Where do I sign up? From Banking Day:
APRA and the RBA and other regulators – not banks – will be the defendants in a class action centred on the questionable home loan finance supply practices of Australian banks over the last decade or longer.
Roger Brown, an Australian living in the UK for many decades, is the entrepreneur behind an action likely to be filed with the Federal Court of Australia.
After more than six years and 8651 tweets under the handle @bankcustomers, Brown is ready to roll, if guarded, with all details.
Brown will be an equal partner in a litigation funding joint venture with a known funder involved, if all pans out as he plans.
Brown will confirm the name of the law firm in coming days.
“I have done all the heavy lifting in developing the litigation, during a six year period of hard research, much of the time being ridiculed for suggesting that banks were corrupt and customers would be wiped out.
“The class action will not be against any bank,” Brown outlined in an email.
“It will be against the Federal Government and its controlled bodies the RBA and APRA.”
The claim will “fit within a particular and narrow grouping of mortgage borrowers.” Brown said.
“This is a critical factor in establishing a meritorious class action.”
It’s going to get worse for the captured regulators very soon, also from Banking Day:
As a sidebar to yesterday’s set piece announcement by the Treasurer, Scott Morrison, on changes to tax rates and the funding of the National Disability Insurance Scheme, at a “doorstop” media conference Banking Day suggested much of the pain could have been avoided had APRA or ASIC taken a stronger role in stopping bad banker behaviour several years ago.
We asked the Treasurer if and when these regulators would themselves be brought before the Commission in their own right to explain their own lapses, much as the banks have been forced to do, rather than appearing at the Royal Commission as occasional commentators.
He responded that these were issues that would be delved into by the Royal Commissioner “at some point in time”.
Bring it on.
