Eric Hutchinson (Lyons, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

Indeed. They left this country in a very dark place. But how good it is to see that now small business confidence in this country is returning, particularly in my state of Tasmania.

With the introduction of these amendments that we see before the House today, there is the opportunity for the Commonwealth to recover those debts after a period of six years. There has been a lot of success, particularly in respect of not allowing people without genuine reasons and humanitarian reasons from being able to travel overseas. So the measures that are before the House, in respect of that part of the legislation, have been shown to work. The second component, as I have just mentioned, is removing that six-year statute of limitations on the recovery of debt. On that note, I finish my contribution and I commend this bill to the House.

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