Sam Dastyari (NSW, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I, and also on behalf of Senator Whish-Wilson, move:

That the Corporations Amendment (Streamlining Future of Financial Advice) Regulation 2014, as contained in Select Legislative Instrument 2014 No. 102 and made under the Corporations Act 2001, be disallowed [F2014L00891].

I rise today to speak about the values that are at the heart of the Australian Labor Party and at the heart of this society. They are very simple values but they are values that we will defend in this chamber and outside this chamber. We are the party of hardworking Australians who are saving for their first home, saving to put their kids into a good school, maybe even if possible to a great Australian university, and putting some money aside for their retirement. We are and have always been the party of the Australian worker and we stand proudly in both the Senate and the House to ensure that, as best we can, the deck is not stacked against our people. We, in the Labor Party, will always give our voice to preserve the values of fairness and integrity. Today, I rise to put my voice on the record opposing the government's changes to Future of Financial Advice laws.

How did we get here today? We all know that the Abbott government wanted to make some changes to the FoFA legislation. We, in the Labor Party, have been very clear that we will negotiate with the government and with our friends on the crossbenches, that we will consult with the financial services and advice industry, that we will consult with consumer groups and that we will consult with legal experts in order to improve, where necessary, FoFA legislation. But we will not allow this government to abuse parliamentary process, which is exactly what they have done in this instance. We will not allow this government to introduce changes by stealth, changes that are widely roundly opposed by consumer and advocacy groups like Choice, National Seniors, Council on the Ageing

We will not allow this government to introduce changes at the 11th hour—a move that has been widely criticised by financial journalists and legal academics, and even surprised officers of the Senate.

As we have heard in this chamber over the past 5 ½ sitting days, Senator Cormann's regulations made with the Governor-General's signature on 26 June—that we do not support and that weaken consumer protections—came into effect on 1 July before anyone outside the government had the opportunity to see them, let alone consult or consider them. As I stand before you today, Senator Cormann's changes are allowing unscrupulous advisers and banks pushing their own products, hustlers running their get-rich schemes and seminars, and all of those con artists preying on working Australians to now bypass the best interest duty and to make their income by putting their own financial gain above the interests of consumers.

We will not allow this government to erode basic consumer protections. We reiterate—and this was echoed this morning by Choice, by National Seniors, by COTA and by my friend, Acting Deputy President, Senator Whish-Wilson—that we will not allow the government to make changes to the FoFA legislation: without consulting widely with the financial advice industry, many of whom are concerned about a return to the dark days before FoFA; without consulting with consumer groups, all of whom are concerned about a return to the horrific losses that happened before FoFA was introduced; without consulting with legal experts, many of whom are concerned about eroding basic consumer protections; and without ensuring that the voices of people who have been the victims of the regime that existed before FoFA—people like my friend, Naomi Halpern, who joined us in the parliament today—who have shared their experiences and stories here in this place.

That is why we, in the Australian Labor Party, are in the Senate. That is why we are in this place. I ask the government: who they are here to represent? Who are they lending their voice to? Who are they standing up for in this chamber? Are they people like Naomi Halpern, who are putting away money for their retirement? Are they people like those represented by National Seniors and COTA, or people trying to ensure that their kids can have better opportunities? Or are they simply standing up for the banks and the financial service industry, trying to take money off the very people who rely on us to make laws, legislation and regulations that are in their best interests?

I know who I will stand up for. I know who I will fight for. The people I represent do not wield power and influence within the Liberal Party. They probably will not be donating to Senator Cormann's re-election campaign. We, in the Labor Party, respect those who do, and we will consult with everybody in good faith if we have an opportunity to have a proper debate about reforming FoFA laws. We will work in good faith with all parties to improve FoFA legislation. I say to Senator Cormann that we will even consider the concerns of some of the interests that he has been protecting. But we will not allow this government to ram through changes by stealth, to deliberately restrict this parliament's ability to scrutinise changes. We will not be bullied into accepting the will of the powerful and we will not back down from standing up for Australian consumers. I urge the Senate to disallow these regulations.

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

The Greens will also be supporting this disallowance motion. This is as much about process as it is about policy. Just yesterday my colleague Senator Penny Wright asked me how she could find an independent financial planner because Penny and her husband want to get some financial advice. It is actually a really good question. What became really obvious during the Senate inquiry is that independent financial advisers, in the true sense of the word, are a small minority in this country. The majority of financial advisers and financial planners—and many of them are small—are actually still tied in many ways, shapes and forms to large financial services companies who have the product platforms and who manufacture the products.

The clear message that we got in the Senate inquiry from people such as CPA Australia and even independent financial planners was that in a generational or two—and it is going to take that long—they want to see a country where most of the advice provided on financial products is provided by independent financial planners who charge a fee for service and who are not remunerated on a sales basis. They want to see the industry transform into that industry. They want to see confidence and trust come back into the industry and these FoFA laws were designed to do that.

As I made it clear at question time today, it became obvious during the Senate inquiry when the lobby groups representing the big end of town—the big banks—said that they had had an agreement with the previous government and the current government to get changes made by 1 July. And in exact words that I quoted in question time today, technical amendments would be 'sorted out' by 1 July.

It is our job here to legislate for public interest, not for special interests. It is very clear by the reaction that Senator Dastyari has eloquently spoken to, consumer groups and advocacy groups across the country—really important advocacy groups like Seniors Australia—are not convinced that we have the balance right. They are not convinced that we have enough trust or confidence yet in the financial planning industry.

I started by saying that this is as much about process as it is about policy—good process and good policy. This was being rushed by the government before 1 July, and it was brought through in the form of regulation. At some point in time it would come back to legislation in front of the house. The clear message sent was that the government knew it would not get its regulations through the Senate, because they were not only contested by the Labor Party, the Greens and other crossbenchers in this chamber, such as Senator Xenophon, but also contested in the public sphere and in the financial media.

Yesterday I talked about the collapse of Barings Bank. For those who have seen the movie Rogue Traderit really was a bad apple that brought down one of the oldest and most prestigious banks in financial history. But it was not just a rogue trader that brought down that bank; the culture in that bank allowed that type of behaviour to go on and on and on—undetected. It was no different from what we saw at the Commonwealth Bank. That culture is really simple; it is a culture of making profits; that is what banks do. Let's not kid ourselves, banks make profits for shareholders and they try to make increasing profits every year. That is their culture plain and simple. Selling financial products, be it general advice or personal advice, to their customers—and they have enormous customer bases—is how they have made their money for nearly a decade now and it is how they plan to make their money in the next decade. This is serious dollars.

But what is good for banks and their profits and their shareholders is not necessarily good for consumers of financial products in this country. That sales based culture is still allowed under this government's FoFA amendments. The 'balanced scorecard approach', or whatever you want to call it, is still an incentive for an employee at the front of the office to sell products to people walking in the door. That is what the banks wanted clarified, and those are the technical amendments they said the government had guaranteed it would get through by 1 July. But it does not change the culture. Speak to the independent financial planners—the industry they want to see in 10 or 20 years time of small independent advisers in this country. I have met a lot of them in this inquiry. They are good people and they do a good job. But we are never going to transform this industry if we do not have a tough set of regulations that lay down the law. Sometimes the regulations have to be simple to be noticed.

This is about restoring confidence and trust in the financial planning industry, which wants more Australians to seek financial advice. Rather than rushing through regulations to support the banks, we need to bring this legislation to parliament and properly scrutinise and debate it. Whatever the final result of that is, at least it will have gone through due process and we will have looked after the interests of the public in this regard, not just the interests of financial planners and the large end of the financial services industry. We need to strike the right balance. The clear and obvious signal from groups in Parliament House today is that that balance has not been struck. It is our job to do that here in the Senate.

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

I thank Senator Dastyari and Senator Whish-Wilson for their contribution to this debate. Obviously the government does not want to see these regulations disallowed. In giving effect to these regulations from 1 July 2014, the government is giving effect to some very firm commitments we made to the Australian people in the lead up to the last election. Of course, the improvements that we have made and will continue to make to our financial advice laws deliver benefits for consumers as well as, in particular, small business financial advisers. Financial advisers across Australia provide a very important service. They help people with their financial health and wellbeing. They help people manage financial risks. They help people seize financial opportunities. They help Australians saving for their retirement, managing their retirement and managing other financial risks through life. Yes, in doing so, they are dealing with other people's money, so there ought to be appropriately robust regulation in place.

Whenever anything goes wrong, as it did with Storm Financial and other such collapses, policymakers and indeed the financial services industry itself ought to step back and reflect on what happened and make judgements on whether the policy settings, the regulatory settings, can be improved. That is exactly what happened in 2009, 2010 and 2011. We had a bipartisan inquiry chaired by the now shadow minister for financial services, Mr Ripoll. It came up with a set of recommendations on how our regulatory system could be improved which was supported by the coalition. The truth of the matter is that the Labor Party used the cover of events in the wake of the global financial crisis to push changes that went too far, to push agendas on behalf of their friends in union dominated industry funds. We have always supported sensible reforms of our financial services regulations. We have always said that we were supportive of the statutory requirement, introduced as a result of the Ripoll inquiry, for advisers to act in the best interests of their clients. We said we were supportive of the ban on conflicted remuneration and a whole range of other changes. Labor, in their changes to FOFA, went too far.

Senator Dastyari and Senator Whish-Wilson said that we are somehow rushing this. That is not true. Nothing could be further from the truth. I released a statement back on 28 April 2011, more than three years ago—and I know Senator Dastyari and Senator Whish-Wilson were not in the Senate then—making the point that 'investors who receive financial advice will face more red tape, increased costs and reduced choice if Labor's latest version of Future of Financial Advice proposals pass the parliament in full'—which, of course, it did. I said: 'The coalition supports sensible financial advice proposals which increase transparency, consumer choice and competition. However, any reforms in this area need to strike the right balance between appropriate levels of consumer protection and ensuring the availability, accessibility and affordability of high quality financial advice.' That is why we have said for some time that we support in principle the proposed statutory best interest duty for financial advisers, subject to seeing the detail in the legislation.

However, we also said then that Labor's push to force people to keep re-signing contracts with their financial advisers on a regular basis was bad public policy, which did not strike the right balance. The reason we said that was that it pushes up the cost of advice without doing anything to improve consumer protections.

Later, then Minister Shorten actually did a special deal with Industry Super, saying that they should not be subject to the opt-in requirements, unlike small business financial advisers. In March 2012, I put out a release titled: 'The coalition will fix FoFA in government'. I said:

If the Coalition is elected to govern at the next election we will fix Labor's FOFA mess.

I said, 'The FoFA legislation passed by the House of Representatives today never went through a proper regulatory impact assessment.' Indeed, it did not. I further stated:

Labor's FOFA will increase red tape and costs for both business and consumers, while reducing choice, competition and diversity across the financial services industry …

It is unnecessarily complex and, in large parts, unclear. According to then Minister Shorten himself, 'FoFA will cause job losses in the financial services industry.'

And further:

Conservative industry estimates suggest that it will cost around $700m to implement and a further $350m per annum to comply with …

From the beginning of this process—

and I am still quoting from my release of more than two years ago—

the Coalition has supported sensible reforms which increase trust and confidence in Australia’s financial services industry.

However, the legislation passed by the House of Representatives, we said, was 'regulatory overreach'. I said:

… it has failed to strike the right balance between appropriate levels of consumer protection and the need to ensure the ongoing availability, accessibility and affordability of high-quality financial advice.

I said then that it was coalition policy that in government we would fix FoFA by implementing all of the 16 recommendations we made as part of the Parliamentary Joint Committee for Corporations and Financial Services inquiry into this legislation. We stated that these changes would include: the complete removal of opt in; the simplification and streamlining of the additional annual fee disclosure requirements; improving the best-interest duty; providing certainty around the provision and availability of scaled advice; and, refining the ban of commissions on risk insurance inside superannuation et cetera.

Rather than it being rushed, not only did we flag in 2011 and 2012 what we would do in exact detail but we actually released the policy in the lead-up to the 2013 election. It was the coalition's policy to boost productivity and reduce regulation. Of course, in that policy, point 18 relates to the Future of Financial Advice amendments. Of course, my good friend Senator Sinodinos, on coming into government, started an extensive process of consultation. When I became Acting Assistant Treasurer earlier this year I paused the process that was underway and conducted some further consultations. I note that Senator Dastyari and shadow minister Bowen have missed this particular statement, but on Friday, 20 June I actually released a very comprehensive five-page statement with the way forward on financial advice laws, including explanations of why we were doing what we were doing and also of the process that we would use in terms of regulation and legislation.

I am pleased to inform the Senate that, as I said last week when I was questioned in the Senate about this matter, I have been consulting with crossbench senators in relation to these matters. In particular, I have had some very good conversations with Mr Palmer, on behalf of the Palmer United Party, and also with the Australian Motoring Enthusiast Party. I know that Labor wanted me to act contrary to good practice. I know that Labor wanted me to rush the tabling of the regulations in the Senate so that there was even more pressure on new senators to deal with a whole range of issues, on top of having to deal with the carbon tax repeal legislation. But I have very much appreciated, having the events of last week behind us and having ensured that the regulations could only be dealt with this week, the time spent with Mr Palmer as Leader of the Palmer United Party and the opportunity to talk through the issues, explain what we were doing and why. In particular, I explained that what the government was doing was in the public interest and was good for consumers because it would improve access to affordable high-quality financial advice by removing unnecessary and costly red tape, while the government was maintaining all the important consumer protections that matter for consumers.

I am pleased to inform the Senate that the government has reached agreement with the Palmer United Party. I have written to Mr Palmer about a range of additional measures that the government will pursue by way of further regulations in order to take on board the positive suggestions that were made by Mr Palmer on behalf of the Palmer United Party. I have written to Mr Palmer and, at the end of reading this letter into Hansard, I will table this letter, consistent with the discussions that I have had, in order to provide full transparency around how we will even further improve the improvements that we have already made to our financial advice laws.

I am reading from the letter here:

Dear Mr Palmer

Thank you for your time yesterday and today and the very constructive discussions with you on behalf of the Palmer United Party about the Government's improvements to our financial advice laws.

As we discussed, the Government's intention is to improve access to affordable, high quality financial advice by removing unnecessary and costly red tape, while maintaining all the important consumer protections that matter for consumers.

As a result of our discussion this morning, if the FOFA Regulations tabled in the Senate on 10 July 2014 are not disallowed, the Government will make further Regulations within 90 days to ensure the following requirements in the Corporations Act 2001 are explicitly listed in the Statement of Advice provided by financial advisers to their client and signed off by both:

I now list the various provisions:

Corporations Act 2001

Corporations Act 2001

These regulations will also specify that any instructions to alter or review instructions must be in writing, signed by the client, and acknowledged by the adviser. There will also be a requirement in those regulations that in that Statement of Advice the financial adviser provides an explicit statement that he or she genuinely believes that the advice provided to the client is in the client's best interests, given the client's relevant circumstances.

There will be a specific requirement enshrined in those regulations that the Statement of Advice is to be signed by both the adviser and the client.

These additional requirements will require regulatory change. The Government will make the necessary regulatory changes within 90 days.

We also will reflect those changes, as required, in amendments to the actual legislation currently before the Parliament, the Corporations Amendment (Streamlining of Future of Financial Advice) Bill 2014.

Finally, the Government will work in consultation with all relevant stakeholders, to establish an enhanced public register of financial advisers (including employee advisers), which includes a record of each adviser's credentials and status in the industry.

Incidentally, that deals with one of the recommendations out of the Senate Economics Legislation Committee inquiry into ASIC and is also consistent with one of the propositions that has been put forward by the Financial System Inquiry interim report released today. I continue quoting:

On behalf of the Government, I appreciate your advice that on this basis, the Palmer United Party and Senator Muir from the Australian Motoring Enthusiasts Party will be in a position to support our regulations to improve FOFA which came into effect on 1 July 2014, by voting against any disallowance and to support our FOFA legislation as amended to give effect to the additional measures in this letter.

The Government appreciates the very constructive approach taken by the Palmer United Party and by Senator Muir on behalf of the Australian Motoring Enthusiasts Party in helping the Government to improve access to affordable, high quality financial advice for all Australians.

Then it says that I have copied this letter to various people. I now table this letter for the benefit of the Senate. For completeness, I would also like to inform the Senate that I had very good discussions with Senator Leyonhjelm and Senator Day as well.

This is very good news for consumers. This means that consumers will have certainty about the regulatory settings moving forward. It will make sure that consumers across Australia will be able to benefit from proper competition. It means that consumers will have the benefit from being able to access affordable advice, because we are removing all of the unnecessary and costly red tape which Labor imposed on consumers and small business advisers, at the behest of the union movement. So I really thank the Palmer United Party for the very constructive approach that they have taken to this process, unlike the Labor Party. All the Labor Party and the Greens have been doing in this is playing politics. In the meantime, the Palmer United Party engaged with the government. They came to us with some positive suggestions. They came to us with some constructive suggestions on how our improvements could be made even better. That is the way to legislate. That is the way to drive public policy improvements. On behalf of the government, I very much thank the Palmer United Party for their very constructive engagement with the government. Mr Acting Deputy President, he has already spoken.

Cory Bernardi (SA, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Thank you, Minister. Before I call Senator Dastyari, who does have the right of reply, I will ask if any other senators wish to speak on this matter. Senator Dastyari.

Sam Dastyari (NSW, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

What we see now is a government that have completely lost control of their own agenda. They are in a state now where, putting aside all of the fiasco of what happened last week, we have the PUP wagging the tail wagging the dog. This is not the government of Australia anymore. They are not setting the policy. They are not setting the agenda. You have a situation where agreements now have to be reached in letter, in writing, and have to be read into the Hansard for there to be any kind of an agreement. My friends in the Palmer United Party, what I worry is that you have been sold a pup. There is an agreement here about what will happen in 90 days. Let us be clear: that gets them outside the disallowance period; that gets them outside the period that is available for these regulations to be disallowed. What you have got here is a government who have said they are going to do a bunch of things, who have made promise after promise after promise to different groups, to different organisations and to different Australians and have broken them at every instance. That is what we are going to see happen here again. There is a 90-day timetable that was set by a government who are bent on breaking every promise they can break.

Today is a sad day for the tens of thousands of Australians who have suffered losses from financial collapses like those of Timbercorp and Storm and from Commonwealth Financial Planning. Rather than recognise what has happened in the financial services industry—an industry where a handful of rogue elements have given the broader industry a bad name—this government has sided with the interests of a handful of crooks, criminals and con men who want nothing more than to return to the bad old days of financial advice. Senator Cormann, you are better than this. You are better than a deal that needs to be done during question time regarding letters and controlling the government. This is a government that has lost control of its own agenda. This is not a government that sets out what happens on a daily basis. We wait and see what Mr Palmer puts in the Financial Review the night before. Let us be clear: we all know that this happened yesterday and today. We wait to see what Mr Palmer puts in the Financial Review and, based on that, the negotiations begin and the agreements get made.

This was meant to be responsible adult government. You had Mr Abbott say, on 4 August 2013:

There will not be deals done with independents and minor parties under any political movement that I lead.

Shame on you, Minister Cormann. Shame on this government. Shame on you for being a government that is prepared to do these kinds of dirty deals at the eleventh hour, simply to protect the interests of a handful of big banks, big interests and the big end of town. I actually have an incredible amount of respect for Senator Cormann. I have always viewed Senator Cormann as someone who has—a view that I do not necessarily always agree with—a libertarian free-market view and a view about responsible policy. Responsible policy is not determined at the eleventh hour in deals that are done in this manner.

A proper legislative process should have taken place, where legislation is brought into this place and there is an opportunity for a proper debate, an opportunity for amendments and an opportunity for every single consumer advocate group in this country to have their say. That is not what we have had. What we have had is a dirty deal being done at the eleventh hour with a minor party. A deal was done with a minor party at the eleventh hour, because this is a government that no longer controls its own agenda. This is a government that no longer controls what happens in the Australian Senate and can no longer control what happens with legislation. The government's relationships are so bad that we witnessed the humiliation of a minister of the Crown having to read into the Hansard an entire letter, simply because that was a term of the agreement. Senator Cormann, you are meant to be the minister and the government of this country.

Cory Bernardi (SA, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Please address your remarks through the chair, Senator Dastyari.

Sam Dastyari (NSW, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Through the chair, Senator Cormann is meant to be a minister of this government. He is meant to be a voice in this government. This is a government that no longer controls its agenda.

What worries me is that today we have broken the hearts of thousands of Australians who rely on and should be able to depend on non-conflicted, strong, good financial advice. What we have instead—from a government that have already said that they are not prepared to take any action on something as large as the financial planning scandal—is another deal that will give the government another opportunity to go around and collect the donations from their friends from the big end of town. Once again, those Australians who do not have the voice to speak for themselves—who do not have the lobbyists, who do not have the money or the power—have been silenced by this government.

Government senators interjecting—

Cory Bernardi (SA, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Order! Senators on my right, come to order!

Penny Wong (SA, Australian Labor Party, Leader of the Opposition in the Senate) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

It is determining your policy decisions. You have taken donations and that is determining your policies. You are doing the bidding of the banks.

Cory Bernardi (SA, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Order! Senators on my right and on my left! Senator Wong, please come to order. I will not call Senator Dastyari until the Senate is quiet. Senator Dastyari, you have the call.

Sam Dastyari (NSW, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I have to say to my friends from the Palmer United Party that, while I accept your position that you will negotiate whenever you can negotiate and get whatever deal you are able to get, this is not the way to do policy. This is no way to run a government. This is no way to run a country. Australian families deserve better than a government that will sell out anyone and anything to protect the interests of a handful of the richest, most powerful and wealthiest Australians. They are the interests that you have chosen to represent today—not the voices of those who suffered at Timbercorp, those who suffered in Storm Financial or those who suffered in Commonwealth Financial Planning. They are not the voices that you have chosen to represent; you have chosen to represent those of CommBank, AMP and Macquarie Private Wealth—the handful of the wealthiest and most powerful groups in this country. And, once again, Australian families have been sold out.

This is no way to do policy, Senator Cormann. This is no way to run a government. This is no way for us to operate for the next few years—with dirty deals being done dirt cheap at the last minute. Frankly, the Australian people never voted for this and they will never support this. The Australian people deserve better than these kinds of deals that are done to protect a handful of the wealthiest and most powerful Australians. Once again, tonight there will be a group of people—the con men, the sharks and those who have misrepresented and misused the financial services industry—salivating at the prospect that, under you, Minister Cormann, they can return to the bad old days of financial planning. Unfortunately, our friends here in the Palmer United Party have allowed them a vehicle to do that. I can assure you of one thing regarding any deal you think you have with this government: they have very cleverly set a 90-day period, because that takes you beyond the disallowance period, to make sure your leverage has been minimised.

Senator Cormann, time after time in the last government, you would get up and give speeches about process. You talk about how the Senate should be run and you talk about the fact that we should have an Australian Senate that is prepared to have legislation and is prepared to bring things forward. But, once again, you have cowered and you have run away.

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

I'm here.

Sam Dastyari (NSW, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Senator Cormann, you did not have the guts.

Cory Bernardi (SA, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Address your remarks through the chair.

Sam Dastyari (NSW, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Through the chair, this government did not have the guts to bring legislation into this place and to allow a fair and proper debate on their regulations. Let us be clear: they have done deals at the eleventh hour and deals at question time, because this is no longer a government that are in control. This is no longer a government in control of the Australian parliament. We saw it happen last week and we are seeing it again this week. The government have lost control of their agenda. The government have lost control of their policy-making ability. Senator Cormann, you are better than this.

Opposition senators: No, he is not.

No, I actually do believe that.

Cory Bernardi (SA, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Ignore the interjections, Senator Dastyari.

Sam Dastyari (NSW, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I think the Australian public rightly deserve better than this. We have seen collapse after collapse. We have seen Australians lose their homes. I spent the morning talking to one victim from Timbercorp who said that there were 300 people in the same situation that she was in. Yet here we have a government who have done everything they can at every point in time, wherever available, to make sure that they represent the interests and protect that handful of dodgy financial planners. Frankly, I believe the Australian people deserve be I believe there are voices out there—tens of thousands of voices—of people who have suffered from dodgy and bad financial advice. And, no, they are not going to be paying $1,500 and $2½ thousand to buy tickets at fundraisers, but there are thousands and tens of thousands of Australians who deserve to be able to rely on the financial advice that they are given, and what we have seen today is the government sell them out. Why? Because this is a government that, firstly, no longer has control over its own agenda. It is a government that has lost control of its ability to make policy and to determine what happens on a daily basis.

Government is now decided and determined based on what Mr Palmer decides to put in the paper the day before. That is how government is being done and how decisions in this place are now being made. Minister Cormann likes to go on about the Labor-Greens coalition. Let us be clear about this: this is now a Liberal-National-PUP coalition that is making these decisions.

The tragedy is: there is going to be another financial collapse; there is going to be another large scandal. We here today had the ability to take, we could have taken, whatever steps were necessary to prevent that from happening again. Instead, to protect their own interests and to protect the interests of a handful of people, this government has decided to sell out.

I say to the government: Australia deserves better. We deserve better than these kinds of deals. We deserve honesty. We deserve transparency. We deserve a proper legislative process where these things could be debated. You do not have a single consumer advocate group—not one single consumer advocate group in this entire country—supporting the measures that are being taken. I will tell you who does support the measures: a handful of big banks; a handful of corporate interests; a handful of donors to the Liberal Party. But the everyday working Australians who rely on financial advice are not with you on this, and they will never be with you on this.

I say to my friends from the Palmer United Party: do not let this be a lesson in how you are going to govern. You cannot have government being run by last-minute deals. We cannot have government done that way. While I respect and accept the fact that you will always negotiate the best deal that you feel you can get, the fact that these people will bend over backwards every time you make any demand, the fact that you now have the ability to set the entire agenda, and the fact that this country is simply being run by your whims and wishes does not mean that that is a power that should be abused. I believe that in this instance, unfortunately, you are abusing that power. You are taking advantage of the fact that this is a hopeless government that has already completely lost control of its own policy agenda.

There is a better way. There is an open way. There is a transparent way. There is a way in which the thousands and tens of thousands of Australian voices can and should be heard. And I urge this Senate to go back to the drawing board and disallow these regulations. Question put.