ERROL PARKER | Editor-at-large | Contact

The sun-bleached sack of mayonnaise that used to run one of Australia’s largest banks was forced to step down this morning after it was discovered his institution laundered money for people allegedly linked to child exploitation.

Westpac was pinged earlier in the week by our nation’s financial intelligence agency, AUSTRAC, which accused the bank of more than 23m breaches of anti-money laundering and counter-terror finance laws.

Westpac CEO Brian Hartzer is leaving Westpac with a few million dollars to see him out. But he still insists that he’s a victim in all this and shareholders, investors and government authorities are just looked for someone to blame for all this.

“I’m happy to be the fall guy for this,” said Hartzer in Sydney this morning.

“But that makes me a victim, too. I’m the one who’s lost his job. I’m the one who’s lost his dignity. I’ve lost everything. I’m ruined,”

“The media also had a role to play in my professional assassination. They care as much about those children as Westpac does. Which is fuck all. If they did care, they’d be able to see past the fact that I didn’t do any of this, I was just the one responsible for it,”

“Lucky me and the rest of the banking community knew this was going to happen for a few weeks and had the chance to short the living shit out of Westpac. Guess things aren’t all that bad.”

“That’s all from me, guys. Res ipsa loquitur, let the good times roll.”

Mr Hartzer then laughed, got up and left the press conference without answering another question.

More to come.

