'Needs a nuclear bomb': Graeme Samuel calls out female director club
Banking royal commission
By Natassia Chrysanthos
March 26, 2019 — 6.43pm
Former competition watchdog chairman Graeme Samuel has lashed out at the quality of directors in corporate Australia, taking particular aim at the "impenetrable wall" around the club of women who sit on company boards.
Mr Samuel, who is chairing a review into the financial regulator, said on Tuesday that current directors lacked the capacity and courage to challenge management.
Graeme Samuel told the AFR banking and wealth summit that clubs of male and female directors needed to be broken down. Credit:Peter Braig
He said a focus on directors' skills and diversity – which were both important – meant other qualities like commitment, conscientiousness and the courage to challenge were "missing ingredients".
"There are two clubs of directors around us," he told the Australian Financial Review's banking and wealth summit. "There's the club of male directors – it's got a wall around it, it's got to be broken down.
"Worse still, there … needs [to be] a nuclear bomb to smash down the impenetrable wall around the female club of directors."
Mr Samuel said the "club" of female directors was so tight it was hampering a push for diversity on boards.
"There are so many wonderful female individuals out there that have got extraordinary expertise and the courage to challenge. But they're not allowed in. You know why? They're not a name," he said.
He noted the "club" was not necessarily created by women but those who promoted them for being "well-known names".
He also said the royal commission's focus on litigation as a measure of a regulator's success was the "only area" where he disagreed with commissioner Kenneth Hayne.
"I'm not one that is necessarily devoted to the court process. It can be very complex, it can be gamed, and let's face it: no matter how many millions of dollars the government gives the regulators, in the end big business has a lot more dollars to game the process," Mr Samuel said.
He said the Australian Securities and Investments Commission should use its entire toolkit to improve banks' conduct, including prosecutions, naming and shaming, and court-enforceable undertakings.
Graeme Samuel
Natassia Chrysanthos
Natassia is a journalist for The Sydney Morning Herald.