And why would he? Via Domain:
In his first public statement since handing down the findings of the financial services probe in February, Justice Hayne contrasted the independent and transparent nature of royal commissions against the “opaque” and “skewed” decisions of politicians influenced by those “powerful enough to lobby governments behind closed doors”.
“The increasingly frequent calls for royal commissions in this country cannot, and should not, be dismissed as some passing fad or fashion,” he said.
“Notice how many recent inquiries relate to difficult issues of public policy: how can we, how should we, look after the aged? How can we, how should we, respond to mental health?
“We need to grapple closely with what these calls are telling us about the state of our democratic institutions.
“Trust in all sorts of institutions, governmental and private, has been damaged or destroyed.”
Alas, yes. When we began MB in 2011, there was still some policy integrity. We have been shocked beyond shock ever since at the decline and fall therein.
That this has been largely a period of LNP Governments is probably not coincidental. That party has been swept away in a tide of ideological lunacy that can best be described as an outright scab grab for public funds.
Labor is not blameless. It began the rot with the post-GFC bailouts, mining and carbon tax disasters and invention of the “Big Australia” concept. But the Coalition has taken all four to such extremes that the notion of “public good” or even “national interest” is today meaningless.
Then there is poor old Josh Recessionberg, who could smile under wet cement and explain how 1+1=7 without breaking stride, and whose crowning achievement is a singular determination is to undo Kenneth Hayne’s good work by restoring mortgage fraud to re-inflate the property bubble:
It’s no wonder Kenneth Hayne doesn’t like the bloke.
