Australia voted yes to equality. Thank you for saying ‘No’.
You did it. Every State and Territory of Australia said NO to the racist Voice EXCEPT for Canberra.
PM Albanese Fails to Listen to the Australian Heartland
Despite hundreds of millions of dollars for the Yes campaign to constitutionally enshrine a Voice to Parliament, the Australian people overwhelmingly spoke with one voice and said NO, except that is for the Capital. This just goes to show how out of step Canberra’s bureaucrat class are with the rest of Australia.
The government’s Yes campaign involved pushing councils, sporting bodies, schools, universities, unions and the corporate sector including the Big 4 banks and QANTAS into backing the Voice.
Australia saw through the spin and the pressure of the Yes campaign. The Voice was not a genuine offer. It wasn’t about helping Australia’s most vulnerable people. It was yet more foreign globalist interference and follows the UN’s resolution, “Transforming Our World: the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development” which Australia signed up to. The UN’s reaction to Australia’s resounding NO is to predictably condemn the vote as exposing “hidden racism” and a failure to recognise human rights of Indigenous Peoples. They fail to grasp that it is aboriginal people in Australian politics and on the ground in the bush who led the NO campaign. Is it ignorance or deliberate misinformation from the UN?
Aboriginal Australians voted against this divisive measure too. Only the Albanese government and woke white saviour lefties voted for it. Albanese is a puppet for the globalists and needs to go.
As Senator Pauline Hanson says, “Australia has dodged a bullet and the people who fired it must now be held accountable”. Despite this overwhelming indication at the ballot box, some state governments are ploughing ahead down the path to treaty. So hang on to your NO t-shirts for now.
The division in Australia isn’t racially driven, it’s politically driven. The Yes campaign didn’t fail on race, it failed because those pushing it, from government to big business, are the same lot that were pushing the COVID shots.
People power is exactly the medicine we needed after COVID.
The government is defying the senate and ignoring its orders for the production of documents. That is contempt and must be punished as such by the Senate.
In this speech I made it clear to the Coalition and to the Greens, if they are serious about orders for the production of documents, about the explanations for refusing, about transparency and accountability, and if they’re serious about being the House of Review, then bring on a motion of contempt or censure. We will support it.
I will be proposing an amendment to Standing Orders in relation to the production of documents. Senators should assess public immunity claims and be able to decide if they are genuine. That assessment can be done confidentially so that the public interest is still protected.
No more slaps on the wrist in response to the callous disregard for the orders of this Senate on behalf of the people the Senate represents. It’s time to enforce the will of the Senate on behalf of the people of Australia.
Transcript
Unfortunately, we are here again for yet another slap on the wrist. This government continues to defy the orders of the Senate. There is no other word for this behaviour. It is contempt. It’s time that the Senate started treating contempt with real punishments. Orders for the production of documents are a vital part of our democratic process. The Senate is constitutionally superior to every law or excuse that government might try to use to justify not handing over documents.
Right now, we’re stuck in an ineffective cycle. The Senate makes an order demanding that the government table documents. The government may have a different opinion, yet these orders are not optional. They’re Senate orders. The government defies the Senate anyway and refuses to hand over the documents. The Senate makes even more orders, rejecting the excuses from the government and affirming that the documents must be produced. The government yet again ignores the Senate’s orders. That, ladies and gentlemen, is called contempt. We must punish it as such. Instead the minister is hauled in here for 15 minutes to give more excuses, and everyone lines up to give them a slap on the wrist and call them a naughty boy or a naughty girl. At the end, the minister sits down pretty chuffed with themselves because they haven’t had to hand over any documents and haven’t suffered any real punishments.
I say to the coalition and to the Greens: if you are serious about orders for the production of documents, about the explanations, about transparency and accountability, about being the house of review and about serving the people, bring on a contempt motion against the minister. We don’t need a referral to the Privileges Committee to tell us whether it is contempt or not. The minister is now in direct defiance of multiple orders from the Senate. Bring on a motion of contempt or censure, and you will have our support.
I foreshadow that I will be introducing, before the end of this year, a confidential process to review documents where any public interest immunity is raised, such as these documents. Public interest immunities are raised on the basis that sensitive information should not be released to the public. Whenever the government makes that claim, it needs to be assessed. Senators should assess public interest immunity claims. That assessment can be done confidentially so that the public interest is still protected. I’ll say it again: that assessment by the senators can be done confidentially so that the public interest is still protected.
To this end, I will be proposing an amendment to standing orders in relation to orders for the production of documents. This would trigger a formal process whenever a minister wishes to raise a public interest immunity claim. This process would require the relevant minister to explicitly outline to the Senate the actual harm that they say would flow from releasing information to the public, who we are supposed to serve. The minister would then be required to confidentially produce the documents to a Senate committee, where the documents would be made available only to senators for confidential viewing purposes. The Senate chamber as a whole would be able to confidentially make an assessment of the public interest immunity claim and whether or not there is any merit to it. If the minister does not comply with the process, it will be very obvious that the public interest immunity claim is not genuine. The Senate can then be more confident in applying sanctions such as censure and contempt. This would be fair to everyone.
This government continues to show callous disregard for the orders of this Senate on behalf of the people we represent. It’s time the Senate punishes such behaviour appropriately. No more slaps on the wrist. Instead enforce the will of the Senate, acting on behalf of our constituents, the people of Australia.
PM Albanese has failed Australia. His failed Voice referendum cost the Australian Electoral Commission a hefty $450 million alone. That’s $100 million over budget.
Added to this, the official Yes campaign was bankrolled by major corporate interests including the Big4 banks, the 3 major supermarkets, Qantas, Wesfarmers, Rio Tinto and BHP. Many of these companies made donations in the millions when they have been laying off staff to cut costs. Their donations to the Yes camp show how out of touch they are with the Australians they provide goods and services to.
The PM has swiftly moved on from his failure to warn that Australia is heading for economic and financial trauma. This is not news to Australians. In fact, it was made abundantly clear during the Voice campaign that Australians were more worried about the cost of living and felt it was inappropriate to hold the referendum.
Why was dangerous virtue signalling the government’s top priority? Why? I’m saddened to be the one to break the answer to you: this government does not care about you.
Will the government listen to the people now? It’s committed to Net Zero by 2050 but may as well be committed to driving us all off a cliff.
Every other country that’s tried to force their power grid onto wind and solar has had their power prices go up by a proportionate amount. When plotted on a graph, it’s nearly a straight line heading upwards, and it’s all for nothing.
The hard data shows that Australians’ carbon dioxide production cannot affect the climate above natural variability. The lie that wind and solar are cheaper is easily debunked by the fact that with more wind, solar, batteries and hydro on the grid than ever in our history, power bills have never been higher. It’s all a crock designed to fill the pockets of parasitic billionaire wind and solar proponents, fraudulently taking subsidies and donating to people in this Senate who support wind and solar.
Australians have already paid billions in subsidies to these billionaire predators and pay again as their power bills skyrocket. Yet both Labor and the opposition are committed to the UN’s net zero by 2050. The cost-of-living crisis cannot end until we ditch the United Nations’ Net Zero agenda.
Transcript
The failed Albanese Voice referendum is the latest spit in the face Australians have had to cop from the government. At a time when bills are going up and bank accounts are going backwards, Australians are going to be furious when they hear how much Anthony Albanese’s Labor government just wasted on a referendum. All I can say is: brace yourself for the answer. Four hundred and fifty million dollars—that’s how much the Australian Electoral Commission is estimating last week’s referendum cost. If you woke up with a hangover after some celebrations on the weekend and were scared to check your bank account, spare a moment to think about the Australian Electoral Commission. If their estimates are correct, the AEC have blown their budget for the referendum by nearly $100 million. In the middle of a cost-of-living crisis, Anthony Albanese has blown $450 million, almost half a billion dollars, on his personal vanity project.
What did Australians get for this? Australians rightly rejected inserting racial division into the Constitution, with a thumping victory for the ‘no’ case. Not a single state reached a majority yes. Only the small Canberra territory, the bubble, recorded a ‘yes’ majority. The ‘yes’ side spewed divisive, racial, abusive rhetoric while claiming the high moral ground. The country is worse off for being put through this divisiveness, at a huge cost and for a proposal that should never have been put forward. Australia rightly asks: why is this Voice issue distracting government as mortgage payments skyrocket, grocery bills shock budgets and life continues to get tougher? Why was dangerous virtue signalling the government’s top priority? Why? I’m saddened to be the one to break the answer to you: this government does not care about you.
While I thank the Liberals for bringing on this matter of importance and allowing us to discuss it, they weren’t any better in government. Honestly, the Liberals put a wrecking ball through the economy and handed it over to the Labor government in one of the greatest hospital passes in political history, yet Labor doesn’t have a snowball’s chance in hell of navigating us out of this one. Neither the Liberal Party nor the Labor Party can fix the cost-of-living crisis because they’re both committed to the UN’s net zero pipedream that caused the cost-of-living crisis.
This government is committed to net zero by 2050. They may as well be committed to driving us all off a cliff. If we keep going down this path, the number of Australians who can pay their power bills will be next to zero.
Australia doesn’t have to do this by ourself and find out the hard way. We can learn from many other countries further down this pipedream path than we are. Every other country that’s tried to force their power grid onto wind and solar has had their power prices go up by a proportionate amount. When plotted on a graph, it’s nearly a straight line heading upwards, and it’s all for nothing.
The hard data shows that Australians’ carbon dioxide production cannot affect the climate above natural variability. The lie that wind and solar are cheaper is easily debunked by fact—this fact: with more wind, solar, batteries and hydro on the grid than ever in our history, power bills have never been higher. It’s all a crock designed to fill the pockets of parasitic billionaire wind and solar proponents, fraudulently taking subsidies and donating to people in this Senate who support wind and solar. Australians have already paid billions in subsidies to these billionaire predators and pay again as their power bills skyrocket. Yet Labor, the Liberals and even the fake farmer friends, the Nationals, are all committed to the UN’s net zero by 2050.
After all the talk about truth telling, here’s some cold hard truth: the cost-of-living crisis cannot end until we ditch the United Nations’ net zero plans. One Nation is the only party that accepts those facts and can deliver cheaper power bills for Australia, turn the coal fired power generators back on, cut all the subsidies with the parasitic wind and solar industry and just get back to common sense, hard data and truth.
https://img.youtube.com/vi/gA3QdPPEJAM/maxresdefault.jpg7201280Senator Malcolm Robertshttps://www.malcolmrobertsqld.com.au/wp-content/uploads/2020/04/One-Nation-Logo1-300x150.pngSenator Malcolm Roberts2023-10-17 16:00:452023-10-17 16:00:49The Cost of Living with Labor
We are witnessing permanent environmental vandalism under Labor.
I spoke today on the Green’s motion to increase the rate at which net zero policies are turning our natural environment into wind and solar industrial landscapes.
A year after Kaban wind turbines turned pristine Australian bushland into an industrial landscape, the heavy machinery is still crushing the rock that was bulldozed and blasted off the top of mountains in the Atherton Tablelands to make way for wind turbines. Rock that is releasing arsenic into the environment with unknown consequences.
Koala habitat has been taken, and while the Greens talk frequently about saving the koalas, they pick and choose which koalas they care about.
This vandalism must stop.
At the end of a mining operation, the mine can be filled in and remediated. In fact, legal contracts require it. Not so with the destruction created by wind and solar. There is no replacing a mountain top after it has been blasted off and bulldozed to make way for wind turbines.
Transcript
One Nation joins Senator McKim in mourning the current environmental damage as a casualty of destructive net zero climate policy. We do, though, disagree on who’s responsible. As we speak today, heavy machinery using diesel engines are still crushing the rock that was bulldozed and blasted off the top of mountains in the Atherton Tablelands to make way for wind turbines. A year after Kaban, when turbines turned pristine Australian landscape into an industrial landscape, the crushers are still going. There was that much destruction. That act of environmental vandalism disturbed arsenic in the rock, released into the environment with an unknown cost to our flora and fauna and to humans.
Koala habitat has been taken. While the Greens talk frequently about saving the koalas, they pick and choose which koalas they care about. The Morrison government refused the Lotus Creek wind installation because of the amount of koala habitat the industrial landscape would remove. The Albanese Labor government reversed the decision and approved the creation of another industrial landscape holding 55 turbines. Native habitat protecting biodiversity included the masked owl, the magnificent broodfrog, the sarus crane, the red goshawk, the northern greater glider and the spectacled flying fox—and the devastation is just starting. Mount Fox will have 193 of these machines—these destructive wind turbines; Chalumbin, 94; Windy Hill, 20; High Road, 20; and Mount Emerald, 37. This is in just 300 kilometres of pristine North Queensland mountain range.
At the end of mining, a mine can be filled in and remediated. Chopping the top off beautiful mountains and cutting 70-metre-wide roads into a mountainside to bring in the wind turbines on diesel powered trucks is permanent environmental vandalism.
On Saturday over 60% of Australians realised that the people are parliament’s masters, not their servants.
I spoke this morning on the Voice to Parliament, which saw 5 electorates with the largest Aboriginal population give the Voice a thrashing.
Australia voted NO to feelings-based governance and NO to elevating one group within our community over all others based only on skin colour.
Saturday’s result clearly shows Canberra no longer represents the values and beliefs of everyday Australians.
It’s time to dismantle the Canberra Aboriginal industry and deliver resources directly to those in need in the bush. It’s time to stop preventing rural Aboriginals from owning their own homes and running their own affairs.
I asked the Senate a simple question – who is better to run Aboriginal affairs: the Canberra Aboriginal industry, or local Government who are in the bush ready to build the roads, utilities and community facilities rural Aboriginals need so badly.
Transcript
Last Saturday was the day Australians said no — no to feelings based governance, no to elevating one group within our community over another based only on race, no to a Prime Minister whose chief skill is to cry on cue and no to spending more tax dollars than our taxpayers can afford. Australians are already struggling with a cost-of-living crisis as a result of shoddy governance from successive parliaments. People need to keep more of their own money, not less. On Saturday, Australians realised that the people are the parliament’s masters, not its servants. The irony is that the referendum did give Aboriginals a voice, and they used it. The five electorates with the largest Aboriginal population gave the Voice a thrashing. It was a result which clearly shows that Canberra no longer represents the values and beliefs of everyday Australians.
For those in this place who supported racism and apartheid—and you were the majority—now is the time to ask yourself, ‘What the hell was I thinking?’ How could you think it was okay to take a system that has failed Aboriginal people for 120 years and embed, enshrine and perpetuate that system in the Constitution? We don’t need to preserve a broken system that’s failed Aboriginals in the bush; we need to tear it down. It’s time to dismantle the Canberra Aboriginal industry and deliver resources directly to those in need in the bush. It’s time to stop preventing rural Aboriginals from owning their own homes and running their own affairs. It’s time for city grifters in comfortable offices thousands of kilometres from rural communities to stop keeping money meant for the bush—money that’s used to fund their own empires and line their own pockets. Enough money goes into the funnel to make things right. A drip comes out the bottom. It’s time to turn the damn funnel around.
Today is a new day for Australia’s Aboriginals. Let’s not waste the chance to ask ourselves this question: who’s best to run Australian Aboriginal affairs? Is it Canberra bureaucrats and the Aboriginal industry, or is it best run from local communities and councils right there in the bush, ready to get cracking on housing, roads, power and community facilities?
https://img.youtube.com/vi/u7synW08jVU/maxresdefault.jpg7201280Senator Malcolm Robertshttps://www.malcolmrobertsqld.com.au/wp-content/uploads/2020/04/One-Nation-Logo1-300x150.pngSenator Malcolm Roberts2023-10-17 06:57:002023-10-17 06:57:05Australians are the Masters of the Government, NOT Servants to the Government!
Schools have a significant influence on future generations. We are seeing more schools introduce drag queen events into the curriculum without involving parent. There’s a need for communities to come together and talk about what’s happening here. This is not just about drag queen performances, it’s a symptom of a far bigger issue. Parents are understandably concerned about boundaries here and you need to know what your children are exposed to.
Join me at the Caloundra Power Boat Club on Wednesday evening, 1 November 2023 | 5:30 – 7:30 pm
As the voices grow louder to “Free Assange,” the Wikileaks founder’s family is in the United States to fight against his extradition. They’ve been asking lawmakers there for help, and all hopes are pinned on the meeting between PM Anthony Albanese and President Joe Biden. Australian government officials of all political parties have come to Assange’s defense.
I, along with over 60 members of the House of Representatives and the Senate, signed a letter urging the U.S. to drop their pursuit. On 20 September, a cross-party delegation representing Australia went to the United States to support Julian’s right to come home to his family, including his two sons, who have been growing up without their father.
This has gone on far too long. The huge amount of support from around the world in defense of Julian Assange shows that the value of courageous journalism, truth and social justice is far greater than the US administration’s desire to retaliate in their embarrassment over the war crimes they committed, which Wikileaks revealed.
At this time online censorship and state control over information is on everyone’s mind. The Albanese government has proposed a bill designed to censor Australians online. What Julian Assange stands for is traditional journalism and free speech, which are cornerstones of our democracy. Assange is a political prisoner and deserves our gratitude for bringing the truth to light.
https://i0.wp.com/www.malcolmrobertsqld.com.au/wp-content/uploads/2023/10/Free-Julian-Assange.png?fit=1079%2C537&ssl=15371079Sheenagh Langdonhttps://www.malcolmrobertsqld.com.au/wp-content/uploads/2020/04/One-Nation-Logo1-300x150.pngSheenagh Langdon2023-10-12 09:05:592023-10-12 09:06:03The Persecution of Assange Must End
Over-the-counter transactions at NAB have decreased 70% since 2015. The BIG Four banks have actively discouraged people from withdrawing cash over the counter in the past several years. By training customers in this way, the banks have been able to produce a ‘shock and awe’ figure of 99.95% reduction in cash transactions.
Sounds incredible, yet that’s exactly what it is. It isn’t so much a shift away from cash by the public – it’s a shift in behaviour by the banks.
The banks have no idea how many people are using cash. They don’t see cash transactions. They are actively discouraging the use of cash, then coming out with statements that people don’t want to use cash, which is just plain wrong.
According to many constituents, if a customer goes to a branch of the NAB to use the counter services, there is a high likelihood they will be shown how to use the ATM. The NAB says that’s because they need to know and be fully aware of the alternative options. In June, the NAB is pleased to report they saw 96% of customers making digital transactions. How many of those were walked outside to do that?
Mortgage applications are now being conducted remotely by 40% of customers. Pre COVID the figure was zero, yet post COVID the NAB has found that customers are very happy to take up the digital services for buying a house. The NAB report that a massive shift has occurred over the last few years. Social distancing and lockdowns furthered their digital goals.
The NAB’s reported 99.95% less cash payments is just for bank transactions within the bank itself. All real-world cash transactions are an unknown figure. Customers still need to go to the bank though to withdraw their money to use it in their daily lives. How hard is that becoming?
Ross McEwan, CEO of the NAB, says there are thousands of ATMs available to do this freely, and also acknowledges that Australia is a large country. The NAB says it looks at a range of factors when making decisions to close branches, including feedback from staff members and what is happening in the community where it has invested. How much of that is about listening to customers’ needs?
Transcript
Senator ROBERTS: Thank you for appearing today. Your submission includes this statement: ‘Banking transactions made over the counter at NAB branches have decreased by 70 per cent since 2015.’ Is that a 70 per cent reduction in actual transactions; and, if so, what are the figures for, firstly, total over-the-counter transactions in 2015 and, secondly, total over-the-counter transactions now?
Mr McEwan: I’ll ask Krissie Jones to address that question.
Ms Jones: I’ve got the data from 2017 in front of me. We understand that, in 2017, there were 35½ million over-the-counter transactions through our branch network. Certainly, there has been a large reduction over the period since then and, at the conclusion of this year, we expect that there will have been a 71 per cent reduction. We’ve seen a massive shift over the last few years with our customers starting to use digital services. In fact, in June, 96.5 per cent of interactions were digital ones.
Senator ROBERTS: According to reports made to my electoral office, if one of my constituents goes into the NAB to conduct an over-the-counter transaction, it is likely that the teller will march that customer out to the ATM in front of the bank and make them conduct their business there. Does your 70 per cent reduction figure compensate for increases in the use of ATMs in front of your bank?
Mr McEwan: First off, we should probably look at the circumstances in which a customer is shown how to use an ATM. It also depends on the branch structure that we have, as we’ve got a number of branches that are open for standardised hours, which will probably be three hours a day, and the staff member may have shown the customer how to use the services 24/7. But I’ll pass over to Krissie because, again, she runs the network and is very familiar with what staff are being asked to do, in training and developing customers and showing them odd services. Krissie, maybe you could talk to the senator on that one.
Ms Jones: Yes, sure. We want to make sure that our customers are aware of all of the options that are available to them. If they want to conduct their banking in a branch, then we would welcome them using the over-the-counter services. But we want to make sure that, for those examples of when a branch isn’t open, they know of the alternative options. Over the last few years, we’ve added in new functionality to be able to deposit a cheque on your phone from the convenience of your home. So we really want to make sure that customers are fully aware of all of those alternative options, whether it’s phone banking, digital banking options or Bank@Post. But, of course, if a customer wants to come in and talk to their local branch team member to do their transactions, we welcome that too.
Senator ROBERTS: This is a quote from your submission: ‘Only three per cent of our personal banking customers exclusively use our branch network to conduct their banking.’ Could you define ‘exclusively’, please. Does one ATM withdrawal or one call to report a stolen card constitute the loss of ‘exclusive’, as in ‘did not exclusively use over-the-counter services’?
Ms Jones: We do publish some of this information in our FAQ sheets as well, but our definition of ‘exclusive’is really about when a customer walks into the branch. So ‘exclusive’ would be a customer who comes in and only uses that branch for their transactions; it would not include things like the use of ATMs or other services, such as digital transactions.
Senator ROBERTS: So, if a customer used a bank for over-the-counter services every time, except for one call to inquire about a bank card, would that mean that they do not exclusively use over-the-counter services?
Ms Jones: It’s a rolling period and so it would be that, in that period, that wouldn’t be the case. But we look at it over different rolling periods.
Senator ROBERTS: You say here, ‘Only eight per cent of our business banking customers exclusively use our branch network to conduct their banking.’ That’s one in 12, which seems a lot to ignore, doesn’t it? Asking that same question again, does the same definition of ‘exclusive’ apply?
Ms Jones: Yes, it’s the same definition of ‘exclusive’. For both our personal customers and our business customers, I think we are seeing a really big shift in the way that they’re transacting. As I’ve said, in June, we actually saw digital transactions occurring with 96 per cent of our customers. So there really has been a very big change. Also, we are seeing more of our business customers starting to use alternatives as well.
Senator ROBERTS: This is another quote from your submission: ‘Over 40 per cent of home lending appointments are held via videoconference.’ That means that 60 per cent are not using videoconference; is that correct?
Ms Jones: Yes. We offer a range of ways in which our customers can take out a home loan with us. They can go onto our website to find an appointment that is the most convenient for them. That can be in their local branch or over the phone; it can be with a banker coming to their home or their workplace; or it can occur by video. What we are seeing, even just in the last week, is more than 60 per cent happening over the phone or via video. But a large proportion of customers still want to come into a branch to undertake that conversation with the banker.
Mr McEwan: Just to give you a feel for the rapid change in those numbers, I can say that, pre-COVID, that was zero; we did not have that facility available. Today, as Krissie has said, these stats were put at 40 and, in the last week, that has gone even higher. So customers are very happy to take up those services, and it doesn’t matter whether they are regional or city-bound customers.
Senator ROBERTS: I quote again: ‘99.95 per cent of all payments made by or received by NAB customers were made digitally in 2022.’ Does that include when a person ‘beeps’ to pay for a coffee, petrol and the minutiae of everyday life?
Mr McEwan: Yes, it does.
Senator ROBERTS: If I withdraw cash from an ATM and spend that cash in a farmers market—in fact, I am noticing an increasing number of small retailers asking for cash payments—how would you know that I’ve paid with cash or not?
Mr McEwan: By way of a retail transaction?
Senator ROBERTS: Yes.
Mr McEwan: If a person paid cash, we would not know.
Senator ROBERTS: That’s right.
Mr McEwan: What are you asking for help on with that one? When people have paid with cash at a market or out in society, we have never known what those numbers were.
Senator ROBERTS: So what is the statistical basis for the 99.95 per cent figure, when you have no idea of what your customers are using cash for?
Mr McEwan: No. That 99.95 per cent figure of the transactions that come through our bank are done digitally; that is, the ones that we’re aware of. The definition of that stat hasn’t changed, as we’ve never known what was going on with a trader or a person at a market who is taking cash for goods. Those stats have never appeared in our stats.
Senator ROBERTS: I made this same point with Westpac, I think it was: so we don’t really know what people are using cash for, but people want to use cash outside of the banking transaction.
Mr McEwan: That’s correct. Yes, you’re absolutely right: I do not know what you use your cash for and you don’t know what I use my cash for. But the point that we’re making is that 99.95 per cent of those interactions with the bank are now done digitally, and that doesn’t preclude customers doing what they like with their cash.
Senator ROBERTS: So 99.95 per cent of payments with NAB might be digital. With customers exchanging money with other customers, we don’t know what it is.
Mr McEwan: No, that’s right. Again, that’s not a service that I provide. Your paying cash to somebody else is not a service that I am involved in; it’s a service that they do themselves.
Senator ROBERTS: No. But for me to pay someone else cash, I need to come to NAB to get the cash.
Mr McEwan: Yes, or you could go to 4,000 ATMs around the country that I pay for you to use and they’re free to you, or you could get the money out at a branch or at 3,400 Australia Post outlets; they will give you the cash.
Senator ROBERTS: Cash is still important. So, on the face of it, your regional banking hubs are a good idea. I assume that these centres are there to handle face-to-face transactions with people from areas where a branch has been closed. You mentioned Emerald in Queensland, where I used to live some years ago. Can I ask: what is the catchment of that Emerald bank, please? How far away are the areas that it is designed to service?
Mr McEwan: We’ll have to look at that. Krissie, do you know the Emerald catchment at all?
Ms Jones: I do, but I want to make sure that we’ve got the facts right, so perhaps I could come back to you on that. We do have surrounding branches to Emerald. As well as our branch in Emerald there are Bank@Post facilities.
Senator ROBERTS: It looks to me as though the next branch, heading west from Emerald, is Longreach, which is four hours away. Is that a good indication of how far apart these regional branches are?
Mr McEwan: The regional branches will be quite different; some may well be at a shorter distance than that and others will be a longer distance apart. As you know, Australia is a huge country. But the point there is that there is a very large number of regional Australia Post offices that people can get to as well, which will service those needs.
Ms Slade: Krissie, you might want to talk about the things that we look at and take into consideration, such as where customers are travelling to already and the other branches that they’re using.
Ms Jones: When we’re making investment decisions or the decision to close a branch, we look at a range of factors, which include: where are our customers shopping; where are they banking; where are they are travelling to, whether it’s to see the doctor or the mechanic; and where do we need to invest to support them? So there’s a range of things that we take into consideration when we’re not only making investments but also making the difficult decision to close. We also seek input from our staff on the ground. We have a large number of colleagues—around 2,300 across NAB—who work across regional Australia, and many of those are bankers who face customers every day. That may be in retail, or it may be in regional and agri, which is where we have over 774 bankers providing services in those areas. So we listen to feedback from our staff members as well about what’s happening in that community, what’s most relevant for that community and what’s the way in which we can shore up in order to serve them as well.
A theme throughout this inquiry into Australia’s bank closures is that bank representatives continue to say they are committed to providing cash for the foreseeable future despite Australians using cash less frequently.
The Commonwealth Bank has no plans to remove the distribution of cash even though it is a cost to the bank to keep cash available, according to CEO Matt Comyn.
I know that Australians are afraid of losing cash. There’s no doubt that the best way to keep cash alive is to keep on using it.
Despite regional bank closures, more than 90% of customers remain which is seen as a sign less customers see a physical branch as important because more of them are using online services.
I asked Matt Comyn about the bank’s digital expansion which includes the CommBank App. He said this app is used by eight million customers and the vast majority of customers appreciate the bank’s investment in it. The bank’s contract with Australia Post, worth tens of millions of dollars, is a partnership allowing customers to make transactions at Australia Post outlets where the bank has been shutting down branches. For many rural customers the Bank@Post scheme doesn’t offer everything they need.
We also discussed the many ways the Commonwealth Bank along with the rest of the Big Four Banks are supported by the government including bail-in, props such as government guarantees for overseas borrowing, regulatory support and their advantages over smaller banks.
When I asked about the shareholdings by asset managers such as BlackRock, Vanguard and State Street, Matt Comyn responded that most of the bank’s shareholders are Australian retail shareholders, domestic superannuation shareholders, and shares held by 12 million Australian families. Share dividends will be high this year with a record $10.2 billion profit and a pay packet for its CEO of $10.4 million.
The Commonwealth bank serves about 10 million customers. Among those customers are many Australians who are worried about digital controls, branches closing, and the gradual loss of cash as a readily available and convenient means of transaction. The Commonwealth Bank prides itself on supporting its customers so let’s hope they’re also a listening bank.
Transcript
Senator ROBERTS: Are you aware of what has happened to Qantas’s reputation in the last few months?
Mr Comyn: Yes, I am.
Senator ROBERTS: You represent a bank which provides financial services, and cash is fundamental to those for many people. People are afraid of cash. Whether you agree with that or not, they are afraid of cash and they’re increasing their use of cash. As to your costs and services, from your statement I concluded that they’re reviewed annually, but are you considering the whole service and what people really expect from your bank?
Mr Comyn: Yes, absolutely we consider the whole service.
Senator ROBERTS: More than 90 per cent of your customers stay after a bank closure?
Mr Comyn: Yes.
Senator ROBERTS: So, your customers are sticky?
Mr Comyn: Yes. It could be perceived in a slightly different way as well, which is the role of a physical branch in some customers’ minds perhaps isn’t as important as it was. I sort of agree with that and I think it very much depends on different customers. I think a range of different conclusions can be drawn from that.
Senator ROBERTS: I agree with you. The fact is your customers are sticky and so are other customers. You mentioned cross-subsidisation of electronic customers on cash is $40 per customer?
Mr Comyn: What I said was we calculated we think the cost of providing cash, and I believe providing cash will continue to be important and is an important issue. I suspect we pay a significant proportion of the costs of providing cash in Australia. I don’t say that as a complaint, I say it more as a statement of fact. We serve about 10 million customers. It works out to be about $40. The reality is, like anything, there’s a small proportion of customers who use cash very often. There’s a much larger proportion who don’t use it at all, and there would be somewhere in between who are using it infrequently across that. I’m not exactly sure I understand the point you made about ‘afraid of cash’? I think you said earlier on in your question that Australians are afraid of cash? Did I mishear you?
Senator ROBERTS: Sorry. They’re afraid of losing cash. Thank you for picking up on that. That’s a very important point. They’re afraid of losing cash. We’ve seen a digital identity mooted by the Morrison government, now raised by the Labor government, and a bill that was introduced not into parliament as such for processing but into the public debate in parliament last year. We’ve seen attempts to limit the cash ban bill. People are scared, especially after losing a lot of their fundamental freedoms in the last three years under COVID mismanagement. They’re worried about being controlled in all aspects of their lives. How much has your bank spent on digital expansion that cash customers did not ask for?
Mr Comyn: It would be very difficult for me to answer that, because we haven’t asked every one of those 10 million customers.
Senator ROBERTS: I understand that.
Mr Comyn: I think we could reasonably assume that with our retail bank, the CommBank app, which is our mobile banking app, we have more than eight million users. On average, they log in 39 times per month. It’s clearly one of the most important, if not the most important, feature that customers use. I’d say that clearly the vast majority of customers highly value the investments that we make, both in terms of hopefully helping make it easier for them to manage their financial lives but also as Senator White was asking, to make sure it’s the safest, secure and most resilient experience possible.
Senator ROBERTS: We’ll come back to cash in a minute. You just said you’ve got a commitment to cash?
Mr Comyn: I believe cash will continue to be available for many years within Australia. I don’t think people should fear that cash is going to be removed from circulation.
Senator ROBERTS: Is that your commitment or is it just your belief?
Mr Comyn: I can only make the commitment on behalf of the Commonwealth Bank.
Senator ROBERTS: That’s what I mean.
Mr Comyn: We certainly have no plans to remove cash distribution or the provision of cash in Australia. I don’t think that’s feasible, and I don’t think that would be desirable, certainly in the foreseeable future.
Senator ROBERTS: Let’s turn to Australia Post and we’ll come back to cash. How much do you pay Australia Post for the community representation fee—not the transaction but the community representation fee?
Mr Comyn: I mentioned in the introduction it’s tens of millions of dollars. I know I’m protected by parliamentary privilege. Would you mind if I checked whether there’s any commercial—
CHAIR: You can take it on notice.
Mr Comyn: I know what the number is. I don’t have any difficulty sharing it with you, but I probably should check that.
CHAIR: I think usually the best idea is to take it on notice. Mr Comyn can provide the information to us.
Senator ROBERTS: Is your concern one of the figure or of releasing it?
Mr Comyn: I’m not personally concerned with either of those dimensions, but since it’s in a contract entered between the Commonwealth Bank and Australia Post I just want to doublecheck if there are any contractual restrictions and probably out of courtesy let Australia Post know.
Senator ROBERTS: It was released in 2018 as being $22 million for each bank.
Mr Comyn: It’s more than that.
Senator ROBERTS: So, you’re currently flooding Australia Post. When I say ‘you’, it’s not just the Commonwealth Bank but all banks. You’re closing branches in the regional areas and Australia Post is getting flooded with customers. Is it more than $22 million?
Mr Comyn: The totality of what we pay Australia Post? Yes, it is. Again, not to get caught up in the semantics, I wouldn’t characterise it as ‘flooding’. We pay on a per transaction basis to Australia Post with an extension beyond 2030. We entered into a long-term contract to give Australia Post and some of those individual franchisees certainty. We meet—I know Mr Jones does—regularly with Australia Post to talk about are there opportunities for us to continue to improve the service to be able to support Australia Post’s customers better and to make sure as many transaction types are available in Australia Post to ensure the convenience is as high as possible.
Senator ROBERTS: So, you’re treating them as a partner?
Mr Comyn: Yes.
Senator ROBERTS: Coming back to the structure of the banking system in this country, especially the big four banks, there is protection for the banks if the banks go overboard in risk or the economy collapses. You’ve got protection in bank bailing, which was legislated I think in 2018. That was confirmed to me by a senior Treasury official two years ago. You’ve had props from the government in the past, and government guarantees for things like overseas borrowing. You have enormous support. Four pillars for a start is a regulatory support. You have more generous treatment from APRA in risk weighting. You have barriers to entry that the regulations provide for protecting the big four. You have a barrier that’s legal in the sense that you’ve got deep pockets and you can fund enormous defences in lawsuits brought against you. I’ve seen this first-hand when chaired the Senate select inquiry into lending to primary production customers. You dominate the cash distribution network. You’re essentially now, as a result of the support from the community and governments, a low-risk business. And your customers are sticky. That’s a hell of a ride.
Mr Comyn: I’d challenge just about every one of the assumptions that you made then, but I’m not exactly sure where that would get us. I definitely wouldn’t characterise it in terms of the context that you did. Are we heavily regulated? Absolutely. Is there a lot of investment required to manage and appropriately respond to that regulation? Yes, there is. Do I think significant financial institutions in Australia and others should be heavily regulated? Absolutely. Do I think it’s important that Australian banks and the Commonwealth Bank have unquestionably strong levels of capital? Absolutely. Because we’re big importers of capital and the success of economies and financial institutions are necessarily very intertwined. I could give you multiple examples but I don’t know how helpful it would be. Even if you think about capital levels, Australian banks hold considerably more capital than many other financial institutions and jurisdictions. As a policy setting I think that’s absolutely appropriate, but to help make the numbers real that costs across the major banks per annum between $7 billion and $11 billion. I’d characterise a lot of things differently. I think sometimes our funding facilities are described in a way that’s not necessarily matched by our experience.
Senator ROBERTS: I acknowledge your view. I point to the fact that every monopoly in the world—I’m not accusing you of being a monopoly—is there as a result of government. You say you have a low-risk business. Your ownership of the Commonwealth Bank, a significant controlling portion, includes the Vanguard Group and BlackRock. I’m reading from your registry: Vanguard Investments, Norges Bank, Goody Capital Management, BlackRock Advisors, Vanguard Global Advisors and a couple more. When I look at the other three big banks, they’re almost identical in terms of the significant controlling interests. It seems to me that we have one bank with four logos. That’s a very tight industry. You hide behind the regulations, I’d put it to you. When I chaired that Senate select inquiry into lending for primary production customers, I saw the services almost identical from each of the banks. The strategy is almost identical. The disregard for customers is almost identical as is the hiding behind regulations. Regulations are there to protect your bank; that’s the way I see it in practice. It’s almost identical across all four banks. Directors appoint you, I take it, and your directors are appointed by the likes of BlackRock, Vanguard, First State and State Street. The banking sector with the four big banks seems to be a very cosy club and you can do whatever you want with very sticky customers; is that correct?
Mr Comyn: No, it’s not. Again, the shareholder base is quite different to the way you outlined. There are quite significant differences even across the major banks. We’re an extremely widely held retail stock. Approximately 50 per cent of our shareholding is held directly by retail onshore shareholders. Obviously that’s a result—
Senator ROBERTS: How many of those shareholders vote?
Mr Comyn: Every one of them is entitled to vote.
Senator ROBERTS: How many of them vote?
Mr Comyn: I couldn’t give you the exact number. One thing I would say is clearly I meet with institutional shareholders. I just came back from meeting with some institutional shareholders internationally. I can assure you I get stopped and asked about the performance, profitability, questions on people’s minds, and the dividend by a lot more retail shareholders than I ever do from international. To finish quickly on the shareholder base, more than 50 per cent would be direct to retail. The next approximately 30 per cent would be institutional but domestic, primarily through superannuation, some of the biggest industry and superannuation funds. We actually have quite a small representation internationally. You mentioned some of them. There’s a mixture of both. You touched on some of our index funds. Some have a variety of different mandates from either US, North America or within Asia. Fundamentally if the Commonwealth Bank is profitable, 75 per cent approximately of our profits go to our shareholders, predominantly Australian families—more than 12 million. I can assure you based on my experience they absolutely do value it. I’m not sure the point you’re making on regulation, either. Obviously we work very closely with regulators.
Senator ROBERTS: The point I’m making was that regulations help you because they give you protection. It’s very difficult for a small borrower to take you on legally.
CHAIR: We’re going to have to rotate the call. Mr Comyn, you can briefly respond to that if you want to. It’s up to you.
https://img.youtube.com/vi/O8cF3E60W4g/maxresdefault.jpg7201280Senator Malcolm Robertshttps://www.malcolmrobertsqld.com.au/wp-content/uploads/2020/04/One-Nation-Logo1-300x150.pngSenator Malcolm Roberts2023-10-09 12:21:122023-10-09 12:21:17What is the Role of a Bank?
Your future is digital and Westpac’s is even higher profits. Once again, the commercial in confidence excuse was trotted out around disclosure of the cost of the Australia Post community representation contracts that are allowing the banks to close many of their regional branches. In 2018 the amount was public information so what’s changed? Westpac has taken the question on notice.
Almost a quarter of Australians cannot do digital banking. Either they lack access or the necessary skills to go online for their banking. I asked Westpac why the bank is turning its back on these Australians. The way Westpac’s CEO Peter King views this is that 96% of their own customers are engaging with them digitally so all is well.
Has Westpac looked at the fact they’re pushing people online who don’t actually have the capability to stay safe and secure on that platform? Instead of directly answering my question, Peter King said the three biggest scam losses are through investment scams, romance scams and business email compromises. Banks are doing everything they can, he said, to prevent this by blocking suspicious payments and educating customers.
Westpac is enthusiastic in its push towards digital. In Townsville for example, where Westpac has shut its doors, the bank conducted education sessions to help customers adapt to the digital transition. Clearly there are factors that limit digital banking in regional Australia. Westpac’s answer isn’t to reverse the closures, it’s to improve its banking app to do everything. The bank intends to shoehorn people into the digital economy whether they like it or not. Peter King believes this shift is much broader than just banking because all government and essential services will become digital too.
Will there still be cash? Peter King thinks that cash will still exist in the economy but its use will decline. Cash made up 70% of all transactions in 2007. That figure is now 13% and trending down. Where telecommunications or power are cut off, Westpac would get cash into an affected area by flying it in. Telecommunications is obviously critical.
Finally, I asked if Westpac’s data might not be accurate. It isn’t capturing all cash transactions. Once cash is circulating there is no way to track it, so perhaps they’re not seeing the real picture of cash use in the economy. I was told the Reserve Bank undertakes surveys into how cash is used and in Westpac’s view there is less call for cash making it less important in the scheme of things. Online banking and Bank@Post will replace bank branches, particularly in regional areas where Westpac and the other big banks are pulling away from in person services.
Profits over personal touch is what’s in store for customers in the digital economic future. In a move we’re seeing across the corporate and political sectors, the Big Four are making the data fit the narrative so they can achieve their goals. Where’s the care factor?
Transcript
Senator ROBERTS: Just sticking briefly with Australia Post, how much do you pay Australia Post for a community representation fee, not the transaction fee?
Mr King: It’s subject to some commerciality requirements. I’ve said it will be over $200 million over 10 years, including the fee. We might see whether we can provide that separately in confidence.
Senator ROBERTS: It wasn’t commercial-in-confidence in 2018. Is something being hidden?
Mr King: No. We’ll work with Australia Post on how much detail we can give you.
Senator ROBERTS: So, you’ll take that on notice?
Mr King: Yes.
Senator ROBERTS: Your submission relies on digital technology as a fallback to the removal of physical branches, yet 23.6 per cent, almost a quarter of the population, either lack access to or the ability to handle digital banking. Why are you turning your back on almost a quarter of the population? Do they not have enough money to warrant your attention?
Mr King: What we see in our customer base is 96 per cent of customers are engaging with us digitally, in terms of transactions.
Senator ROBERTS: That’s your customer base. I asked about the population of Australia. Almost a quarter don’t.
Mr King: In terms of our service offering, if you take the cash, we have our own branch network, and the Australia Post, and an ATM arrangement. So, there are plenty of opportunities for customers who still want to use cash to get cash through the country.
Senator ROBERTS: The ACCC reports that Australians lost $3 billion in online scams in 2022. Has Westpac done any work on what share of that has come from Westpac and the banking sector in general, forcing this 23.6 per cent of the population online when they lack the skills to avoid being scammed? Is Westpac simply setting up these people to lose their money in an online scam?
Mr King: In short, no. There are three big drivers of scam losses, and the biggest one by a long way is investment scams. As to investment scams, we have less financial planners in the country, more people doing research, including on social media platforms, and that’s devastating. Romance scams are still pretty high in terms of people being prepared to pay for romance scams, and then there’s business email compromises. A lot of those are issues around how customers are being tricked out of their money, effectively. The way the banks are reacting is to do everything we can to help customers make better decisions. So, prompt them about those types of things, put friction in the system to stop the payments. But we do need to help our customers pick these scams up as well.
Senator ROBERTS: In towns where you close your branch and provide education to customers on how to use online banking safely, do you open a digital education centre?
Mr Miller: In a regional town where we’re closing a branch we have a fairly lengthy period where we’re consulting with our customers. We run education sessions from the branch before it closes. When the branch has closed, we’ve enabled our call centres to be able to take calls from customers anywhere in Australia where they can continue that digital education with customers online. We would have had 340,000 of those conversations with customers since March this year.
Senator ROBERTS: Some of them are a physical, face-to-face in town where the bank is about to close?
Mr Miller: Absolutely. That’s our priority during the transition period.
Senator ROBERTS: What factors would limit digital banking in regional Australia?
Mr King: For us, I think we’re looking to have everything you can do in the bank in the app. We’re not there yet, as Ross said, but we will be. Another is, as you just said, helping people transition to the digital economy. But I think it’s broader than banking. If I look at government services, banking services and most services in the country, they’re all going to go digital, so we have to help people get on. Then telecommunications is critical as well.
Senator ROBERTS: Are you saying there will be no cash, none of this stuff?
Mr King: No.
Senator ROBERTS: You said ‘all digital’?
Mr King: I believe there will still be cash in the economy but the usage will go down. I think I used a stat before that, in 2007, 70 per cent of consumer transactions were cash based. It’s now 13 per cent and it will go further down; that is the trend. Cash will be less important in the scheme of things than it has been historically.
Senator ROBERTS: What are customers supposed to do if the bank or the NBN or the telco fails for a whole day? I noticed in Mount Isa, the day before I arrived recently there was no internet and no EFTPOS so people had to use cash. Business was open purely because of cash.
Mr King: That is an important part, but also the merchant terminals can go into a mode which is called offline for a period of time, but you need your card. You need to put your physical card in. It’s hard to use a digital wallet in that situation. There are fallback facilities when telecommunications are down. It’s a bit harder when the power is down, obviously. In that case, like we do in any event, a flood or fire, we would get cash into the area and a way to distribute it. We did that in Lismore through the floods by flying it in.
Senator ROBERTS: If a constituent of mine goes to a farmers market and pays cash, how is that captured in the data for cash use and electronic payment?
Mr King: It will depend on how that merchant reports. Certainly, when we’re tracking cash usage we’re looking at money going in and out of the banks. It will depend on how that person banks, whether they go near a bank at all. They might just spend it. The Reserve Bank has the data on how much cash is on issue, and then it touches the bank at certain points but we don’t see 100 per cent of it because some of it’s in the economy and going around without us seeing it.
Senator ROBERTS: That’s exactly the point, isn’t it? The data does not capture all of the cash transactions?
Mr King: If it doesn’t go through us we won’t see it; that’s right.
Senator ROBERTS: Correct. Could the volume of cash transactions occurring outside of the banking sector be quite different to the data you present as being the reduction in cash transactions?
Mr King: Possibly, but the Reserve Bank also does periodic surveys where they survey consumers on how they’re using cash. That doesn’t rely on the reported data. You also get surveys. Our experience in what we’re seeing is there is less cash being used for transactions, and much more cards and particularly debit cards are being used for transactions.
Senator ROBERTS: I’m being sent complaints about queueing in the branches that remain after closures in the area. Your point of presence is now inadequate. If a customer wants to use face-to-face and their branch is closed, then they go to the next nearest branch which is queued out the door so they give up and go home and use phone or internet or banking, would you consider your bank as being helpful?
Mr King: As I started with, customer service has to improve. If there are examples from your constituents, send them through and we’ll have a look.
https://img.youtube.com/vi/-RDbqOZMf-c/maxresdefault.jpg7201280Senator Malcolm Robertshttps://www.malcolmrobertsqld.com.au/wp-content/uploads/2020/04/One-Nation-Logo1-300x150.pngSenator Malcolm Roberts2023-10-09 11:24:252023-10-09 11:24:30The Future is Digital Says Westpac CEO
