Peter Whish-Wilson (Tasmania, Australian Greens) Share this | Hansard source

I want to reiterate that, while we accept Senator Cormann's explanation and Senator Xenophon's explanation about this amendment cutting across the intent of the bill, the key reason we're opposing it is that we're not sure that it is workable. It's actually set out that Labor proposes to turn the safe harbour carve-out into a defence and require the appointment of a registered liquidator to provide restructuring advice to the directors in order to prove that defence. Then, if you go on to the next part of the amendment, in order to prove the defence to the civil standard of proof, a director will need to provide evidence that he or she obtained advice from an appropriately qualified entity labelled as a registered liquidator and insolvency practitioner.

I will just go back to what I said earlier. I'm not sure why liquidators and insolvency practitioners would be entering into the corporate restructuring game as corporate doctors. It wouldn't necessarily be in their interests to do so, because they want to liquidate companies and make lots of money over a long period of time. I would be very suspicious of getting advice from a liquidator about how to restructure my company and trade out of trouble, because they actually are good at liquidating assets when companies go bankrupt. I don't support the amendment at this stage because we haven't had the information we need to see how this is workable. I reiterate that the Greens won't be supporting these amendments but we will be supporting Labor's next amendment, on sheet 8239.

The CHAIR: The question is that amendments (1) to (15) on sheet 8224, moved by Senator Gallagher, be agreed to.