Slade Brockman (WA, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

Senator Gallagher, I was hoping you were going to go for another six minutes and then we would all go and have some rest! But I'll jump to my feet and speak—

Senator Gallagher interjecting—

Oh, my best six minutes! Alright. I'll start where you finished, Senator Gallagher, and address Senator Patrick's second reading amendment. Particularly those opposite who claim to be the opposition party of government, the alternative government, actually have to think through how legislation and regulation work together and how the primacy of this place makes what Senator Patrick has asked for almost impossible, particularly at the moment and into the foreseeable future where we will have a Senate with a crossbench. If you have to produce what you are effectively asking for, which is final regulations with every piece of legislation, then you're not actually going to have regulations. You may as well put them all in the bill.

Senator McKim interjecting—

No, not exactly, because that's not the way our system of government functions. I'll take the interjection, Senator McKim. It's not the way our system of government functions. Regulations have a legitimate place. I would possibly agree with you, Senator McKim, that regulations, as a percentage of the total body of law, have become significantly larger over the years, and that's a fault of all sides of government. I think it is something the political process needs to attempt to rein in. But the idea that you can have final regulations prior to a bill being discussed in this place would be, in practice, impossible to manage. You need to have final legislation passed before you can finalise regulations. That goes without saying, if you think about the way the law operates for just a little while. Can you have exposure drafts of regulations? Absolutely. Obviously, that was discussed in Senator Gallagher's contribution. But the idea that you can somehow have final drafts of regulations before legislation is passed completely ignores the deliberative role of this place in actually amending primary legislation. How could you do that? How could you have final regulation which is subsidiary if you are presenting that before the legislation has gone through this place? It would be impossible.

I go to the Financial Sector Reform (Hayne Royal Commission Response—Better Advice) Bill. It implements recommendations from the Hayne royal commission. As I have stood up and said before in this place, royal commissions are effectively reports to government, reports to society. They are not tablets handed down from on high in stone. They need to be considered. They need to be considered in the light of the existing regulatory framework. They need to be considered in the light of practicality. They need to be considered in the light of regulatory burden that's already placed on a particular industry in the interim. So it's very important that we take our deliberative role in this place and the role of executive government seriously and actually consider what's coming out of royal commissions—the way the recommendations should be implemented to make them work in practice—and recognise the reality of industries as they operate on the ground.

It is very important to say that the vast majority of people working in the various parts of the financial advice industry did not act in a way that the many egregious ones did. There were many examples of egregious behaviour at the Hayne royal commission, but that does not reflect the behaviour of the vast majority of participants in the financial advice industry. In fact, I personally want to see, and I know many others want to see, a strong financial advice industry so that working Australians, Australians planning for their future, and Australians who aspire to a higher standard of living later in their lives or for their children, should have the ability to seek out that high-quality professional advice and be able to plan their affairs in a way that enables them to achieve those aspirations. I think that is a really important and fundamental goal that we set for this industry. In the main, the vast majority of financial advisers operating within the framework acted in that way at that time.

However, there is a need to simplify the regulatory system, and this bill does that by increasing regulatory alignment. In particular, this bill includes creating a single disciplinary model, moving the standard-setting functions to the government, introducing annual registration requirements and removing duplicate regulation for tax advisers. The Financial Services and Credit Panel within ASIC will take on the role of the single disciplinary body and will be given new sanction powers. Where the panel concludes that a breach occurs, the panel can take a range of actions, including issuing an infringement notice, imposing an administrative sanction or recommending ASIC seek a civil penalty.

Debate interrupted.