Banking tellers of truth and obfuscation

Some witnesses struggled, some survived and some shined. We rate the banking royal commission performances.

Macquarie CEO Nicholas Moore in the box at the Royal Commission.

To put it in terms bankers will understand, recent theatrics at the Hayne royal commission resulted in a clear leaderboard of effective performers — and those who struggled.

The performance review comes after senior counsel assisting Rowena Orr QC and lieutenant Michael Hodge QC put most attendees through their paces by questioning versions of events and their accountability for a string of bank scandals.

The wooden spoon goes to Commonwealth Bank chairman Catherine Livingstone, whose constant sparring with Ms Orr, memory lapses and inability to answer questions directly didn’t leave her in good stead.

“I’m just not sure about my memory,” Ms Livingstone said on day two of the hearings, saying several times she couldn’t recall whether she challenged management at an October or December board meeting in 2016, and events around that time.

The following day she clarified matters but board minutes did not document her questioning management on breaches of anti-money-laundering and terrorism-financing laws.

“To the best of my recollection, it was at the October board meeting that I challenged management in relation to the anti-money-laundering/counter-terrorism-financing reports,” Ms Livingstone added, admitting she hadn’t sought the reports to investigate.

Commonwealth Bank Chairman Catherine Livingstone leaves the Royal Commission on Wednesday. Pictures: Hollie Adams

There were repeated attempts by Ms Livingstone to say that after joining the board in March, 2016, it took her many months to get across CBA’s list of compliance red flags.

CBA chief Matt Comyn fared better than his chairman but he also admitted several failures under his watch, including not properly understanding the anti-money-laundering obligations that got his retail bank division into hot water.

Documents tendered showed Mr Comyn went to some lengths to do the right thing on consumer credit insurance, but didn’t take the matter to the board. That was after the commission was shown his handwritten notes from a meeting with Mr Narev where he wrote that he was told by his boss to “temper your sense of justice”.

Commonwealth Bank CEO Matt Comyn. Picture: Hollie Adams

It was the line that defined the week as the blame game began. Ms Livingstone, under rapid-fire questioning, kept it going by noting former chairman David Turner had declined a request to return 40 per cent of his fees as an accountability measure.

After Mr Comyn it was the corporate regulator’s James Shipton on the bottom-up leaderboard. He raised the ire of Ms Orr, and was often flustered and long-winded in his responses. Commissioner Kenneth Hayne interjected several times to clarify his answers.

In one instance the commissioner said: “ASIC should know what it alleges. There should be no controversy about either what is alleged or what is admitted”.

Westpac’s chief Brian Hartzer fared reasonably OK, despite he and Mr Hodge being involved in several heated exchanges, culminating in Mr Hartzer dodging a question on dealership finance by exclaiming: “I couldn’t say. I’m not a car dealer.”

Westpac CEO Brian Hartzer. Picture: AAP

Macquarie Group chief Nicholas Moore, who retires on November 30, came across as the poster boy of proceedings as he spoke of the lessons learned from his rogue retail stockbrokers. Probing on his advisers’ behaviour was limited.

Despite his easy passage, Mr Moore had prepared for all eventualities. He had hired security guards to accompany him out of the building to a waiting car.

A shouting older bank customer was ejected from proceedings on Friday, rounding out the week’s theatrics and shifting the spotlight to a new set of actors.