Senator IAN CAMPBELL (Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister for Communications, Information Technology and the Arts) (4:57 PM) —The resourcing of APRA, the Australian Prudential Regulation Authority, and ASIC, the Australian Securities and Investments Commission, is a matter that the government holds as incredibly important for the very reasons that Senator Cook has made clear. I had the privilege of assisting the Treasurer in relation to ASIC for the period of November 1996 through to October 1998, a time when the government was developing the legislation that Senator Cook was referring to, which was known then as CLERP6 and which has now changed its name to the Financial Sector Regulatory Reform Bill, which is to come before this place.

For some of the reasons that Senator Cook may have been exposed to at the hearings of the Joint Statutory Committee on Corporations and Securities, it is a very important piece of legislation—which this government has been pushing for now for at least three or four years—that will bring together the regulation of similar financial products and services under a single regulatory regime. If he looked closely at the development of that legislation—which, as I said, will come to this place shortly, I hope—he would know that the government's best intentions in this area are often thwarted by a range of different stakeholders in the various industries that we are seeking to regulate. I know, from when I was trying to get those parties to agree to what I regard as a new world's best practice regulatory regime—and certainly my successor in that portfolio, Minister Hockey, has been endeavouring to do that—that there are some people in those industries who have been fighting a subterranean campaign—certainly, it was in my time—and sometimes an above the ground campaign to try and stop those nasty people in Canberra from regulating them.

I think all of us have seen financial failures, be it aggressively marketed tax schemes or managed investment schemes, that would say to the financial investment, the planning industry and the people who sell schemes, aggressively or otherwise, that there is a very important need in Australia for consumers who are receiving financial advice to feel that they are being given advice by people who are working in an industry that is properly regulated and that people who create or proffer advice or sell products or services in a way that falls outside a proper regulatory regime will feel the full force of the law, be it by losing their licence to operate or by some other financial penalty. Consumers deserve that sort of protection. I look forward to that legislation coming before the chamber, and I hope that we can rely on the Australian Labor Party and other parties in this place to support that effort of Minister Hockey and this government.

In terms of the resourcing of APRA and ASIC, as I said, those agencies are regarded by this government as being very important. During my period of responsibility for ASIC we had a very close liaison with the commissioners of the securities commission. I think Senator Cook would recall from his own experience as a minister that very rarely does an agency or department readily come to the government at budget time and say, `We're fully resourced and we don't need any more money.' It is generally the case that most departments and agencies would seek to get more money. The government is committed to ensuring that both APRA and ASIC, which fulfil an absolutely crucial role within Australia in the regulation of our financial sector, are properly resourced. We believe at the government level—I know the Treasurer takes a very close personal interest in these issues—that they are properly resourced and that any issue of underresourcing should be brought to the government's attention and be closely monitored.

The people of Australia need to understand that they have a world's best practice financial sector regulatory regime with the reforms and the new regulatory regime which came into being in July 1998. Generally speaking, most national and international observers of the regulatory regime in Australia would regard the new financial sector regulatory regime as having performed extraordinarily well compared to any other international structure. In fact, I understand—as I do keep an eye on these things even though I have left the portfolio—that many other nations are seeking to copy what Australia has done in breaking up the prudential regulation, the corporate regulation and the other aspects of it. I say to Senator Cook that we regard the resourcing as a vital issue. We would not allow APRA or ASIC to be anything but adequately resourced, and I am happy to recommit the government to that.