Mathias Cormann (WA, Liberal Party, Minister for Finance) Share this | Hansard source

I thank Senator Dastyari for that question. What we are winding back is the unnecessary and costly red tape, which does not make any difference to consumer protections but just pushes up the cost of advice. On this side, we want people saving for their retirement, people managing their retirement and people who are managing financial risks and seizing opportunities throughout their life to have the advantage of high-quality advice that they can trust and that is also affordable.

The senator mentioned the so-called opt-in requirements, which force clients to re-sign contracts with their advisers on a regular basis. After the Storm Financial collapse and so on, we had a parliamentary inquiry into Australian financial products and services. Out of more than 400 submissions to that inquiry, how many do you think recommended that bit of additional red tape? One. And it was from the Industry SuperFunds network. The inquiry, chaired by Mr Ripoll, was so convinced of that particular recommendation that they refused to adopt it. The Ripoll inquiry did not recommend the introduction of opt-in—that additional bit of red tape. Guess what? Because Minister Shorten, who was the Minister for Financial Services and Superannuation at the time, was so close to his friends in the union movement, because he was so committed to doing the bidding of the union movement, what did he do? He put it into his laws.

The reason we are making improvements to the Future of Financial Advice laws is that Labor's changes went too far, egged on by union dominated industry funds, and we are making sure we get the balance right for consumers with important consumer protections, and we are making sure that access to high-quality advice remains affordable. (Time expired)