Rod Sims to replace Graeme Samuel as ACCC chair

Treasurer Wayne Swan has announced economist and experienced regulator Rod Sims as his recommendation to replace outgoing Australian Competition and Consumer Commission chair Graeme Samuel when he steps down on July 31.

Swan has also named Gary Medcraft as his recommendation to replace current Australian Securities and Investments Commission chair, Tony D’Aloisio.

“Mr Sims and Mr Medcraft are just the people we need to keep standing up for competition and also to protect the integrity and stability of financial markets,” Swan told reporters in Canberra this morning.

Council of Small Business of Australia chief executive Peter Strong, who has been critical of Samuel as being too close to big business, welcomed the recommendation of Sims.

“We support it and we look forward to talking to him about the small business environment,” he told SmartCompany.

While Sims does not appear to have direct small business experience, he does have an impressive background in both the public and private sectors.

He was formerly deputy secretary of the Department of Prime Minister and Cabinet under Bob Hawke, has served as chairman of the Independent Pricing and Regulatory Tribunal in NSW and is a key advisor to Labor’s multi-party climate change committee.

He is currently a director of economic consultancy Port Jackson Partners Limited.

Strong isn’t concerned by Sims’ lack of direct small business involvement.

“If he can engage with the rest of his commissioners, then it shouldn’t matter because there is some really good small business experience there. One of the problems [with Samuel] is that it has appeared to be a one-man-band.”

“If he can work with the likes of Michael Schaper, who is very good, then it will work well.”

Strong says the key issues he wants to talk to Sims about are the regulation of small business tenancy matters and the regulation of the franchising sector.

He will also be looking to discuss the role of the ACCC in regulating online retail, which has become the subject of controversy since the start of the year, with retailers complaining that they are being undercut by overseas retailers who don’t need to charge GST on goods under $1,000.

“I want to talk about making sure we can keep a level playing field,” Strong says.

The announcement of Swan’s support of Sims – the economist will still need to be approved by the states before he formally takes the job in a few months time – ends months of speculation about Samuel’s intentions.

While Samuel announced to staff his intention to step down in early April, the ACCC has refused to publically confirm he is going.

The last year of his reign as ACCC chairman has been tinged with controversy over Samuel’s ownership of a stake in the DFO Factory Outlet chain, which came close to collapse last year.

Samuel’s co-investors in DFO, rich list entrepreneurs David Goldberger and David Wieland, launched an extraordinary public attack against Samuel, calling for an inquiry into what their former business partner knew about the problems at shopping centre chain DFO.

Goldberger and Wieland, speaking through their lawyer Leon Zwier of high-profiled Melbourne firm Arnold Block Leibler, told The Australian that they want a “full, open and transparent inquiry about DFO” and potential conflicts of interest with Samuel’s role as ACCC chair.

“If the ACCC does not maintain the highest standards of governance, the ACCC as a regulator cannot make either criticism, or demands, of boards to ensure executive officers remedy corporate culture and comply with the Australian anti-trust law,” Zwier said.

Samuel denied any wrongdoing and said he held all his investments in a blind trust.

New ASIC chief Gary Medcraft joined ASIC as a commissioner in February 2009.