Download PDFMedia Release SENATOR THE HON. CHRISTOPHER ELLISON Minister for Justice and Customs
Manager of Government Business in the Senate Senator for Western Australia
E102 /05 16 August 2005
Joint Communiqué: Second Industry Roundtable on Anti -Money Laundering and Counter -Terrorist Financing between the Minister for Justice and Customs, Senator Chris Ellison, and representatives of the Financial Services Sector
The Minister for Justice and Customs, Senator Chris Ellison, yesterday held a second roundtable meeting in Sydney with representatives of the Australian financial services sector, to discuss remaining issues related to proposed anti -money laundering (AML) and counter -terrorist financing (CTF) reforms. The first roundtable meeting was held on 21 July 2005.
Senator Ellison and Australian Bankers’ Association Director, Tony Burke, jointly chaired the meeting which was attended by representatives of the banks, card schemes , fund managers, life insurers and associations representing financial planners, credit unions, stockbrokers, investment banks, building societies, the credit, superannuation and insurance industries.
From the Federal Government, representatives attended f rom the Attorney -General’s Department, the Department of Prime Minister and Cabinet, Treasury and AUSTRAC.
The purpose of the meeting was to discuss remaining issues arising from the 21 July roundtable and to reach further agreement on the detail of previo usly discussed options for implementing the Recommendations of the international Financial Action Task Force on Money Laundering (FATF). The FATF’s Recommendations are the recognised international standard in measures to combat terrorist financing and mon ey laundering.
It was agreed at the 21 July roundtable meeting that customers already identified under the Financial Transaction Reports Act would not need to be re -identified. It was further agreed yesterday there would be no general obligation to re -ide ntify all other existing customers but it was recognised that in some cases existing customers may need to be identified on the basis of risk triggers to be developed in consultation between government and industry.
There was general agreement that foreign Politically Exposed Persons (PEPs) would be identified using procedures agreed between industry and AUSTRAC. The meeting agreed to explore a range of options for identifying PEPs.
The Government and the financial services sector agreed that options for non -face -to -face electronic customer identity verification should be explored. It was recognised that electronic verification options would need to provide the same confidence in the verification process as face -to -face identification.
The roundtable meet ing also agreed that options for third party identity verification need to be explored further.
The meeting agreed that action to regulate the activities of the alternative remittance sector should continue concurrently with regulation of the formal financ ial sector.
Senator Ellison emphasised the importance of increasing Australia’s capacity to combat the financing of terrorism and the meeting agreed that proposed legislation would strengthen processes for moving funds by international and domestic wire t ransfer.
The representatives of the financial services sector agreed that the industry roundtable meetings had made substantial progress on all key policy issues underlying proposed AML and CTF reforms. It was agreed that there would be a further meeting in advance of the release of an exposure draft Bill to facilitate future consultation.
Senator Ellison thanked the financial services sector for their commitment to the development of workable proposals to strengthen Australia’s AML and CTF systems and for their valuable contribution to the process.
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