The Federal Treasurer, Scott Morrison has pointed to Government knowledge of further executive exits from the Commonwealth Bank in the wake of recent scandals including yesterday’s $700 million settlement of the AUSTRAC Anti-Money Laundering and Counter Terrorism Financing action.
Speaking to media in reaction to the $700 million settlement, Morrison claimed there had been significant change within the bank with more change to come.
“Already what we have seen at CBA and internally is there’s been a very significant change in who is running all of these areas in that organisation,” he said. “I mentioned before that people have gone, some people are still yet to leave, and those changes are being made at the CBA and it’s for them to discuss the reasons behind those.”
The Treasurer said he believed the Commonwealth Bank’s actions were necessary for it to rebuild trust and pointed to the availability of the Bank Executive Accountability Regime (BEAR) in the event of future failures.
“The Banking Executive Accountability Regime comes in on 1 July, and that will ensure that going forward that these issues get the appropriate accountability applied to them within banking organisations,” Morrison said.
He described the BEAR as being signature Government legislation “introduced to deal with what was ultimately at the heart of this problem, and that is individual executives and individual board members for that matter, not living up to their accountabilities for what was happening in these institutions”.
“So, that’s the law as of 1 July and I know it is already dramatically changing how these matters are being dealt with within inside the major banks,” Morrison said.
