Mathias Cormann (WA, Liberal Party, Vice-President of the Executive Council) Share this | Hansard source

We are opposing this. The purpose of this guarantee is to help businesses survive. We need to have flexibility in any approach to ensure that we are not ruling companies out as a result of legislative criteria. By being prescriptive, we may actually make it harder for companies that should get access to the money and they might miss out. The banks will have skin in the game by sharing the risk; and, as they assess the loans, they will be looking to support companies to be able to get through the impact of the virus. Given how fast the circumstances are changing, we need to ensure there is flexibility in the legislative instrument that may need to be amended to deal with those circumstances. Ultimately every business will need to be looked at on an individual basis and that is why we are getting the banks and non-bank lenders to decide on this as they know their customers better than the government.

The CHAIR: The question is that Greens amendment (1) on sheet 8916 revised be agreed to. I believe the noes have it. Senator McKim.