Andrew Murray (WA, Australian Democrats) Share this | Hansard source

I wish to speak briefly on this report. I, too, am a member of the Parliamentary Joint Committee on Corporations and Financial Services. In fact, I am in my 11th year, so I am a very longstanding member of that committee. I must put on the record how much I value the work we do and how much I value the oversight we exercise with respect to ASIC. Perhaps the Senate is not aware that the committee has regular discourse with ASIC through the secretariat and through correspondence. But the Senate is aware that, in the broad, ASIC is subject to continual oversight through the estimates process.

The point I wish to emphasise is that, whilst ASIC has its very strong critics in the community, from a parliamentary perspective there is not a regulator in Australia subject to more scrutiny and interrogation through the parliamentary process. It is extremely valuable and it does have very good consequences. I will give just one example, but there are many. The committee produced what I thought was an excellent report on insolvency law. ASIC was underperforming and underachieving in that area. They noted the committee’s interest and attention and, without any shift in government policy or legislation or funds, started to pay much more attention to the issues that the parliamentary committee had unanimously raised. So I think that, on behalf of Australians, the parliament is indeed doing the job it needs to do with respect to ASIC. That does not mean that I diminish the strong concerns that people do have; they can be disappointed in their interactions with a regulator. But I do think this is a case where the committee and the parliament are on the case.

That is one of the reasons I wish to stand and speak to this report. The other is to reinforce the point just made by Senator Sherry and to urge the chair, through the government backbench, to reinforce recommendation 1. It is unusual for the committee to put recommendations in the oversight report. Generally speaking, an oversight report constitutes commentary. This recommendation arises because the committee is of the view, as is ASIC, that the court case surrounding this issue of promissory notes indicates there is a legal loophole. I note the comment in section 2.25 of the report that, in response to a question on notice, ASIC stated that the government did not intend to increase the $50,000 threshold applying to promissory notes. And, at 2.26, the committee urges ASIC to further press the government to close the loophole. At 2.27, of course, is the recommendation. It is one thing, though, for ASIC to press the case. It is quite another for the chair of the committee to press the case, and I would urge the chair to take this up with government. Government should have the opportunity to review its decision and to act as both ASIC and the experienced committee recommends.

One issue not dealt with much in the report is this: the report deals with a list of items, but there are also a list of items which were briefly mentioned at the committee’s hearing but do not feature in this report, and that issue is of other specific individual cases. The committee, generally speaking, tries to attend to broad policy issues and tries to avoid becoming party to what is known as ‘forum shopping’—in other words, individuals who have a grievance and shop around for somebody to pick up their grievance. Nevertheless, once we have done that filtering, the committee still does act as a direct conduit for individuals in the Australia community to get a point made or their case heard. And that is a very valuable additional aspect of the committee’s work. I commend the report to the Senate.

Question agreed to.