Mathias Cormann (WA, Liberal Party, Shadow Assistant Treasurer) Share this | Hansard source

The coalition supports the Corporations and Other Legislation Amendment (Trustee Companies and Other Measures) Bill 2011. This bill amends the trustee company provisions in chapter 5D of the Corporations Act 2001 to correct some oversights and unintended outcomes flowing from the 2010 reforms in the regulation of trustee corporations. They include allowing corporate groups with multiple trustee company subsidiaries to transfer the business of those subsidiaries into one licensed entity, providing administrative processes for the voluntary transfer of estate assets and liabilities as a whole rather than individually, altering existing transfer of business provisions by enabling such a transfer to state and territory public trustees in cases of failing licence trustees, requiring that a prospective licensee write to the minister responsible for administering chapter 5D explaining how it satisfies certain criteria before the Governor-General considers making a regulation to list the applicant as a licensed trustee company, clarifying and strengthening the magnitude of penalties, and clarifying the powers of trustee companies to charge for preparing tax returns and to draw management fees and common funds administration fees from capital as a last resort.

These changes are necessary reforms to improve the federal regulatory framework of the sector following the change from state and territory jurisdiction. It is good housekeeping. With those few words, I commend the bill to the Senate.