Member Article

Project Pay founder Louise Stewart relocates business in UK to escape political interference

Financial technology business, ProjectPay, says Macquarie Bank, infamously known as the "Vampire Kangaroo" for its aggressive profit-taking, terminated their business relationship after the Morrison government made negative comments about its founder, raising concerns about possible political interference.

Founder Louise Stewart set up ProjectPay to provide payment protection for contractors in the construction industry and was in the advanced stages of a two-year integration partnership with Macquarie Bank when they abruptly ended the relationship.

As a result, Ms Stewart relocated her business to the UK and ProjectPay has received over £1m public funding from Innovate UK to develop the platform, providing payment protection for construction industry projects, securing funds from builder insolvency, and guaranteeing fast payment for contractors across the building supply chain. The platform is backed by Lloyds Bank in the UK.

Ms Stewart, former chair of an Australian Subcontractors Association, claims she was effectively ‘dumped’ in Australia for political reasons – similar to the experience of British politician Nigel Farage, who lost his account at the private bank, Coutts, because of his political affiliation.

The move came shortly after she had stood as an independent in the 2019 federal elections in Curtin, Western Australia, campaigning against the Liberal Party on a promise to introduce statutory protection for payments on building projects that would have protected homeowners and small business subcontractors from devastating losses when builders collapse.

She received an email from the bank in October 2019, citing disparaging comments made about her by Mathias Cormann, former Australian Minister for Finance and the current OECD Secretary-General, as a reputational risk for the bank and warning they would have to “work through the negative sentiment” if they were to continue with the integration partnership. The email asked Ms Stewart for further information and assurances but added: “I can’t guarantee they will appease the bank to a point where we can proceed with integration”.

ProjectPay says it had previously passed the bank’s compliance review and they were proceeding with an agreed business model to integrate the payment platform. Sensitive documents had been shared and technical teams had been engaged and were already working on delivering the integration. 

A month earlier, Macquarie Bank had also terminated a 20-year relationship with another independent, who also ran against the Morrison government.

Ms Stewart has made a subject access request to Macquarie Bank under the Privacy Act 1998, requesting details of any internal correspondence or discussions between executives about her business and the reasons for terminating the relationship. So far Macquarie has refused to comply with their obligations under the Act and has not provided any information.

She has also lodged Freedom of Information requests with the Department of Finance and the Treasury, seeking any information about the relationship between herself, ProjectPay and Macquarie Bank which originated from either civil servants, or the departments’ ministers, Mathias Cormann and Josh Frydenberg, both of whom had well publicised dealings with the bank in 2019, the election year.  

ProjectPay has recently submitted a complaint to the National Anti-Corruption Commission, which is now being investigated in Australia.

Having ‘debanked’ Project Pay, Macquarie Bank is now rolling out a very similar business model with a competing start-up set up by ex-Macquarie Bankers. However, unlike Project Pay, which protects builders’ payment rights, the new platform makes developers custodians of project funds and fails  to protect downstream subcontractors.

Louise Stewart, founder of ProjectPay, said:

The recent actions of Macquarie Bank and its former employees raise serious ethical concerns. Through our innovative payment platform, ProjectPay aims to bring fairness, transparency, and financial security to all construction project stakeholders. Unfortunately, the behaviour exhibited by bad actors like Macquarie and their copycat start-up shows a blatant disregard for what is right. We remain committed to upholding integrity as we work to transform the payment process using new technologies."

This was posted in Bdaily's Members' News section by Lucie Hayes .