In a celebration of Australia’s pivot to more Pacific engagement, an Order of Australia gong goes to former Westpac director Steve Harker, who provided so much support for Samoa’s finance sector with his offshore super fund.

Harker was a man ahead of his time. When he moved to London with BZW in the 1990s, he says to avoid double taxation, parent company Barclays insisted that he set up a super fund in Samoa, SJH No. 2, which was too complicated to unravel when he returned to Australia to head Morgan Stanley.