The guardians of the public accounts, particularly in the public service, have never manifested much intense interest in white collar crime of the type manifested by old colleagues or people with whom they have constant interchanges. Treasury bureaucrats, for example, had to be dragged kicking and screaming into the royal commission into the banks, insisting all along that nothing bad would be found, and that any systemic issues had already been resolved by its wise stewardship.
They persuaded successive ministers of the essential honesty and stability of the system, and the risk that any asking of rude questions might accidentally cause it to totter. They persuaded ministers and prime ministers of their conviction that chaps with backgrounds very similar to their own would not stoop to do anything that was dishonest. That was an opinion echoed back to the public by all the great and good of industry and high finance at the lobby dinners, donor functions and private meetings and over the confidential phone calls by which the wisdom of the chaps informs treasurers, prime ministers and reserve banks and prudential regulators of the mood and the temperature of the national economy. One invisible hand washing the other, assisted by a healthy interchange of post-retirement appointments, even for ministers.
