given the index investing in compulsory super forces, millions of Australians to be exposed to the performance of all ASX 200 directors.

Thanks, Mr. Mayne, and I am going to disappoint you because it is totally inappropriate at a Suncorp Annual General Meeting with Suncorp shareholders to quote on the deliberations or actions of other companies. So please ensure that questions are relevant to Suncorp. Are there other questions online?

Chairman, that concludes the questions received via the online platform for this item of business.

That addresses all of the questions and comments on Sally's reelection. No, I'm sorry. No. Microphone #1, who we got [indiscernible].

I've been very surprised.

Sorry, what is your name?

I'm Anna Day.

Anna Day. Thank you, Anna.

Former journalist, now retired. But what I've really noticed here is all these brilliant women here and it's been really extraordinary for me to see. I don't know why Suncorp hasn't been getting these people on television so that the world knows that women can have these high positions. Is there a policy in the company not to put the women forward?

No. Ms. Day is not a policy in the company. I think though we don't actually see it as the role of the Board to be putting ourselves on television. That's the role of the CEO and the leadership team.

So therefore, CEO.

Well, I think there's a number of them in the front row there.

And they're quite often on the television. But no, it is, Suncorp does have a very strong cohort of women on the Board, in the leadership team and in fact, across our operations. Whenever I'm visiting teams on the ground when there is disasters, we're always very well represented by our men and our women. Thank you.

So I think that's all the questions on Sally's reelection. So please now vote using the voting card in the online portal, the Vote+ app or your paper voting card. Details of direct votes and proxies votes prior to the AGM in relation to Sally's reelection are again shown on the screen.

Taking into account the direct and proxy vote shown on the screen and the total number of shares being voted today, it appears this resolution will be passed. Congratulations and thank you, Sally.

So I can now confirm that a total of 553 shareholders, proxyholders and other attendees joined us today throughout today's proceedings. So thank you for taking the time to do that because that really reinforces the value you see in AGMs. Belinda, before we move on, do we have any shareholder questions that have not been addressed during the meeting?

Chairman, I can confirm there are no further questions or comments to be addressed during this meeting.

So that concludes the business of the meeting. The poll will remain open for a further 5 minutes to enable you to complete and submit your online or paper voting card. And if you're here in Brisbane and need assistance with your voting card, please see one of the team members. And if you're online and need assistance, please contact the share registry's online AGM support team on 1 (800) 990-363. Once the share registry has counted the votes cast during the meeting, the results of the poll will be announced via the ASX later today and will also be available on the Suncorp website. A replay of today's AGM webcast will also be available on our website.

I would now like to invite Duncan West to make some brief comments as Chairman Elect, and then we'll all go and have a cup of tea.

Thank you, Chairman, and good afternoon, everyone. I'm very conscious that I stand between you and the very fine sausage rolls outside. So I will keep this pretty short.

It's a pleasure to be with you here and have the opportunity to address you as the incoming Chairman of Suncorp. As a proudly Queensland-based company with a strong retail shareholder footprint in this state, I would like to extend a special thank you to our Queensland-based shareholders, including those here today in the room. We value your loyalty.

It is an enormous privilege to be taking on this position at such an important time for Suncorp. As a member of the Suncorp Board since 2021, I have been at Suncorp's material transformation journey to date. And I am enthusiastic about the opportunities that lie ahead for Suncorp in our new chapter as a stand-alone trans-Tasman general insurer.

Having worked in financial services, including the insurance industry for more than 40 years, I deeply understand the critical importance of insurance to the economy and our communities, and the vital role Suncorp plays in supporting our customers when the unexpected happens.

As you heard through the Chairman and CEO's addresses earlier, Suncorp is well positioned to build on its exceptionally strong foundations to drive further momentum and efficiencies and deliver the benefits of being a profitable, well capitalized and customer-focused business that can invest in the future and create value for all our stakeholders across the Tasman. Importantly, this position also provides us an enhanced ability to address some of the very real challenges our customers, communities and the industry continue to face when it comes to insurance affordability and accessibility and the impacts of climate change. These urgent issues are at the core of our strategy and will remain a priority for your Board together with our executive leadership team including through our advocacy with government, regulators, the industry and communities.

On a personal level, I am committed to serve you, our shareholders and have taken steps to ensure that I have the time and capacity to give the role the attention it deserves.

I'm also very appreciative of our important Queensland heritage and the commitments we have made to the Queensland government and wider community. And with my Board colleagues, Steve Johnston and his team, we will continue to respect this.

Finally, I would like to join the CEO and my Board colleagues in acknowledging the significant contribution of our outgoing Chairman, Christine McLoughlin. On behalf of my fellow directors and all shareholders, Christine, thank you for your leadership and dedication to Suncorp. Under your stewardship, and together with our CEO, you have led Suncorp through periods of unprecedented challenges and supported the company's evolution in line with changing customer and community expectations and fast-paced workforce and technological changes. Importantly, this has been done with a deep consideration for all our stakeholders. I look forward to building on your legacy and those before you with a focus on driving long-term sustainable growth and shareholder value through the delivery of positive outcomes for our customers and communities across Australia and New Zealand.

Thank you, and I hope to meet as many of you as possible following the conclusion of the meeting.

With that, I'll now hand back to the Chairman.

Thank you, Duncan. As that now concludes the business of the meeting, I declare the meeting closed. And I'd like to take this final opportunity to thank all of you, our shareholders, for your support. It's been a great privilege to serve on your Board or past decade, including as your Chairman for 7 years. I wish Duncan, Steve and the Board well as they guide Suncorp through its next chapter. And I will continue to be a shareholder and a customer.

For those of you here at the physical AGM in Brisbane, light refreshments will be available in the foyer, and all of your Board and leadership team will come out and have an opportunity to ask further questions and just -- we'll just say hello. So thank you so much for taking the time to come in and join us today for this important meeting. Goodbye.