Andrew Leigh (Fenner, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Assistant Treasurer) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I move:

That all words after "That" be omitted with a view to substituting the following words:

"whilst not declining to give the bill a second reading, the House notes the Government's failure to commit to a full suite of measures to strengthen the consumer watchdog, including:

(1) increasing the maximum penalties for anti-competitive conduct;

(2) cracking down on payday lenders;

(3) providing the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission with an independent market studies function;

(4) increasing the litigation budget of the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission;

(5) requiring car manufacturers to share technical information with independent mechanics on commercially fair and reasonable terms, with safeguards that enable environmental, safety and security-related technical information to be shared with the independent sector; and

(6) prioritising cases that disproportionately affect disadvantaged Australians".

It is always a good day when the coalition belatedly adopts Labor's policies. On 15 June 2016, Labor called on the government to raise the penalties for ripping off consumers. We did so following a succession of scandals in which firms had seen penalties for anticonsumer conduct as simply the cost of doing business. We had that period from 2011 to 2015 when Nurofen, one of the big shots in the pain business, began selling a series of painkillers said to target pain in the body—Nurofen Back Pain, Nurofen Period Pain, Nurofen Migraine Pain and Nurofen Tension Headache—but the fact was they all had the same active ingredient, 342 milligrams of ibuprofen lysine. The fact was that Nurofen were misleading consumers, and the penalties dealt out to them were a mere slap on the wrist.

The same was true when Dulux said that their outdoor paint could reduce the temperature of a house by 10 degrees and when Uncle Tobys asserted that its oats were a natural source of protein, leaving it to the fine print for consumers to understand that the oats are only a good source of protein when eaten with skim milk. More recently, we've seen the list of those who've been reprimanded by the competition watchdog read like a Who's Who of the top end of town: Jetstar, Virgin, Arnott's, Optus, Harvey Norman franchisees, Kogan and Unilever. Earlier this year we had the Federal Court bring down a judgment against Flight Centre, finding that Flight Centre had asked a number of airlines not to publish on their websites ticket prices that were than Flight Centre's prices. That decision saw a penalty of $12½ million for conduct between 2005 and 2009. Indeed, Rod Sims, the head of the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission, has voiced concerns that penalties for anticonsumer and anticompetitive conduct in Australia are 'significantly lower' than the penalties in other OECD jurisdictions.

So this bill is welcomed by this side of the House. This is a Labor policy being enacted into law. But the coalition need to go further. They need to amend the Competition and Consumer Act to give a fully autonomous market studies function to the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission and to explore public interest issues such as pricing discrepancies and increased market concentration. They need to increase the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission's litigation budget so they can take on more potential scammers like those going door to door in Indigenous communities, ripping off some of the most disadvantaged people in Australia. They need to ramp up the penalties for anticompetitive conduct, which are lower in Australia than they are in comparable jurisdictions. Labor's policy on penalties for anticompetitive conduct says courts should use the European Union formula in the first instance, which makes the base penalty 30 per cent of the annual sales of the relevant product or service, multiplied by the number of years the infringement took place, capped at 10 per cent of annual turnover.

We have, in Australia, fewer competitive markets than we need. By one estimate, in the research done by Adam Triggs and me, more than half of Australia's markets are concentrated, where concentration is defined as the big four having more than a third of the market. We need to see fewer monopolies and more competitive industries in Australia. Only Labor's policy will deliver that. Labor welcome this belated adoption of our policy, but it shouldn't have taken two years to get this point. Indeed, this bill has languished on the Notice Paper since February. We should have had it dealt with by now.

Other measures include an 'egg-citing' measure about the definition of 'free range' which ensures that Australian customers know what 'free range' means when they see it on a label. We know many shoppers feel that suppliers are being a little chicken in telling them exactly what's going on. Having a precise definition of 'stocking density' will be good for consumers. Labor also supports the amendments to the Competition and Consumer Act to ensure that confidential supplier information obtained by the Australian Energy Regulator in performing its wholesale market monitoring and reporting functions under the National Electricity Law remains confidential under Commonwealth law.

The contrast between the two parties when it comes to consumer and competition issues is stark. Labor would have acted on this issue of raising penalties more than two years ago. That was when we announced this Labor policy. Labor still believe that there is more to be done in making sure the penalties are right, that the regulator is appropriately resourced and that the regulator has the teeth to do those critical market studies. Labor will be supporting the bill, but we are doing so at a time when we know the government are going soft on payday lending because of their 'friends of payday lending' backbench group that is stopping them supporting a bill that has previously been backed by their own party room.

We know they're not doing the right thing by independent mechanics, who are currently hitting the wall because they don't have access to the same data to fix cars that the authorised dealers have. We had the absurd situation on Monday of a private member's motion debate in which the coalition said they were already requiring manufacturers to share the same information with independent mechanics as they do with authorised dealers. That would be news to Australia's tens of thousands independent mechanics who right now suffer a competitive disadvantage by not getting the same data the authorised dealers get. As a consequence, consumers are paying higher prices and getting less choice.

Labor have always been the party of consumers and competition. Labor continue to lead the consumer and competition debate, and we welcome the government, two years late, catching up on this important reform.

Ian Goodenough (Moore, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Is the amendment seconded?

Jason Clare (Blaxland, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Resources and Northern Australia) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I second the amendment.

Ian Goodenough (Moore, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The original question was that this bill be now read a second time. To this the honourable member for Fenner has moved, as an amendment, that all words after 'that' be omitted with a view to substituting other words. If it suits the House, I will state the question in the form that the amendment be agreed to. The question now is that the amendment be agreed to.

Tim Wilson (Goldstein, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

While this is a relatively straightforward piece of legislation, it's an important one that the government supports and that all members in this House support. The Treasury Laws Amendment (2018 Measures No. 3) Bill deals with three specific schedules around laws directly affecting consumers which need to be properly addressed. Schedule 1 deals specifically with issues around consistency and making sure that the laws and penalty regimes that exist under consumer law are contemporary and reflect the modern reality. This is a very straightforward exercise, but it is actually critically important to do. Across this great nation every single day millions of consumers go about buying-and-selling behaviour to procure and consume goods and services to be able to support themselves, their families and their communities. People should not be taken advantage of. One of the foundational principles of a free and open market is that there be a sufficient amount of information available to make sure that consumers are informed about a product or a service if they're seeking to purchase it and that people are not misled and not taken advantage of.

Of course, there is always a scenario where people may want to take advantage of consumers or other businesses that act as consumers, and that may be through providing deceptive conduct or engaging in some sort of fraud. Making sure that you have a penalty regime that's proportionate and reflects the reality of making sure that those who take advantage of consumers suffer the consequences is critically important, because over time—and this happens in other areas of law as well—if the penalty regime is not sufficient people may see the advantage in simply allowing for the breach of the law and paying the penalty. By having modern and consistent laws that work for 21st century consumers, particularly in an age of technology, people are able to buy things at a much faster rate and perhaps with less degree of scrutiny, so it's important to have this regime in place. This principle of support that underpins free and fair competition is something that this government should be proud of and proud to support.

Schedule 2 of this piece of legislation directly deals with making sure that consumers, who are becoming increasingly mindful of their consumer behaviour, are protected under consumer law, particularly around making sure that, when they purchase something as straightforward as eggs, the eggs they buy are the eggs they get. In the Goldstein electorate, there happen to be lots of people who buy free-range eggs, including myself. Whether you're down at Bay Street Coles, Woolworths Bentley or, of course, one of the thousands of people every weekend that go to farmers' markets, like the one organised by the great people of Hampton Rotary in Sandringham or the one organised at Beaumaris North Primary School by Beaumaris Rotary in Beaumaris, when you buy eggs you want those eggs to be the ones you purchased. You also want to make sure that there are proper protections in place under law to make sure that if people are selling free-range eggs they are actually free-range eggs and that there are proper measures in place to work with business to be able to make sure that those people who sell these products are doing the right thing.

By making some relatively simple amendments around the safe-harbour provision, we're increasing the confidence and capacity of people to be able to provide the product. We know what happens when you increase supply, funnily enough: generally speaking, it should lead to lower prices, or at least more competitive prices. This makes sure that consumers get the benefit of that and do not experience deceptive or misleading conduct in the process of buying eggs. I know that across Goldstein, while it may not be at the front of everybody's mind around legislation, these are the sorts of simple things this government can do to make sure that consumers are better protected, to ensure that consumers, no matter where they are in our economy or society, get fair and equitable treatment and to provide certainty for businesses so that they can make investments and engage in providing products to the market to meet market demands.

The principle of the amendment around schedule 3 is related to the Australian Energy Regulator and the information it collects around confidentiality. What this provision predominantly does is provide consistency across the market and across legislation, and that's a fundamental good. It sits across a backdrop of an increasingly challenging energy environment across Australia, where information is more important than ever to be able to inform the market and to make sure that governments make sensible, measured, proportionate policy decisions to try to deliver reliability, security and cheaper prices for Australian consumers. It sits across a backdrop where government involvement in the market, as much as it is testing at times, is necessary. The framework and the design of the market is very important, particularly when you look at leadership policies like the National Energy Guarantee, which is going to be critical in delivering the three pillars of reliability, security and affordability. It is important that we have the information available to us.

A condition of people providing information is a sense of confidence. The information they provide, at times, may be market sensitive, and therefore requires a certain degree of confidentiality, and sometimes it's consumer sensitive as well. If you look at what this government is doing, the core focus of its agenda around energy is to deal with the problems with the legacy that we have inherited over decades through a mixture of policy incoherence and intransigence. The federal government has a direct responsibility for dealing with international commitments, environmental commitments and other policy commitments, particularly around the reduction of emissions. That directly affects the sectors that are principally responsible, which is predominantly the stationary energy sector. Of course, the states predominantly have responsibility for stationary energy.

What we have had is an incoherence, a lack of consistency and a misalignment between what the federal government has been doing and how the states have behaved in turn. That is what the National Energy Guarantee is focused on addressing. It's actually focused on making sure that, when the federal government acts, it's proportionate and is acting consistently with the states so that investors can have security and confidence about the money they're going to put down over long time horizons. They need to be able to invest in energy to deliver lower prices and supply the grid—and similarly for not just those in the wholesale business for supply but also, of course, those people investing in network infrastructure, all the way through to retailers. That's about giving consumers confidence and business the confidence that they need to be able to meet the increasing demands that this country expects.

Of course, energy consumption is critical not just to the energy demands of households—and we obviously regularly reflect on that, particularly household bills, because I know everybody is sensitive to that, including me and including the people of Goldstein—but also because there is a foundational input into the energy market for businesses to be competitive. Across the entire south-eastern corridor of Melbourne, we have businesses, particularly in areas around heavy manufacturing and the supply of components for industry, and also many other manufacturing businesses, who need that confidence in the energy market and affordable energy so they can be competitive on the world stage. That is not just the world stage for supplying to the global market. They can be suppliers and contributors to other parts of the market for other Australian businesses that then want to export into the global marketplace.

Every little tweak in every little measure, including those introduced in the Treasury Laws Amendment (2018 Measures No. 3) Bill 2018, is a critical part of building the framework and the infrastructure to achieve that degree of certainty. The more information we have, the more we can make decisions about market design to make sure that we can deliver—for those households, for those struggling families, particularly those with the least flexibility, and, in addition to that, for those people and those businesses who help provide the foundations and the pillars for the growth of our economy.

That is because the coalition, and particularly the Liberal Party, believes in free markets. The Liberal Party foundationally believes in strong competition in the economy, driven by people who are doing the right thing to drive growth in the economy and provide the goods and services that people demand. Even something as technical as this piece of legislation is critical as part of that agenda. That's why it has been brought forward by the Turnbull coalition government as part of building this nation's future.

Milton Dick (Oxley, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I'm delighted to enter the debate about the Treasury Laws Amendment (2018 Measures No. 3) Bill 2018 and I want to thank the member for Fenner, in particular, for moving the amendment to the motion for the second reading, which was moved to highlight the fact that there are a number of issues where the government is not delivering on action for consumers. In my speech on the amendment today, I'm going to focus on a couple of key issues that are very important, I believe, for consumers not only in my home state but right across the country. They are two issues that I've been speaking on and championing for some time because I've seen the impact firsthand, and because I believe governments should take action, where appropriate, to protect consumers but also ensure that businesses and small businesses are protected. They, of course, are the issues of cracking down on payday lenders and of requiring car manufacturers to share technical information with independent mechanics on commercially fair and reasonable terms, with safeguards that enable environmental, safety- and security-related technical information to be shared with the independent sector.

I have spoken about these issues in this place. At every opportunity that I get to demonstrate my commitment to the protection of consumers and businesses, I will take that opportunity. In moving the second reading amendment, the member for Fenner made it very clear how this government has let down consumers and continues to do so on a daily basis. This includes the government's failure to commit to a full suite of measures to strengthen the consumer watchdog. On this side of the chamber, we welcome the adoption of our policy to increase penalties, which we announced over two years ago. But the government is still falling well short of community expectations for the protection of consumers, as I said, in many areas.

Perhaps the most notable of these is the absolute failure by the government to crack down on out-of-control payday loans. I now put on the record in the House of Representatives that it's now been 1,055 days since the government initiated the review of the payday loans industry in this country. Despite repeated promises made by the government, including by the now Deputy Prime Minister and the Minister for Revenue and Financial Services, that we would see action to clamp down on the payday loan sharks, we've yet to see any decisive action. It was only earlier this week that we heard on ABC Radio that we heard of the heartbreak and pain these shonky lenders are causing everyday Australians like Jane, a childcare worker who took out a payday loan to cover a few bills and has ended up with over $10,000 in debt.

I'm delighted that the assistant minister who has responsibility for cracking down on payday loans has entered the chamber, because—

Michael Sukkar (Deakin, Liberal Party, Assistant Minister to the Treasurer) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

You're delighted? I'm delighted to be here!

Milton Dick (Oxley, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

He's just announced he is delighted to be here. Well, despite his sheer delight, it would be great if, rather than avoiding this issue, he could actually start siding with consumers rather than with payday loan sharks.

Michael Sukkar (Deakin, Liberal Party, Assistant Minister to the Treasurer) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Are you speaking on this bill? Which bill are you speaking on?

Milton Dick (Oxley, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I'm speaking to the amendment, if you could keep up. Through you, Mr Deputy Speaker, I'll take the interjection. I know the assistant minister doesn't like turning up to the chamber, as we've found out. We now have an amendment which he is clearly not on top of and which, clearly, because it is about his responsibility, he is trying to avoid.

For the benefit of the assistant minister, who hasn't bothered to even read the amendment before the House of Representatives today, I'll remind him that over 650,000 Australians who've turned up and taken out payday loans are now faced with outrageous terms and conditions and interest rates of almost 900 per cent. I met with the Consumer Law Action Group this week and with other people who deal with this. They also asked for a meeting with the assistant minister, who is at the table, this week. His office told them he would be happy to meet, but he never followed up. That is a government that is out of touch and not listening to stakeholders. If the minister is true blue about listening to the stakeholders, he should meet with the people being affected by the loan sharks in this country.

We know the cost of living has drastically risen under this government and that 1.8 million households are now financially distressed, which has resulted in 650,000 families turning to payday loans just to get by. I place on record again that these figures have almost doubled in the past decade. In return, consumers are paying interest rates as high as 884 per cent for household goods like fridges and washing machines, which would normally cost $350, but which end up costing consumers almost $4,000 because of loan sharks looking to rip off vulnerable Australian families.

I pay tribute to the Minister for Revenue and Financial Services, who actually led the charge on this and sadly has now been rolled by the hard Right of the Turnbull government and by the friends of payday lending inside the government. I know, from talking to welfare agencies and experts in the field who try to help people put their lives back together, that government can take action. They can take action. Do you know why, Mr Deputy Speaker? Because the government initiated a review. They've actually committed to legislation surrounding this. Instead, they've hidden it; they've kept it secret. They've just sat on their hands and done absolutely nothing. I remind the House that we did see that glimmer of hope but, unfortunately, the hard Right of the Liberal Party, perhaps in a factional spat, has now decided not to proceed with that. The minister and the new Deputy Prime Minister committed to real reform, but, as I've said, for 1,055 days the government has sat on this report and done absolutely nothing.

In receiving the report and recommendations from their own review, the minister at the time was full of praise. I'll remind the House of memorable quotes such as, 'the government supported the vast majority of the recommendations, in part or in full'. And:

Implementation of these recommendations will ensure that vulnerable consumers are afforded appropriate levels of consumer protection while continuing to access SACCs and leases.

It's only this side of the House that has shown leadership when it comes to clamping down on payday lenders by introducing legislation earlier this year on 26 February. Sadly, not one coalition MP rose to support it. This is, in fact, despite the issue that the bill was the identical copy of the draft legislation released by the newly minted Deputy Prime Minister when he had responsibility for small business in 2017. The bill was approved by cabinet but later buried, as I said, as a result of pressure from the parliamentary friends of payday lenders. If these reforms were good enough for Minister McCormack and the coalition last year then they are surely good enough now.

As recently as just last month, my office obtained a copy of the letter from the Assistant Minister to the Treasurer, again, pledging that the legislation will be implemented this year. I won't be holding my breath, because after 1,055 days we've heard all of this before.

I say to the assistant minister who is responsible and is now in the chamber: start backing consumers and start listening to those people being ripped off by the loan sharks in this country. I've received countless examples—on it goes—of victims and of outrageous behaviour, that's the only word I can use. The government sides with the payday lenders rather than consumers.

The government is just not serious when it comes to protecting Australian consumers from businesses who do the wrong thing by them. Under this government, the Turnbull government, penalties for engaging in anticompetitive conduct and for breaching the rights of consumers are simply inadequate. Penalties are too small to act as a deterrent, are low by international standards and are seen as a mere cost of doing business according to the Federal Court, the ACCC and legal experts.

Over the last five years we've seen a range of appalling contraventions of consumer rights, often targeting the most vulnerable members of our community. These include predatory consumer leasing agreements, breaches of product safety standards, scams and misleading advertising. The maximum penalty a corporation faces for breaching the ACL is $1.1 million. This is a very small amount relative to the annual revenue of large companies and is one-tenth of the size of the maximum penalty under the CCA's competition provisions.

I want to say very clearly on the record today: let's not forget it's the Labor Party who was the party of encouraging competition. Competition means lower prices, higher wages and better quality products for Australian families. It means a more productive and more innovative economy that has more jobs and a higher standard of living. Strengthening competition is about defeating vested interests. It is about promoting a fair and equal society, which, sadly, cannot be said for those opposite when it comes to giving people like Australian motorists a fair dinkum choice as to where and when they get their car serviced.

We know, and I've spoken about this in the parliament this week, because more and more car and vehicle manufacturers are holding back information from local service centres, meaning higher costs for motorists and less choice as to where you can get your car serviced. Yet again, it has been left to Labor to show leadership in this space, particularly the member for Fenner, who has done a great job in advocating for our great policy, alongside Bill Shorten, the Leader of the Opposition. Presently, car manufacturers generally own and control technical information and, in many cases, are the only sources of codes and software upgrades, which means that independent car repairers, who comprise the vast majority of Australian mechanics, are at a competitive disadvantage since most car manufacturers do not supply the same information to independent mechanics that they provide to authorised dealers. But I'm really pleased to support Labor's Your Car, Your Choice policy. We are seeking to change this to support the thousands of independent service mechanics right across Australia.

I listened to the debate in the Federation Chamber on this exact matter earlier this week. Government speaker after government speaker started talking about roundtables into roundtables, committees into committees. 'Trust us. We'll get to it. We might do something on the never-never.' I know that, when I've spoken to mechanics at Sumner in my electorate, when I've taken the shadow Treasurer and the Leader of the Opposition to sit down and listen to the mums and dads and small business operators in my community, they are sick and tired of the government not taking action. They want to see some action.

We hear a lot from the LNP and the coalition government that they're the party of small business. Time and time again we hear these lectures. It's time now that the so-called party of small business started listening to small business, particularly the auto mechanics—people like Ian from Mr Spanner's and Scott from Future Auto Sumner Park. I know how much that would mean for their local businesses. Owners have told me that not only would it allow their local businesses to better service local residents but it would also be a huge win for our local economy as they could employ more mechanics and more apprentices to ply their trade.

I know this government sits by and does nothing. They weren't even able to defend their position in the Federation Chamber this week, as I already said. What we heard and continually hear is a lot of wishy-washy defence about how 'We're thinking about doing something about it down the track.' After consulting with industry, we know that this clearly isn't the case and we know that there is so-called consultation but only one-way consultation on this issue. We have heard that the government has a working party, yet I'm proud to say in the chamber today that the industry haven't heard anything about this. They've also apparently had a working party for some time, but that's also news to the industry, who said that's not their understanding but rather the government is meeting those who call them up. Let's call it what it is. That's not consultation; it's a joke.

So we know that this government, when it comes to consumer protection, simply cannot be trusted. When it comes to simple-yet-important changes that are needed to support local industry and local businesses, I call on the government to adopt Labor's Your Car, Your Choice policy of mandatory information sharing, which would mean a fairer playing field for all. Labor is committed to increasing the rights of consumers. We'll always stand by the consumers because Labor is on their side.

Michael Sukkar (Deakin, Liberal Party, Assistant Minister to the Treasurer) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I suppose imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, so I thank the former speaker. The Treasury Laws Amendment (2018 Measures No. 3) Bill 2018 delivers on a range of the measures that this government is undertaking in the consumer space because, as we saw sadly under the former government, we had very little action for six years and we are methodically working our way through. Schedule 1 to this bill delivers on our 2017-18 budget commitment to strengthen the Australian Consumer Law penalty regime to ensure that our Consumer Law continues to be an effective piece of legislation in the current economic environment. Schedule 1 increases the maximum civil pecuniary penalties and penalties for criminal offences for contraventions of the Australian Consumer Law.

Over time, as our economy continues to grow and thrive, the current penalty regime in the Australian Consumer Law has become outdated and insufficient to continue to deter breaches of the law. This ultimately puts consumers at risk of being victims of poor and non-compliant conduct, particularly where the conduct that breaches the law may be highly profitable or the company in breach is a large corporation. Schedule 1 to this bill increases the penalties in the Australian Consumer Law and sends a very clear and simple message to businesses: if you're considering engaging in conduct that would breach the Australian Consumer Law, think again, because the penalties will match the contravention. In the end, this government backs all Australian consumers.

The new maximum penalties for a body corporate include three possible penalty amounts, taking into account the benefit gained from the act or omission and the size of the business based on that body corporate's annual turnover. If the court can determine the value of the benefit obtained from the act or omission, then the new maximum penalty is the greater of $10 million or three times the value of the benefit obtained as a result of that act or omission. If the court can't determine the value of the benefit obtained from the act or omission, then the new maximum penalty is the greater of $10 million or 10 per cent of the annual turnover of the body corporate during that 12-month period—that is, the 12 months preceding, including the month in which the particular act or omission occurred or commenced occurring. The new maximum penalty for a person other than a body corporate is $500,000.

Schedule 1 of this bill secures better protections for all Australian consumers. It provides a real deterrent to businesses considering engaging in noncompliant conduct. The increases to these maximum penalties will hold companies who breach the law accountable and will impose a real financial cost, instead just the cost of doing business. The amendments in schedule 1 have the support of all state and territory governments, who jointly enforce this law with the Commonwealth.

Schedule 2 of this bill amends the Australian Consumer Law to insert a safe harbour from the misleading or deceptive conduct provisions for egg producers who comply with the Free Range Egg Labelling Information Standard. This will provide certainty for producers complying with the Free Range Egg Labelling Information Standard by ensuring that they won't be subject to prosecution under the misleading or deceptive conduct provisions of the Australian Consumer Law in relation to a claim that their eggs are free-range. By providing this certainty, the measure encourages industry adoption of the Free Range Egg Labelling Information Standard, which came into effect on 26 April this year following a 12-month transition period. The Free Range Egg Labelling Information Standard was developed following extensive consultation to provide producers and consumers with more clarity in relation to claims that eggs are free-range. The standard will give consumers and producers a very clear indication of the requirements that must be met when a producer makes a claim that their eggs are free-range. This means that, for the first time, consumers are able to be confident that eggs labelled as free-range were laid by hens with meaningful and regular access to the outdoors and the ability to roam and forage. The standard also makes sure consumers are getting what they pay for when choosing free-range eggs by requiring the disclosure of each producer's stocking density, as well as prescribing a maximum stocking density of 10,000 hens or fewer per hectare. This will now allow the consumer to select the free-range egg brand that meets their own personal preference.

Schedule 3 of this bill amends the Competition and Consumer Act to rectify an inconsistency between it and the National Electricity Law. This inconsistency between the National Electricity Law and the Competition and Consumer Act emerged in 2016 when the National Electricity Law was updated to provide the Australian Energy Regulator with new monitoring and reporting functions relating to the wholesale electricity market. The Australian Energy Regulator will use these functions to determine if there are features of the wholesale electricity market that undermine its effective functioning. As the Competition and Consumer Act is a Commonwealth law it currently takes precedence over the National Electricity Law. This bill will fix this inconsistency, which will ensure that confidential supplier information obtained by the Australian Energy Regulator in performing its wholesale market monitoring and reporting functions under the National Electricity Law remains confidential under the applicable Commonwealth law. This will ensures that our energy regulation regimes remain fair and efficient, and that the Australian Energy Regulator will continue to be a proactive and effective regulator.

I commend this bill to the House.

Ross Vasta (Bonner, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The original question was that this bill now be read a second time. To this the honourable member for Fenner has moved as an amendment that the all words after 'That' be omitted with a view to substituting other words. The immediate question is that the amendment be agreed to.

Question negatived.

Original question agreed to.

Bill read a second time.