CBA chair Catherine Livingstone to face bank committee grilling

The parliamentary committee that grills the major bank chiefs has reached further into the industry’s boardrooms.

CBA chairwoman Catherine Livingstone. Picture: Britta Campion.

The parliamentary committee that grills the major bank chief ­executives has reached further into the industry’s boardrooms, calling Commonwealth Bank chairwoman Catherine Living­stone as a witness next month.

Ms Livingstone and CEO Ian Narev will appear before the house economics committee, which is chaired by Liberal MP David Coleman, on October 20.

The move to call Ms Livingstone is unprecedented. Only CEOs have previously appeared.

However, CBA announced at the height of the Austrac money laundering scandal last month that Mr Narev would leave CBA by June next year, as part of the bank’s succession planning.

An industry source said: “So this comes down to a continuity issue. You have the chair before the committee, as well, so that questions can be answered that go beyond the tenure of the current CEO.’’

Next month’s hearings will be the third grilling for the major bank CEOs. National Australia Bank will appear on the same day as CBA. Westpac and ANZ face the music on October 11.

Industry submissions on draft legislation for the punishing Banking Executive Accountability Regime are due at the end of week, and are likely to feature prominently in the hearings.

The Turnbull government has aggravated the banks by allowing them just one week to respond to the draft, which proposes to defer almost half the pay of bank executives for four years and to expose their employers to fines of up to $210 million.

Scott Morrison yesterday defended the short turnaround time.

“They (the banks) saw it last Friday, and we had the consultation on the specific proposals for the legislation back in July. It was flagged in the (May) budget,” the Treasurer told ABC radio.

“This is one of the oldest tricks in the book — I know it’s a quick turnaround but I’m not mucking around.

“The Australian people expect us to take action now on this and I have full confidence the final touches will be sorted out in the course of this week.

“I know the banks don’t want a lot of these things to be in there, but I’m not going to give them three months to make a case why they shouldn’t be in there. They’re going in.

“We have been cracking on this since February this year.”

The Coleman committee will also have to tread warily around the Austrac issue as Federal Court proceedings are already under way.

The financial intelligence agency has alleged multiple breaches by CBA of anti-money laundering legislation.

And with Mr Morrison foreshadowing the BEAR legislation will apply from July 1 next year, executive accountability is also likely to emerge as an issue.

Last week, along with the $3.8 billion sale of its life insurance business and a potential float of its global asset management business, CBA announced the departure of its wealth boss Annabel Spring by the end of the year. Mr Narev denied her departure was an accountability measure.