Ed Husic (Chifley, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary to the Shadow Treasurer) Share this | Hansard source

My questions are to the Assistant Treasurer. They relate primarily to the Assistant Treasurer, but I always take the opportunity to talk with and ask questions of the Minister for Small Business. At this point I would not mind pursuing the matter that the Assistant Treasurer knows I have an interest in which relates to the transferral of functions from the Private Health Insurance Administration Council to APRA. APRA's job, as people are well aware, is fairly significant, covering the banking and financial system through to superannuation and general insurance. It will be tasked from 1 July with the responsibility of being responsible for taking over PHIAC's core responsibilities.

At the moment, PHIAC is basically oversighting the jobs of 34 different private health insurers providing over 40,000 products and 6.4 million policies covering 13 million Australians. On top of APRA's fairly significant workload, it will now be required to give effect to the oversight of private health insurance regulation in this country. It is a fairly big task. APRA already has a big amount of work on its plate, having to be cognisant of what is being proposed in the Murray inquiry, what is coming from overseas, financial regulation and the impact on the banks here, particularly through potentially increased capital requirements.

APRA is also potentially responsible through the Council of Financial Regulators for introducing a variety of macroprudential tools within the lending market, particularly for housing—both owner occupied and investor lending. Given that is of deep interest to me in Sydney and given the pace of growth in that market, the way in which APRA manages that is of deep concern.

Having a set of functions responsible for the health insurance of 13 million people is something that is pretty serious. What I am interested in finding out from the Assistant Treasurer is how many people in PHIAC are currently responsible, or being brought on within that regulator, to manage these functions? How many will be expected to be responsible in this space, post the merger? How many people within APRA will be dedicated to this process of regulation—in this new process for APRA—and what amount of money has been set aside for it?

I understand industry consultation has been undertaken to help in the transition. Can the Assistant Treasurer detail how many meetings have been held and where in the country they have occurred, or have they just been concentrated in two capital cities? What concerns have been raised by industry and have these been addressed?

APRA says it has met with various participants and I would be interested to know who those participants were—other than the actual companies themselves? There has also been an indication that formal meetings have been held with boards. Have all boards been met with—and if not, why not? Is the Assistant Treasurer confident that APRA will be able to provide robust, regulatory oversight into the future, or is this simply a cover for a funding cut that will weaken the quality of oversight? And can he also explain the regulatory arrangements?

I have had fruitful discussions with the Minister for Small Business in relation to the potential introduction of a framework for equity crowdfunding in this country. We are—as the minister knows—very keen to see this framework brought in as quickly as possible. I know he has a very similar degree of interest in seeing the framework introduced to support innovation in this country. From memory, I note that $7.8 million has been dedicated to the development of a disclosure template that would be provided to ASIC. To the Minister for Small Business: I am interested in the development of that framework and when it will commence, given the draft legislation is not in place. I do not necessarily see that one has to follow the other, but it would be interesting to know where the process is up to. Have consultations begun between ASIC and stakeholders? Which stakeholders have been targeted? Is a formal consultation process being observed, and how is that being implemented?

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