The woman tasked with guiding troubled consultancy firm PwC through the early stages of the tax leak scandal says she was disappointed not to stay on to finish the job.
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Kristin Stubbins, who was promoted to the top job after then-CEO Tom Seymour stepped down, told a parliamentary hearing on Tuesday she would have liked to have continued in the role to manage the unfolding crisis.
Ms Stubbins acted in the CEO job for several months before UK partner Kevin Burrowes was brought in by global management to take over.
"I did want to continue, I wanted to own the outcomes of what had happened and I felt that I could lead the Australian firm," Ms Stubbins told the parliamentary committee set up to look into ethical issues in the sector.
"I wouldn't say I was surprised (by the decision to bring in a new CEO), I was very disappointed."
Yet the former interim CEO also understood the firm wanted an experienced leader with the gravity of the international firm behind them to manage the scandal.
"If put myself in the shoes of PwC international, there was a brand crisis."
Labor senator Deborah O'Neill and Greens senator Barbara Pocock both suggested it could be viewed as an example of a woman being appointed to the top ranks to deal with a crisis before being exited.
"There were 30 years of really very hard work, I don't doubt, within PwC, that ends with you coming into a massive truncated clean up, which you are dismissed from before you want it to be," Senator Pocock said on Tuesday.
PwC came under fire last year after it came to light that staff shared confidential tax information from the Treasury department to drum up new business in the private sector.
The firm has since divested its government consultancy business, sacked several staff members, and been fined nearly $100,000 by a disciplinary tribunal.
Ms Stubbins, who appeared before the parliamentary committee as a private citizen, said she was "deeply upset" by the behaviours of some of the partners.
"I'm also very upset that the seriousness of these issues was kept hidden from the broader partnership for so many years."
"That points to the uncomfortable truth that despite PwC Australia doing many good things in recent years, there were underlying cultural issues of which most of us were unaware, and which Dr Switkowski calls out in his report."
Ms Stubbins was a member of the executive board from 2020 and 2023 and said she was given a couple of "brief verbal updates" on legacy tax matters that were described as "largely resolved".
"When I was appointed acting CEO on the ninth of May 2023, I was stunned to learn about the extent of these issues," she said in an opening statement.
"As you would expect, I sought to understand the situation in great detail, and I quickly gleaned that the issues were much more than individual breaches of confidentiality, but were cultural in nature.
"And that need to be thoroughly investigated."
Australian Associated Press
