, he played the dual role of showing contrition at the scandal engulfing the super fund he chairs and promoting the performance and governance structure of industry funds, but he didn't mention trust.
While board structure and investment performance may be correlated it doesn't mean it's the cause of the investment performance. A number of factors are at play. Liberal senator Andrew Bragg, who chairs the senate inquiry into super, says industry funds have an unsustainable governance model.He said it will look at capital requirements, governance and board relationships with sponsoring organisations as well as claims handling in light of ASIC's decision to Cbus alleging systemic claims-handling failures, after lengthy delays in death and disability claims.
Some members are already vocalising their complaints via social media, thousands have lodged complaints with the Australian Financial Complaints Authority and hundreds are going to mainstream media. In business, complacency is the silent killer of success. The upshot is if the standard of service doesn't improve, members will take their funds elsewhere, including into self-managed super funds, which recently hit more than $1 trillion.
It has enabled some industry funds to invest more heavily in longer-term, higher yielding and less liquid investments than retail funds.