The Australian Prudential Regulation Authority (APRA) today announced the disqualification of Mr Michael van Rens, Mr Anthony Glass, Mr Terrence Lawson and Mr Damian Foley from acting as trustees, investment managers or custodians of a superannuation entity or responsible officers of a superannuation trustee corporation, investment manager or custodian under the Superannuation Industry (Supervision) Act 1993 (the SIS Act).

All four individuals are former trustee directors of the Perth-based Strategic Capital Superannuation Fund (the Fund), which manages some $10.6 million of assets on behalf of 488 members.

The disqualifications follow a formal APRA investigation into the Fund’s affairs, which began in March 2003 and is still continuing, that has to date uncovered multiple suspected breaches of the SIS Act by the former trustee company.

APRA replaced the former trustee in April 2003 on the grounds that its conduct may have placed, or may place, the Fund in an unsatisfactory financial position and appointed Deloitte Management Pty Ltd as Acting Trustee to reconstruct the accounts and secure the Fund assets. This firm is associated with the Deloitte accounting group.

The Australian Securities and Investments Commission are also investigating matters concerning the Fund.

The Australian Prudential Regulation Authority (APRA) is the prudential regulator of the financial services industry. It oversees banks, credit unions, building societies, general insurance and reinsurance companies, life insurance, friendly societies, and most members of the superannuation industry.APRA is funded largely by the industries that it supervises. It was established on 1 July 1998.APRA currently supervises institutions holding approximately $1.8 trillion in assets for 20 million Australian depositors, policyholders and superannuation fund members.