Via Ian Rogers at Banking Day:
The muted, even trivial, supply of urgently needed business finance from banks – especially for SMEs – in the face of an epic contraction and a national consensus to minimise job shedding has turned into a flash point between the industry and the Australian government.
Barely six weeks has passed since the big banks (especially) and their industry association elected to play the reputation recovery game. At the time they presented themselves as core (and keen) members of ‘Team Australia’, shorthand for big business following the federal government playbook to cushion the deep fall in output and demand flowing from social distancing and lockdown rules and to contain the threatened fast spread of COVID-19.
