Crown Resorts has accepted its failings and is working earnestly to address its deficiencies, according to the embattled casino giant’s lawyer Kanaga Dharmananda.
Crown Resorts has accepted its failings and is working earnestly to address its deficiencies, according to the embattled casino giant’s lawyer, Kanaga Dharmananda.
The address was one of several given as the second phase of the Perth Casino Royal Commission got underway today, with statements from counsel assisting Patricia Cahill, Crown’s lawyer, a lawyer representing the Gaming and Wagering Commission and the state’s Department of Local Government, Sport and Cultural Industries.
Mr Dharmananda told the hearing Crown was responding appropriately as the object of sustained scrutiny, addressing its deficiencies and working earnestly to change.
“[Crown] is not adopting the posture of defiance,” he said.
“There has been great change and those works are continuing.
“Some of the matters likely to be the subject of some attention in the inquiry happened under the watch of a different company, in effect.
“There has been change at the level of structure, ethos and people.
“Crown has committed to transform its processes for review and culture.”
Mr Dharmananda said the company had since invested in changes to its financial crime resourcing and team structure, training, transaction monitoring and regulatory reporting.
The second phase of the inquiry will assess the suitability of the Perth Casino licensee, with the commission expected to call a number of key witnesses in the coming days, including former Crown Resorts director John Poynton, who was also chair of Crown Perth, and Burswood director Maryna Fewster.
Crown Perth’s former director of 13 years Tim Roberts will also be called.
In the following week, various current and former executives of the Crown group will also be questioned, including Crown’s chief legal officer Joshua Preston, chief operating officer Lonnie Bossi, senior executive Claude Marais and executive Barry Felstead.
Crown chief financial officer Alan McGregor is set to be questioned on August 11, while executive chairman Helen Coonan will be examined on Thursday, August 12.
While the schedule has not yet been set in stone, commissioner Neville Owen told the hearing the second phase of the inquiry would likely be conducted in four two-week blocks.
The first will centre around the governance and operations of Crown Group’s Perth entities, how they relate to the broader company structure, and their interaction with the Gaming and Wagering Commission.
Then, the commission will review matters outstanding from the May hearings, corporate governance and management issues affecting the suitability of the Perth entities and Crown Resorts.
Finally, the commission will review the remediation efforts being made by the Crown and how they affect the local entities.
The commission hopes to complete the hearings by mid to late October, with closing statements by mid-December and responsive statements by mid-January, 2022.
On Friday, the state government granted the commission a four-month extension on the delivery of its final report.
The commission had requested more time to produce the final report and consider the findings and recommendations of the Victorian Royal Commission, which was also given a two-month extension on the delivery of its final report (now due mid-October).
The state government received the interim report on June 30, a product of 13 days of public hearings which centred around the state’s regulatory framework and how the Gaming and Wagering Commission of WA had carried out its functions.
That report is expected to be tabled in parliament when it next sits in August, with the final report now due by March 4 2022.
The state government announced the royal commission in March – the first such inquiry to be held in WA in two decades – to determine whether Crown Perth should keep its casino licence.
Commissioners Neville Owen, Lindy Jenkins, and Colin Murphy were appointed to lead the inquiry in the wake of a damning report by independent commissioner Patricia Bergen, which accused Crown of laundering money through subsidiaries’ bank accounts at its Perth and Melbourne operations.
Over the past two months, several prominent figures have stood before the commission, including Department of Local Government Sport and Cultural Industries director general Duncan Ord and former chief casino officer Michael Connolly.
