Page 1826 - Week 07 - Wednesday, 22 August 2007
Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Speeches . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . . PDF . . . .
And so on. I really have to reject the imputation that our motion is saying that the whole sector is at fault. Of course it is not. But we are finding—for instance, in response to a question I asked on notice during the estimates process—that the office of fair trading has had five complaints about one credit lender and yet we are still waiting for court action against that lender. So at the moment I do have concerns about the ability of the office of fair trading to take action. It must be under-resourced; that is the best interpretation of its lack of action. At times it is up to ASIC to take action where the OFT has failed.
The institutions that we have got are not working. At the very least let us hope that we can get something out of this debate. My motion has been more or less rejected. The Liberal amendment even takes out reference to part (c) of my motion, which says that there is an “upward trend in the number of borrowers facing home repossession by non-bank lenders”, even though, in the speeches, it was admitted that that is the case. I cannot see why it has been removed from the motion; I do not think it hurts to recognise that.
I have not heard from Mr Corbell that the commonwealth and the states and territories are going to come to an agreement any time soon. Perhaps we can hear a bit more about that. The problem is here now; we do not want it to drag on and on. Nor do I want to see this develop into a states and territories versus the commonwealth issue; again, that is a recipe for nothing happening.
The government and the opposition are offering very similar amendments. It will be interesting to see which one prevails. I am sure that CARE will be surprised to find itself being allocated to the fringes by Mr Mulcahy. It is very obvious that this motion is a quick response; however, we have had the CARE report for over a year. The Greens have been concerned about this issue for over a year. We have been talking to CARE. The issue has been precipitated into the spotlight by a situation in the US and by CARE’s continuing dealings.
CARE is the place where people go as a first resort; it is through their assistance that people follow up the channels that do exist whereby there can be some help. But it is too late for most of them. We need some legislation that kicks in before people find themselves in this situation so that they do not have to go to make a complaint about an institution when they are already locked into an arrangement whereby they stand to lose their house because they were not informed. Let us face it: when we put the emphasis on the consumer, as the tendency is, we have to make sure that consumers are informed.
There should be an obligation on all lenders to make sure that people get all the documentation required. Maybe some of these lenders do not actually care if people cannot pay back their loans. You can get a loan with some of these people through filling out a form over the internet. You might never personally interact. This is what we are talking about here. We are not talking about all the good, respectable people that help.
I remember a time when women could not get loans from the banks to buy houses. I am not saying that we should go back there. I am saying that we should do this from
Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Speeches . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . . PDF . . . .