Penny Wong (SA, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Corporate Governance and Responsibility) Share this | Hansard source

My question is to Senator Coonan, the Minister representing the Minister for Revenue and Assistant Treasurer. I refer the minister to the Westpoint scandal in which 4,000 Australians lost $300 million worth of savings. I also refer the minister to the $50,000 promissory note loophole that the regulator, ASIC, says prevented it from taking earlier action in the Westpoint matter. Didn’t the minister on a number of occasions in answers to questions in this place on 22 June emphatically state:

... there is no loophole.

Is the minister aware that the chair of ASIC, Mr Lucy, again called on the government to close the loophole on 27 June, a mere five days after the minister denied there was any problem? Didn’t Mr Lucy say that the loophole could be closed very simply when he said, ‘One way of addressing it would be to go from $50,000 to $500,000’? Can the minister tell the chamber who is right: Mr Lucy and the regulator or the minister?