Assistant Minister for Finance David Coleman, tells Ross there’s “ample room for improvement” for our banking sector.

An interim report from the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) has revealed Australia’s mortgage market is worth a cool $1.3 trillion and the big four have most of the pie.

Commonwealth Bank, Westpac, NAB and ANZ along with Macquarie Bank account for 84% of the market’s mortgages.

The ACCC is looking into whether mortgage pricing is fair to consumers or whether it’s favouring the big end of town.

They’ve found new borrowers pay lower interest than existing borrowers and there are glaring signs of a lack of vigorous price competition.

Mr Coleman says there’s evidently “ample room for improvement”.

“We were concerned about a lack of competition and the fact we’d only had one new banking licence issued in Australia in a ten year period.

“That tells you a lot.

“Scrutiny is important because the banks need to know that from now on this ACCC monitoring unit is going to be watching them very closely.”

Click PLAY below to hear the full interview with David Coleman

ACCC Chairman Rod Sims tells more about the big four’s conduct.

“They’re looking at each other… they’re aiming to not lead the market down.

“They’re not really competing amongst themselves on price.

“We need more competition and we’ll be looking at how that can come about.”

Click PLAY below for the full interview with Rod Sims