Malcolm Turnbull (Wentworth, Liberal Party, Prime Minister) Share this | Hansard source

the great work done by David Murray in heading this panel, and the other members of the panel. This has been a very important piece of work, commissioned by the government, commissioned by the then Treasurer, Mr Hockey. It is building on the work of previous inquiries, such as the Wallis inquiry, whose recommendations were implemented by the government of John Howard, with Peter Costello as Treasurer. Over many years—generations, in fact—the coalition, the Liberal and National Party governments, have been constantly improving the prudential management, the security, the choice and indeed the flexibility of our financial system. Our financial services system is absolutely fundamental to our prosperity and the prosperity of our children and grandchildren in the future.

The initiatives that have been announced today and this response will ensure that Australians can have full confidence in our financial system and greater choice and control over how they spend and save their own money. All Australians will appreciate the importance of one of the key measures announced today to ensure that surcharges imposed on customers by business for use of cards, especially credit cards, are limited to no more than the actual cost to the business itself of that card being used. This is a measure to ensure transparency and to ensure that consumers get a fair deal.

These common-sense reforms that have been part of our parties' tradition have delivered one of the world's strongest and most effectively regulated financial systems. We should not forget that one of the reasons Australia did not fare as badly during the global financial crisis as other countries was because of the strong financial services system that we had in place.

Ms Plibersek interjecting—

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