Suggestions jailed FAI chief Rodney Adler agreed to a “plea bargain” to reduce his sentence got short shrift from the Australian Securities and Investments Commission (ASIC) in Federal Parliament last week.

ASIC Head of Enforcement Jan Redfern and Melbourne barrister Peter Clark told a Senate Estimates Committee hearing that establishing Mr Adler’s guilt “to sufficient criminal standard, in admissible form” was the real reason behind his minimum two-and-a-half year sentence in April.

While the pair said they “very fully” investigated the recommendations made by the HIH Royal Commission in 2003, they told the committee there was simply not enough evidence to run a criminal conviction.

Mr Clark, who assisted ASIC’s HIH investigations, took the committee through some of the charges Mr Adler could have faced, showing how prosecution would have been difficult.

Regarding Mr Adler’s involvement in selling FAI Insurance to HIH in 1998, Mr Clarke said establishing proof that Mr Adler knew FAI’s reserves were inadequate was needed to charge him criminally.