Obliged by convention to spruik a defiantly reformist report on the finance industry from the Productivity Commission at a business lunch today, treasurer Scott Morrison ignored the most compelling material and grasped at populist ephemera.
Advised in clear-cut terms to jettison Peter Costello's pet "Four Pillars" policy, Morrison omitted this label from his speech, and wandered around the underlying arguments.
Noting the obvious, that "banking and insurance markets [occupy] an entrenched, dominant market position," Morrison glossed over the substance of the commission's call to leave any mooted mergers between big banks to the ACCC and the case law.
Dominance, the Treasurer suggested, "doesn't mean competition is weak as a result. It is the exploitation of that power that has the potential to constrain competition and deliver a poor outcome to customers.
"The PC notes that because of the unique and dominant position the major banks have in the market, they have been able to insulate themselves from competition and largely bat away major economic shocks like the GFC without taking a significant hit to their profits."
In one concession to the meat in the PC report, Morrison agreed "there is evidence that they have sustained prices above competitive levels, offered inferior quality products to some groups of customers, subsumed much of the broker industry and taken action that would inhibit the expansion of smaller competitors in some markets."
He added: "All are indicators of the use of market power to the detriment of customers,'' the report claims," as if he doubts the analysis.
Diving into boilerplate: "We need our banks strong, stable and profitable."
"Much of Morrison's talk covers safe, familiar terrain; open banking, the Banking Executive Accountability Regime, the equity crowdfunding regime, predatory behaviour in the credit card market, Comprehensive Credit Reporting and weirdly claims credit for "the launch of the New Payments Platform" - whose correct name Treasury or his speechwriters did not know.
The "drop" of Scott Morrison's speech this morning into the Financial Review, there are hints this may have caused a bit of a ruckus, such as at the Australian Prudential Regulation Authority, a regulator unused to being punched in the guts by its wonkish mates from the Productivity Commission.
"Mr Morrison will take a swipe at prudential regulation, saying it 'has had a dulling effect on customers' and 'put us to sleep'," the newspaper, presumably with an advance copy of this Morrison talk, reported in its splash today.
Edits may have been the order of the day, the second of those quotes missing in the text published at the Treasury website this afternoon
Morrison included ritual and conservative language regarding APRA.
"Regulation has played a pivotal role in making our banking and financial system stronger, in a prudential sense," the treasurer said.
"This has always been the prudential regulators job, and I have nothing but praise for the work of APRA and Wayne Byers to this end."
But, Morrison allowed, "this hasn't necessarily made the customer any stronger. It is fair to say, nor was it likely it wasn't designed to.
"This does not reflect poorly on regulators, but the regulations and goals we task them to deliver and perform against."
The treasurer spoke earlier today to the Australian British Chamber of Commerce in Sydney.