Members of the Future Fund board will be excluded from discussions and decisions that relate to their particular institution if there are potential conflict of interest issues.

But Fund chair, David Murray, said this would only occur on random basis. In response to questions from Senator Nick Sherry, opposition spokesperson for superannuation, in Senate estimates hearings last week, Murray said the board had put considerable efforts into managing conflicts of interest. “It is not likely, in the ordinary course of events, that conflicts would arise with that group or, to the extent that they do, we would only have to exclude individuals from discussions and decisions on a random basis, not on a continual basis,” Murray told the hearing. He said he did not expect there would be significant numbers of people unable to participate in discussions or decisions at any one point in time. The six board members include: John Mulcahy, chief executive officer and managing director of Suncorp; Trevor Rowe, QIC chair; Susan Doyle, chair of CSS/PSS; Robert Elstone, managing director of SFE Corporation; Jeffrey Brown, former partner of Sullivan & Cromwell; and Brian Watson, executive chairman of private equity investment management firm Georgica Associates. Murray said it would have been “nearly impossible” to appoint a suitably experienced board that did not have their own assets, superannuation funds or “involvements in things”.