Briefs: NAB CPO heads RBA HR, RBNZ tweaks to regulation, Bascand departed under a cloud 24 January 2022 5:35AM Banking Day staff Briefs, Appointments, RBA, Finance regulation The Reserve Bank of Australia has appointed Karlee Hughes as Head of Human Resources Department. She replaces Michael Andersen, who has been appointed as Chief Representative Europe in the Reserve Bank's London office after four years as Head of Human Resources. Hughes re-joined the RBA last week from NAB where she was Chief People Officer, Corporate and Institutional Bank. She will report to Guy Debelle, the RBA’s Deputy Governor. The Reserve Bank of NZ and the Financial Markets Authority have released their finalised framework for assessing the systemic importance of Financial Market Infrastructures (FMIs) including payment systems, securities settlement systems, central securities depositories, central counterparties, and trade repositories. The two regulators will next be consulting on an exposure draft of the standards. The RBNZ is also seeking feedback on proposals to improve the readability of the assurance reports required on banks’ disclosure statements, after hearing concerns some of the reports are complex and hard to read. It says it is consulting on changes to "rationalise the structure of the assurance reports and hence improve their readability" without compromising the level of assurance provided on disclosure statements. The consultation is open until 15 March 2022. In mid-January the RBNZ confirmed in emails to news media that former deputy governor Geoff Bascand left the bank a week earlier than planned over a breach of protocol. Bascand's departure was originally scheduled for early January but was altered after he leaked internal information about the RBNZ's leadership reorganisation to an undisclosed third party. Bascand was deputy governor with the Bank since May 2013, and was also a member of the Monetary Policy Committee.