Ms Annmarie O'Connor:

The strategic plan is to be welcomed. It will be a critical document for each credit union as it moves forward.

Our concern about the strategic plan is that at present there does not seem to be provision made for the areas of social inclusion, financial inclusion or social lending. If there is to be a place for those areas to be addressed specifically or in detail, it is in the context of the strategic plan.

In particular, one of the ideas MABS proposed is that there would be a social audit of the common bond area. That is important in giving the credit union a full understanding of the demographic of its membership. That could include many different matters such as the demographic of the membership within the common bond, the membership's housing status, etc. It would give the credit union a much better understanding of its membership and that would feed into other areas such as risk management. We suggested that in the strategic plan, in terms of the way it is described in the heads, that area is somewhat neglected.