The royal commission that Liberal MP for Cook and Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison, along with the rest of his government, fought so hard to prevent delivers another damning report.....
Monday 27 August 2018
Financial Services Royal Commission delivers its Round 5 report
The royal commission that Liberal MP for Cook and Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison, along with the rest of his government, fought so hard to prevent delivers another damning report.....
Financial
Review, 24
August 2018:
NAB and Commonwealth
Bank have been lashed in a 200-pagedocument published by the Hayne royal commission that details thousands of
breaches of the law including the Corporations Act, the Superannuation Industry
Supervision (SIS) Act and the ASIC Act – some of which carry criminal
penalties.
Counsel assisting the
Hayne royal commission Michael Hodge QC has said it is open to the Commissioner
to make these findings against the banks in a blockbuster closing statement
published just before 7pm on Friday evening.
The two banks are not
alone, with open findings also delivered against AMP
for breaches of the Corporations Act and the SIS Act, against IOOF for
breaches of the ASIC Act and the SIS Act, against Suncorp for breaches of the
Corporations Act, the ASIC Act and the SIS Act, and against ANZ for breaches of
the Corporations Act.
Open findings of law
breaches have also been delivered in relation to case studies that were not
heard in public with Westpac and AON Hewitt sized up for breaches of
the Corporations Act.
NAB and Commonwealth
Bank have been singled out, however, for repeated and systemic
breaches of laws which included NAB's inability to notify ASIC of breaches of
licence conditions under Sections 912D of the Corporations Act and CBA's
13,000-fold breach of the SIS Act.
NAB came in for a
spectacular serve from counsel assisting the Hayne royal commission, who
described the bank's negotiations with ASIC over the fees for no service
scandal as "ethically unsound" as it tried to substitute services it
promised to provide with services it did provide.
Mr Hodge also said the
bank was engaged in unconscionable conduct over the charging of fees and its
attempts to weasel out of repayments despite knowing the "fee should never
have been charged to members and was not adequately disclosed".
NAB
chief customer offer Andrew Hagger was singled out for his dealings
with the regulator over the fees for no service scandal which counsel assisting
said revealed "disrespect for the role of the regulator and a disregard
for the gravity of the events".
Counsel assisting
submitted that "no reasonable person would believe that NAB's
communications with ASIC" over the matter that would see NAB on the hook
for almost $90 millin in refunds were "open and transparent" -
despite the bank's attempts to characterise its actions as just that.
In addition, the systems
and controls the bank had to monitor the provision of advice were
either not adequate, non-existent or ineffective according to
the savage take-down……
Much of the bank's
offending related to its inability to move more than 13,000 super fund members
to low-fee MySuper accounts after January 1, 2014 - leaving them in higher-fee
paying accounts instead. The bank's communications with members about the issue
was described as misleading by counsel assisting, with the bank's witness
accepting the description during the hearings.
CBA's platform operator
Aventeos also was the subject of open findings for the charging of dead
customers for financial advice, a practice counsel assisting said was in breach
of Section 52 of the SIS Act.
The lengthy document
will add even more fuel to the fire that has singed the for profit super sector
following revelations they have charged customers more than $1 billion in fees
they have never provided, including to dead
customers, and then lied to regulators about it.
The prospect of criminal
charges was first raised by Commissioner Hayne himself when he asked NAB's
superannuation trustee Nicole Smith "Did you think yourself taking the
money to which there as no entitlement raised a question of criminal
law?"
Diversified financial
services company AMP - which was excoriated
for its dealings with the regulator in the second round of hearings
- was exposed for an arrangement that saw its superannuation trustee
contracting out services it was meant to undertake to other arms of the
business.
During the hearings it
was revealed the arrangement, which oversaw $100 billion in retirement savings
spread over the accounts of 2.5 million members, meant AMP's trustee was unable
to lookout for its members by stopping AMP from gouging account holders or
looking for another service provider….
Read the full
article here.
Labels:
banks and bankers,
royal commission
Luke Hartsuyker? Luke Hartsuyker? Think I recall that name
Luke Hartsuyker Image: Greater Springfield Daily Record |
NSW National Party MP for Cowper Luke Hartsuyker is retiring at the next federal election.
He has been a
member of the federal parliament since 2001 and is a clear example of a man
rising to the level of his own political incompetence.
Hartsuyker has briefly
held one ministerial and three assistant ministerial positions since entering parliament – the last ending in March this year:
Assistant
Minister for Employment from 18.9.13 to 21.9.15 (2 years).
Minister
for Vocational Education and Skills from 21.9.15 to 18.2.16 (less than 5
months).
Assistant
Minister to the Deputy Prime Minister from 19.7.16 to 20.12.17 (17 months).
Assistant
Minister for Trade, Tourism and Investment from 20.12.17 to 5.3.18 (less than 3
months).
Hartsuyker
was Deputy Leader of the Nationals in the House of Representatives from 18.9.13
to 18.2.16 (approximately 2 years & 4 months).
By the time the next federal election rolls
around Luke Hartsuyker will have been in the Australian Parliament for 17
years, yet the best his party could say of him when he announced his intention
to resign was to list as his achievements work
largely done by other politicians.
I am sure
there are parts of the Cowper electorate where his name barely registers with
local residents and one has to suspect it won't take too many years before the only way he is remembered is as an obscure name on weathered building dedication plaques.
Sunday 26 August 2018
Waiting for home care in Australia in 2018
There are now 108,000 older Australians on the
waiting list for Home Care Packages.
On this list
are individuals who have:
*
not yet been approved for home care;
*
been previously assessed and approved, but who have not yet been assigned a
home care package; or
* are receiving care at an interim level
awaiting assignment of a home care package at their approved level.
Waiting time
is calculated from the date of a home care package approval and this is not a
an ideal situation, given package approval times range from est. 27 to 98 days
and the time taken to approve high level home care packages is now than twelve
months - with actual delivery dates occurring at least 12 months later on average.
Labor’s Shadow
Minister for Ageing and Mental Health issued a statement which pointed out that
“With
the waiting list growing by almost 4,000 older Australians in just three
months, the 3,500 new home care packages a year committed in the Budget won’t
come close to keeping pace with demand”.
With more
than half the applications for permanent entry into residential aged care taking
more than 3 and up to 8 months to be met, this is not going to be a go-to first
option in any solution for this lengthy home care waiting list - even if enough older people could be persuaded to give up the last of their independnce and autonomy.
By June 2017
New South Wales had the largest number of persons on the home care waiting
lis at 30,685.
Given the
high number of residents over 60 years of age in regional areas like the the
Northern Rivers, this waiting list gives pause for thought.
Then there is
this side effect of the waiting list and home care start dates identified by Leading
Age Care Services Australia (LAGSA):
Consumers with unmet
needs and unspent funds
LASA has undertaken an extensive review of the
disparity that exists in the current release of HCP assignments, noting that
there are substantial numbers of consumers on HCPs with either unmet needs or unspent
funds . This bimodal distribution of home care package assignments reflects a
mismatch between consumer package assignment and a consumer’s current care
needs. The mismatch appears to be a function of the extended lapse of time that
exists between approval assessments and package assignments. Until this dynamic
is sufficiently addressed by Government, LASA expects that providers will be
faced with a unique set challenges in 2018 when providing care to HCP
consumers. This is likely to increase the need for regular care plan reviews in
the context of unmet needs and unspent funds. This dynamic could be considered
more closely within the context of developing a single assessment workforce.
Thus far Australian Minister for Aged Care and Liberal MP for Hasluck Ken
Wyatt is offering no insight into federal government thinking on this
issue.
Sources:
The American Resistance has many faces and this is just one of them……(23)
Image: C-Span US television network |
Text
of open letter to US President Donald J.
Trump by William H. McRaven, a
retired Navy admiral, who was commander of the U.S. Joint Special Operations
Command from 2011 to 2014. He oversaw the 2011 Navy SEAL raid in Pakistan that
killed al-Qaida leader Osama bin Laden. Published in The Washington Post on 16 August
2018:
Dear
Mr. President:
Former CIA Director John
Brennan, whose security clearance you revoked Wednesday, is one of the finest
public servants I have ever known. Few Americans have done more to protect this
country than John. He is a man of unparalleled integrity, whose honesty and
character have never been in question, except by those who don’t know him.
Therefore, I would
consider it an honor if you would revoke my security clearance as well, so I
can add my name to the list of men and women who have spoken up against your
presidency.
Like most Americans, I
had hoped that when you became president, you would rise to the occasion and
become the leader this great nation needs.
A good leader tries to
embody the best qualities of his or her organization. A good leader sets the
example for others to follow. A good leader always puts the welfare of others
before himself or herself.
Your leadership,
however, has shown little of these qualities. Through your actions, you have
embarrassed us in the eyes of our children, humiliated us on the world stage
and, worst of all, divided us as a nation.
If you think for a
moment that your McCarthy-era tactics will suppress the voices of criticism,
you are sadly mistaken. The criticism will continue until you become the leader
we prayed you would be.
Labels:
Donald Trump,
US politics
Saturday 25 August 2018
Who do we blame as matters go from bad to worse over the next eight months in Australia?
The country is being crippled by the effects of drought and basic food prices will soon begin to rise, while at the same time wages growth remains stagnant. Cost cutting by successive Coalition federal governments is impacting service delivery on everything from health and welfare through to national broadband connectivity.
The federal government is still a policy-free zone with regard to energy and climate change due to toxic infighting between members of the Liberal Party of Australia which, along with its coalition partner the National Party, has an ideological inability to drag itself into the 21st century to face the consequences of ongoing land degradation and water insecurity.
Australia now has a new prime minister, but this situation is unlikely to change as the hard right remains holding the reins of government.
The next federal election is still over eight months away.
So who do we blame for the situation the country finds itself in between now and the election?
Take your pick.......
According to News.com.au this is the list of federal parliamentary members of the Liberal Party of Australia who voted to bring on the leadership
spill of 24 August 2018:
1.
Andrew Hastie
2. Tony
Pasin
3.
Craig Kelly
4.
Michael Sukkar
5.
Kevin Andrews
6. Tony
Abbott
7. Ian
Goodenough
8.
Nicolle Flint
9.
Peter Dutton
10.
Jason Wood
11.
Ross Vasta
12.
Luke Howarth
13.
Rick Wilson
14. Ted
O’Brien
15. Zed
Seselja
16 Greg
Hunt
17
Steven Ciobo
18
Angus Taylor
19 Alan
Tudge
20.
Michael Keenan
21
Andrew Wallace
22
Scott Buchholz
23 Jim
Molan
24
Slade Brockman
25 Dean
Smith
26 Jane
Hume
27
Mitch Fifield
28.
John McVeigh
29.
David Fawcett
30.
Amanda Stoker
31.
Jonathon Duniam
32.
David Bushby
33.
James Paterson
34 Eric
Abetz
35.
Concetta Fierravanti-Wells
36.
James McGrath
37.
Mathias Cormann
38.
Michaelia Cash
39.
Karen Andrews
40. Andrew Laming
41 Ben Morton
42. Sussan Ley
43. Warren Entsch
Sadly the Joke of the Decade was on the Australian people
"I will not
lead a party that is not as committed to effective action on climate change as
I am." [Liberal
Party leader Malcolm Bligh Turnbull,
October 2009]
Labels:
#TurnbullFAIL,
climate change
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