I am pleased to announce that the Administrator in Council has appointed Dr John Laker as a member and Chairman and Mr (Kerry) Ross Jones as a member and Deputy Chairman of the Australian Prudential Regulation Authority (APRA) for five-year terms commencing 1 July 2003.
The Government will also recommend to the Administrator at the next Federal Executive Council meeting on 30 June 2003 that he appoint Mr Stephen Somogyi as a member of APRA for a three-year term, also commencing 1 July 2003.
These appointments arise from the Australian Prudential Regulation Authority Amendment Act 2003. They are all full-time appointments.
Dr Laker, Mr Jones and Mr Somogyi bring considerable skill and relevant experience to these important positions. I am confident that each will make an extremely valuable contribution in his new role.
Dr Laker is currently Assistant Governor (Financial System) of the Reserve Bank of Australia (RBA), the Deputy Chair of the Payments System Board of the RBA, a board member of the Australian Prudential Regulation Authority and an RBA representative on the Council of Financial Regulators. He has held various positions in the RBA over the past twenty years and before that worked for the International Monetary Fund and the Treasury.
Mr Jones is currently a Commissioner at the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission and an Associate Professor at the University of Technology, Sydney (UTS). He has acted as a consultant to competition authorities in the United Kingdom, Canada and Argentina and has lectured on economics at the UTS for more than ten years.
Mr Somogyi is currently the Chief Executive Officer of the CPI Group Limited, a Commissioner of the Safety, Rehabilitation and Compensation Commission, Chairman of the Monash Institute of Health Services Research, Director of Collins Associates Limited, Councillor of the Institute of Actuaries of Australia, Director of the National Paper Council of Australia and Director of Bridgewater Lakes Estate Limited. He has extensive experience in the insurance industry both within Australia and overseas.
These are the first appointments made under the enhanced governance structure that the Government has introduced in response to recommendations made by the HIH Royal Commissioner, Justice Neville Owen. Under this structure, the three person full-time executive group replaces the APRA board. This executive group will be responsible and accountable for the operation and performance of APRA and thereby further strengthen Australia's existing prudential regulatory framework.
As the new governance arrangements involve the replacement of the APRA board, I wish to acknowledge publicly the substantial contribution that has been made by the members of that board and to thank them for that contribution.
APRA was formed in 1998 following the recommendations of the Financial System Inquiry, involving the integration of diverse functions and staff from the RBA, the Insurance and Superannuation Commission and a number of state financial sector regulators into a new organisation with very important prudential supervision responsibilities. This was a substantial and important task. The Government appreciates the important contribution that retiring Chairman, Dr Jeffrey Carmichael, Chief Executive Officer, Mr Graeme Thompson, and other members of the board have made to the achievement of this task and to meeting APRA's broader responsibilities over the period in which they have held those responsibilities.