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Jacinta nodded. “There is nothing to stop anyone making this discovery. We’re lucky it’s not hit the media already.”
Malcolm put his palm down on the table, not a slap, but not far off. “So what if some hack discovers it.”
“That would be uncomfortable for us,” said Henry.
“More than uncomfortable,” Constance countered. “It’d be a huge hit to our brand, another reason to make the bank bashing lobby groups feral and bring the regulators down on us, if not the government.”
Malcolm looked across the table. He singled each of the board members out for individual attention. “I do not agree. No shareholder is going to care. This is beyond the purview of the regulators. We won’t lose a single customer.” He abruptly cut off eye contact and slumped in his chair. He could be theatrical if he felt it warranted. “It’s a storm of Jacinta’s own making.” He looked at his hands on the table, a sure signal he was about to make it personal. “Frankly I’m surprised and disappointed in her.”
Henry coughed. Papers were shuffled. Briefcases snapped open. She could take it on the chin and hope the connection never came to life, never needed to be dealt with, or that Malcolm was right and if it did surface, it made for an uncomfortable few days before everything went back to normal.
But if she did that, if she did nothing at all, it was the same as saying the bank had no moral obligation to the people who made up its customer base.
“I would like to discuss this, Henry,” she said.
Henry played his part. He got up from the table, went to the sideboard and poured himself a coffee. “I suggest a five minute break and then we reconvene to hear what Jacinta has to say.”
“I agree.” Constance stood and strode out of the room, taking a bathroom break, no doubt. It was a good idea to do the same, to take herself out of Malcolm’s orbit.
“Jacinta.”
Too late. She turned to him and he said in his normal booming voice, “What are you doing? This is ridiculous.”
“We have to acknowledge some kind of moral obligati
on in this.” She fought the desire to pitch her voice low. If Malcolm wanted a domestic argument played out in front of the board he could have it.
“You’re going to stand in front of my board and suggest because this madman was a customer we’re somehow responsible.”
“I’m not saying we’re responsible. We didn’t make the bomb. I am saying we should discuss the issue and decide where we stand on it.”
He turned away. “There is nothing to discuss.”
“They died outside my apartment, Dad. I tried to go out and help.”
He stopped still. He grunted. Not because he was struck by the argument but because she’d called him Dad. She took a breath. That’d been a dumb thing to do. It called his bluff on making it personal, and it reinforced the fact they had nothing truly personal at stake. She hadn’t called him Dad since he sent her off to boarding school. He’d been Malcolm from the time she was fourteen.
He kept his back to her. “While I think of it, I want us out of that sponsorship and anything like it where people could get hurt.”
She stepped around him to look in his eyes. “So you do understand what I’m saying about our moral oblig—”
“I think sponsorships of these people power events are a waste of money. This is a good reason to get out.”
“If everyone is ready,” called Henry.
Jacinta took her seat. She watched the other board members bring coffee back to the table, turn off their phones and settle in. No one had tried to approach her to discuss the issue; no one had tried to engage Malcolm either. That was a sure sign she didn’t have support.
Henry had warned her, told her to be careful she wasn’t acting out of shock, out of outrage. He’d reminded her they were not in the humanitarian business. Their sole objective and their obligation to shareholders was profit. There was no room for sentimentality. She’d swayed him with the argument that it was better to be on the front foot, to acknowledge the unfortunate connection and to be prepared to answer charges of neglect of care, than be surprised by a headline and an anti-bank campaign as a result. It was a rational argument and Henry was persuaded.
But it was more than that. Jacinta had stalked the executive floor corridors late at night, unable to shake the idea that there were other potential Roger Kincaids out there. People pushed to the brink by circumstances outside their control. Most of them wouldn’t become psychopathic killers overnight, and Wentworth wasn’t to blame for the way individual people choose to act, but still. Was their business not big enough, profitable enough to consider, through policies and procedures, how people might be affected and work with that understanding in mind? Would it not make this part of the world she had control over better if a customer’s financial security was more assured than threatened by the bank’s actions?
“Jacinta,” said Henry. “When you’re ready.”
She stood, looked down the table. She’d already lost Malcolm. Henry would vote with his conscience, she had to win the rest.
She started by reminding them of the bank’s slogan: Bank for Life. And their customer promise; a charter of expectations customers could be guaranteed of, none of which suggested being made jobless, and homeless. She went on to propose there were ways of working to put services in place to prevent financial catastrophe affecting their customers.
Malcolm interrupted three times. The first to laugh, “Change the bloody slogan then, if that’s the problem.” The second to say no bank was responsible for people’s idiocy with money and the third to force Henry’s hand.
