Sally Loane says she never considered quitting after horror bank inquiry grilling

Former journalist Sally Loane says she never considered resigning after her excruciating turn in Ken Hayne’s hot seat.

Financial Services Council boss Sally Loane in the banking royal commission hot seat. Picture: Supplied

Financial Services Council boss Sally Loane says she never considered resigning after her horror interrogation as a witness at the royal commission into financial sector misconduct.

In her first public comments since last month’s appearance in the witness box, Ms Loane said she “never once” thought about giving up the high-profile job.

In a performance described as a “trainwreck” and “career limiting,” Ms Loane was unable to answer general questions about the industry and was admonished by counsel assisting the commission Rowena Orr. Members of the FSC, which includes the wealth management arms of the big banks, life insurers as well as AMP and Perpetual, have been accused of systematically breaking the law and resolving conflicts of interest against the interest of clients. Earlier this month, the Life Code Compliance Committee, which was launched by the FSC to oversee the life insurance industry, corrected some of Ms Loane’s evidence.

Ms Loane, who has been CEO of the FSC for four years and is on an open-ended contract rumoured to pay $500,000 a year, said the appearance at the royal commission was a “tough day at the office” but she “went back to work the next day.

“And trust me there is nothing much more difficult than either being on the front page of The Australian or the business pages or in front of royal commission. It doesn’t get much harder than that,” Ms Loane said at a panel discussion on female business leaders for The Deal, a magazine published in The Australian.

Financial Services Council CEO speaking at The Australian's schools event today. Picture: Hollie Adams

“It’s not easy when you are a CEO because you have to do hard things, you really do.

“You have to make hard decisions and you have to show up for really difficult things.”

The former newspaper journalist and ABC broadcaster defended her inability to answer questions by saying that none of her 25 staff experts were allowed to take the stand to provide technical details.

“The royal commission said ‘No, you must appear. We don’t want to have your technical expert’”

“You have to get across everything. Now that is almost impossible and being a former journalist I knew that was going to be a hard day at the office even before I got to the office.

“Never once would I consider resigning or not getting back on the horse.”

To an audience of schoolgirls in Sydney today, Ms Loane credited her resilience to her days as a young girl helping her father muster on horseback.

“My dad was an old bushy and he said to me every time I fell off — that hard ground, I was crying, all I wanted to do was walk home — He said, Sally get back on the horse and ride. And that’s what has stuck with me all these years.

“You will come a cropper, things will happen to you in your life that you think you can’t recover from … but you need to get back on that horse”