Chris Ellison (WA, Liberal Party, Minister for Justice and Customs) Share this | Hansard source

I will deal with that issue. Does the current legislation allow for the situation that Senator Murray has mentioned? I am aware of those cases that I have come across personally where people who have come to Australia from another country do not have that detail available as to date and place of birth, and I accept that it is an issue out there for some people. We do not want to disadvantage them because of that. The section which deals with this in the Financial Transaction Reports Act 1988 is section 17FB(6), which puts it this way:

customer information, in relation to an international funds transfer instruction transmitted into Australia, means the following information about the ordering customer on whose behalf, or at whose request, an ordering organisation sends the instruction:

It then lists the details that are required:

the ordering customer’s name—

You do need that, and that is straightforward. It goes on:

(b)

any one of the following:

(i)

the ordering customer’s full business or residential address (not being a post office box);

(ii)

the ordering customer’s date and place of birth;

(iii)

a unique identification number given to the ordering customer by a foreign government;

(iv)

the identification number given to the ordering customer by the ordering organisation—

So there are four requirements there which are alternatives. I would suggest that, where you have someone in this position, who does not have their date and place of birth, the other three criteria could be met and any one of them would suffice, according to the wording of the section.

That said—and I would submit to the committee that it addresses the concern raised by Senator Murray—certainly I will take on board the comments by Senator Murray in dealing with this change to the legislation to ensure that in the private sector, as much as we can ensure it, no-one is disadvantaged in the application of this legislation and no-one is disadvantaged who is in the position of not knowing their date and place of birth because of reasons beyond their control. Certainly they should not be disadvantaged. I think the legislation does accommodate it because it prescribes it in the alternative, but I still take on board Senator Murray’s point. That is something we will bear in mind when we are looking at this.