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Speaker 1: It turns out that the government did get lobbied by

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Speaker 1: the Banking Association to make a law change to prevent

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Speaker 1: potentially costly law action class action lawsuits. You know, we've

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Speaker 1: been talking about this government's going to change things retrospectively

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Speaker 1: so a couple of Australian banks don't have to potentially

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Speaker 1: pay out fines to Kiwi customers in this class action.

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Speaker 1: Last month, the Minister now Responsible Scotsson told us the

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Speaker 1: banks hadn't called for this. I've met with the Bankers

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Speaker 1: Association and they aren't calling for it. I mean, come

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Speaker 1: off at why would you people be making this change

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Speaker 1: if it wasn't for the fact that the banks wanted it.

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Speaker 2: Well, well you might think that here th.

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Speaker 1: Gene Tibschraney is The Herald's Wellington Business editor who's been

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Speaker 1: looking into this and with us. Now hey, you know,

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Speaker 1: hey Heather, now what's going on here? Is he just

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Speaker 1: not across the detail?

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Speaker 2: Well, you know that would be the generous view of this.

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Speaker 2: The government most definitely was lobbied by the banks. The

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Speaker 2: banks have for years wanted the government to change the

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Speaker 2: way the law is applied to a period between twenty

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Speaker 2: fifteen and twenty nineteen, so that if the banks are

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Speaker 2: taken to court for failing to disclose the right information

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Speaker 2: about loans to their customers, so that the penalty that

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Speaker 2: the banks face isn't too high. As it stands, banks

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Speaker 2: have to reimburse customers all their interest costs and fees

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Speaker 2: for the period of the breach, regardless of how serious

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Speaker 2: that breach is. The banks don't like that because of

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Speaker 2: course it exposes them to you know, like potentially hundreds

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Speaker 2: of millions of dollars in costs. So they've been calling

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Speaker 2: for this change now. Actually, interestingly, yesterday we got a

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Speaker 2: bunch of documents from the government. We can see that

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Speaker 2: about a year ago the bank's association wrote to the

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Speaker 2: minister specifically to say can you please make this change,

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Speaker 2: and then later throughout the year last year the Ministry

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Speaker 2: MB officials met with ASB and A and zed the

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Speaker 2: two banks that have been taken to court to get

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Speaker 2: their two cents on this issue. So when Scott Symptom

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Speaker 2: says they weren't lobbied, they most definitely were.

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Speaker 1: Well, of course they were. I mean in anybody with

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Speaker 1: any inside, like anybody who understands how these things work,

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Speaker 1: which is pretty much everybody would understand that asked for it.

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Speaker 1: But I mean, am I, there is the outside possibility

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Speaker 1: that it was Andrew Bailey, who was the previous minister,

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Speaker 1: who was lobbied, And there is an outside possibility that's

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Speaker 1: somewhere along the line in the handover from Andrew to Scott.

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Speaker 1: Scott just didn't realize the banks that asked for it.

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Speaker 1: Am I being too generous?

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Speaker 2: I mean, that is quite possibly what happened. But you know,

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Speaker 2: it is worrying because you know, that would suggest that

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Speaker 2: he's making this law change which has quite severe consequences,

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Speaker 2: like the penalties that the two banks face could be

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Speaker 2: in the hundreds of millions of dollars. It's a lot

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Speaker 2: of money. Yes, to think that he's making a change

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Speaker 2: like that without sort of understanding the broader context or

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Speaker 2: the different players involved is concerning.

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Speaker 1: It is concerning, and I'm starting to see a little

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Speaker 1: bit of a pattern of this emerging with Scott Simpson. Now,

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Speaker 1: I can't imagine that the lawyer who is representing the

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Speaker 1: kei We clients in the class action is stoked about

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Speaker 1: this revelation.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, exactly. I actually just talked to him, Scott Russell.

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Speaker 2: He is sort of disgusted by this situation because you know,

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Speaker 2: it's it's fine if officials talk to banks, that's all good.

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Speaker 2: But you'd think that they'd talk to the other side

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Speaker 2: as well. You'd think that they'd talk to him, and

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Speaker 2: they didn't do that. Now you might just think, well,

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Speaker 2: they didn't think to call him up, why should they?

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Speaker 2: But he specifically emailed MB a few days before the

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Speaker 2: Bankers Association emailed Andrew Bailey saying that he was interested

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Speaker 2: in this issue. Scott Russell, you know, specifically asked them,

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Speaker 2: are you considering making this law change retrospective, because of

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Speaker 2: course that would affect the court case that he's involved with.

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Speaker 2: An MB official said no. So in June last year

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Speaker 2: they said no. You know, a few days later the

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Speaker 2: bankers email and say can you look into this thing?

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Speaker 2: They end up looking into it, they end up making

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Speaker 2: the change, and the first the public knows of this

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Speaker 2: is when the government introduces the bill to Parliament in

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Speaker 2: March this year. So all this stuff was happening behind

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Speaker 2: closed doors. We didn't know about it until it happened. Now.

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Speaker 2: Scott Russell is obviously not happy about that.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, I can imagine Jannay, thank you so much, really

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Speaker 1: appreciate your insight. Jane tub Trainey, the Herald's Wellington Business editor.

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Speaker 1: For more from Heather Duplessy Allen Drive, Listen live to

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