The legal team behind a Storm Financial class action has questioned the federal government’s relationship with the Commonwealth Bank of Australia (CBA) after the Deputy Prime Minister was seen wearing a t-shirt carrying the banking group’s logo.
In an open letter to Wayne Swan, Levitt Robinson Solicitors and Attorney principal solicitor Stewart Levitt said the appearance of Swan along the Cairns waterfront with the CBA logo across his shirt was “an affront to many hundreds of your own constituents”.
“The appearance of you, Deputy Prime Minister, openly ‘waving the CBA flag’ on your tee-shirt, has engendered scepticism among my clients concerning the true intentions of the government and ASIC towards CBA with regard to the Storm debacle, which both the government and the opposition have so far failed properly to address by bringing the culprits to account,” the letter said.
“[It is] both demoralising and hurtful – given the pendency of significant litigation both by ASIC and my clients against the CBA.”
Levitt claims the photograph of Swan published twice, once in 2008 and again last month, in the Brisbane Courier Mail wearing a CBA branded tee-shirt was a concern to the 3000 margin loan borrowers who lost more than $3 billion in the collapse of Storm.
In the letter, Levitt informed Swan that the claims the group’s clients has brought against the CBA include allegations the banking group engaged “unconscionable conduct towards Storm-referred customers under both ASIC and Trade Practices legislation” as well as allegedly engaging in conduct which was misleading and deceptive.
Storm Financial collapsed in January 2009.
