It is a fallacy to portray the timetable for liquidity rules' reform for banks in Australia as being ahead of the world, John Laker, chair of the Australian Prudential Regulation Authority, argued at a Senate committee hearing on Wednesday."The majority of the internationally active banks in the world are already meeting the 100 per cent [liquidity coverage ratio]. We are not in the front of the pack.""My view has been that we should be in the leading part of the convoy, because arrangements in Australia would allow our banks to meet that target by setting up a facility with the Reserve Bank of Australia, so they do not have to adjust their balance sheets as they might in some other countries to meet that requirement. "The major international banks are already there and it is not part of the convoy we want to be at the back of."Laker explained that because of the need for local banks to rely on the planned committed liquidity facility "no Australian banks could get there without the facility from the Reserve Bank, for the very good reason that there are not enough high quality liquid assets in Australia. "Because that facility will be available to them by the beginning of January 2015, they can meet the requirement on that date. We are by no means leading the field on this one."Laker added that "the International Monetary Fund continually draws attention to the vulnerability of the Australian banking system to dislocation in offshore funding markets because our banks continue to rely on those markets."We saw in the latter part of 2008 the challenge it poses when those markets became severely disrupted. We think it incumbent on our banking system to demonstrate, given they have this reliance, that they are able to meet liquidity pressures."