The Hayne Royal Commission into the banking and finance industry
has so far uncovered and brought about admissions of widespread
unfair and dishonest practices by institutional lenders and
financial services providers. It is being reported that
prosecutions are expected to follow.
Unfair and dishonest lending practices have a long history.
However, they are by no means confined to publicly listed and
institutional lenders. Around the country, private money lenders
too, have been found to have made deals with borrowers that fall so
far below community standards of acceptable commercial practice
that the courts have refused to enforce them.
A practice that has attracted the Courts' particular
opprobrium is known as "asset lending". Asset lenders
take out, and seek to foreclose on, mortgages against the homes of
vulnerable people without regard for the borrower's ability to
repay. A particularly immoral instance of such conduct that we have
seen involves naming
