Page 2826 - Week 10 - Tuesday, 13 September 1994
Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Speeches . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . . PDF . . . .
Rather than refunding it directly to those consumers or those customers, the legislation provides that an equivalent amount be payable into this trust fund to do penance for the harm that has been done. Obviously, it would generally be employed where the contravention covers a large number of contracts but in a small way, and I assume that that is the intention of the legislation.
I note that clause 4 of the Bill amends the definition of "financial institution" to cover bodies that are registered outside the ACT. It has the effect of widening the catchment of the Act; but it does so apparently retrospectively to 1 July 1992, which was the day when the Credit (Amendment) Act 1991 passed by the previous Assembly came into force. I suppose that it could be seen as imposing a burden, by doing so, on some corporate citizens, which was not previously applied. As I have indicated before in debates on other matters, my party is not utterly zealous about retrospectivity, about adverse retrospectivity at least, and we have never taken the view that adverse retrospectivity is absolutely unacceptable.
In this case the amendment appears to clear up a genuine ambiguity in the legislation, and I am not aware of any credit provider who was unwilling to be caught by the Act. I have made some attempts to contact a number of credit providers in the ACT to ascertain their view about the legislation, and none that I have spoken to were concerned about it. I might say, though, that I did contact a number of organisations, large and small, who are providing credit in the ACT. Initially at least, none of them were aware of this Bill or its contents. It subsequently transpired that national umbrella organisations of at least some of these bodies had heard of the Bill. I am not sure whether they were told about it by an agency of the ACT or whether they have paid officers whose job it is to search out these kinds of Bills and bring them to the attention of their members. But it is a matter of concern that a Bill with fairly significant changes in the law relating to credit provision in this Territory should have been introduced and possibly have been passed without some clear consultation with the major credit providers in this Territory. Notwithstanding those comments, Mr Acting Speaker, I think this legislation represents some valuable changes to the law in this area which may be important in the lead-up to uniform legislation, and, as such, the Bill has the support of the Liberal Opposition.
MR CONNOLLY (Attorney-General and Minister for Health) (8.17), in reply: I thank Mr Humphries for his comments that are in support of this Bill. As he says, this is probably one of the last goes we will have at tampering with the ACT Credit Act, because we hope that the long awaited process of uniform credit laws is on the horizon. Some of his comments about consultation or the value of consultation caused me some concern. It was certainly my understanding that the industry was aware of what we were doing here. I suspect that what has happened is that everyone's attention has been focused on the national uniformity project, and some of these fairly technical amendments to ACT laws have probably not been high on the industry's agenda.
It really demonstrates, again, the need for national uniformity. At the moment there are eight separate legal regimes, differing in quite substantial form, applying to the credit provider throughout Australia. We operate in a single national market, with only very few exceptions - relating perhaps to the university or one of the financial institutions linked to the university. Anyone who does business in the ACT also does business in New South Wales and, in most cases, throughout eastern Australia or indeed
Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Speeches . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . . PDF . . . .