Nick Sherry (Tasmania, Australian Labor Party, Minister for Superannuation and Corporate Law) Share this | Hansard source

I will respond on behalf of the government. We will not be supporting the Greens amendment. The first home saver account does not limit eligibility where an applicant holds an investment property. To do so would be to impose a further regulatory and compliance requirement. Given the likely size of the issue that the Greens have raised, which I think would be very small in reality, we do not believe we should be imposing additional compliance requirements.

I might point out that I have been involved to a significant degree in the development of the disclosure documentation on these first home saver accounts, and the documentation that has been prepared is simple, readable, distinct and standardised, which I think is a very good thing. The more requirements we add, the more the disclosure document has to be added to, and that is a difficulty because the reading and understanding of disclosure documents more generally in financial services is not easy—and that is putting it mildly. We have attempted, and I believe achieved, a simple and standardised disclosure document. So, the more caveats, requirements et cetera that are added, the more difficult both compliance and disclosure become. I have a point to make in respect of a technical issue on means testing; I will get to that shortly. We do not support the Greens amendment on this occasion.