New Macquarie Bank director David Whiteing
Former global chief operating officer of Standard Chartered Bank, David Whiteing, will join the Macquarie Bank board in September, bringing to three the number of bank-only non-executive directors Macquarie Group has appointed to the MBL board under an agreement with APRA to improve the bank’s governance.
However, there is some doubt as to whether Macquarie has actually fulfilled its commitment to appoint three BONDs to the bank board, given that one of them, Michael Coleman, served as a Macquarie Group director for 10 years.
Over the past year, Macquarie has responded to APRA’s concerns about the governance of its banking subsidiary by implementing a remediation plan covering governance, risk culture, remuneration and group structure.
The changes include establishing separate board audit, governance and compliance, risk and remuneration committees for the group and the bank.
Another change is the appointment of three bank-only non-executive directors to the bank board. The first of these, former banker Ian Saines, joined the bank board in May last year.
Then in July, Coleman, who had been on the group and bank boards for 10 years, retired from the group board and became the second bank-only non-executive director on the bank board.
After 10 years on the group and bank boards, it would be incumbent on Coleman and Macquarie chair Glenn Stevens to make the case that Coleman has not lost his independence from management over that time.
They have not done so, and it is open to argue that Macquarie has appointed only two genuine BONDs to the bank board and has failed in its undertaking to the regulator.