Tim Watts (Gellibrand, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

The Treasury Laws Amendment (ASIC Governance) Bill 2018 makes a series of changes to the governance of ASIC. For example, it allows for the appointment of an additional deputy chairman of ASIC. And it's not beyond time that we see change at ASIC. It's not beyond time that we see change in the enforcement of Australia's corporate laws. We know that ASIC sits at the heart of preventing the kinds of scandals that we've seen at the royal commission that is being held in Melbourne as we speak. We know that it's important because the Treasurer told us. He told us for 600 days that there was no need for a royal commission into the banking and financial sector in Australia because we had ASIC, a corporate watchdog that was 'a tough cop on the beat'.

What is the result of it? We've seen this government get every call wrong when it comes to banking and financial services regulation, and they have made the wrong calls because they have got the wrong priorities. The government, led by Prime Minister Turnbull, are in it for the big end of town. They are in it for the banks, not for rural Australians. They make the wrong calls because they have got the wrong priorities. That's why they fought this royal commission for 600 days. It's why, even in the face of ongoing shocking revelations and disclosures from members of the public to representatives in this parliament, when the government were dragged kicking and screaming to initiate this royal commission, they made it very clear that they didn't want it to happen. We heard it called unnecessary, a populist whinge and reckless. And on the day they caved in and initiated the royal commission, it was called regrettable.

Since then we've seen the most shocking revelations of rorts and rip-offs in the banking and financial sector in Australia, new revelations that we did not know about before this royal commission was initiated. We have heard revelations about banks charging fees to customers who they knew were dead. We have heard about banks charging customers fees for services they didn't provide, services that they knew they weren't providing. We've heard endless stories of dodgy financial planners giving self-interested advice and ripping off their clients. We have heard stories about financial planners impersonating their clients on the phone to superannuation funds. We have heard them giving advice to switch to a super fund associated with them. That would have incurred exit fees. In one example that was heard at the royal commission, that would have cost one man a quarter of his superannuation in exit fees. Another person was given advice by her financial advisor to bundle her superannuation into a self-managed super fund in a way that would have cost her $500,000. It would have helped the celebrity financial planner who gave her the advice to do that. Half a million dollars! We've heard about it being common practice at NAB to falsely witness documents inside the company, documents dealing with the life savings of Australians. We've heard about one in 20 pieces of financial advice coming out of ANZ being 'inappropriate' because the advice was either in the self-interest of the financial planner or they didn't appropriately investigate other options for advice.

Why do I flag these issues? I flag these issues because, in every one of these cases I have talked about, the misconduct occurred during the 600 days that the Turnbull government was delaying the royal commission. It wasn't historical conduct; it was happening while the Turnbull government said everything was fine. It was happening while we had that 'tough cop on the beat' protecting Australians—ASIC, the subject of the bill before the House today. Despite this, the government continues to refuse to apologise for this delay. We've heard Prime Minister Turnbull say it was a political mistake.

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