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The MFAA has said it will continue to hold the media accountable after it announced it had received an apology from The Australian.
The industry body rushed to the defence of the broker industry after a critical column in The Australian linked the broker model to the US sub-prime crisis.
The column was published after ASIC announced that two Melbourne men had been arrested for carrying out an alleged mortgage fraud valued at $110 million.
MFAA chief executive Siobhan Hayden said the journalist responsible for the critical column, Andrew Main, had “apologised” for including incorrect figures in his column and had corrected the online version.
“He also said that he attributed careless mortgage lending in Australia to the banks more so than to brokers,” Ms Hayden told The Adviser.
“He mentioned that he’s not trying to get at the vast majority of brokers, but stood by his critique of brokers who are not doing the right thing.”
Ms Hayden said she will continue to voice her opinion whenever the industry is misrepresented, and that more can be done to educate the media.
“It’s all about conversations. Over the course of my tenure in the role, I would like to talk to journalists who write about our industry and profession so that they can better understand what brokers do and the rigour at which they’re held to,” she said.
Ms Hayden said one of the big misconceptions that industry outsiders have is how hard it is for brokers to lie about their earnings to get a better loan outcome.
“There are so many checks and balances to confirm a customer's income, such as tax returns, payslips and bank statements, and I don’t think this is understood,” she said.
“Also, when loans are in arrears, it doesn’t benefit anybody. Brokers don’t get a trail commission on those loans, so the notion of a broker wanting to set up a fraudulent loan for the purpose of getting a benefit from the income of that is a misnomer because they don’t get paid if it’s in default.”
[Related: Alleged $110m mortgage fraud may have been inevitable]
