Coalition hopeful of bipartisan FOFA report
The Federal Opposition is still hopeful the Parliamentary Joint Committee (PJC) reviewing the Government's Future of Financial Advice (FOFA) bills will deliver a bipartisan report on key amendments, but stands ready to issue a dissenting report.
The Shadow Minister for Financial Services, Senator Mathias Cormann, has told Money Management that the Coalition members of the PJC remained hopeful that it is capable of delivering a bipartisan report recognising "the flaws in the current bills and making recommendations for necessary and sensible improvements".
"We will only be in a position to make a judgment whether a dissenting report is required once we know what the Committee report on FOFA actually comes up with," he said.
"We have a clearly articulated Coalition view on opt-in, we're against it and if the government persists with it we will seek to have it removed from the legislation when it is debated in Parliament," Cormann said.
However the shadow minister said a range of other issues raised as part of the PJC hearings remained under consideration by the Coalition members of the committee.
"In relation to some of the other issues, like the current drafting issues in relation to the best interest duty, issues around the opportunity for scaled advice and for clients and financial advisers to agree on the scope of advice, we will continue to carefully consider the evidence put to the Committee by stakeholders and Treasury before we make final decisions on the best way forward," Cormann said.
The PJC is due to issue its report to the Parliament by the end of the month, after which time the Government is expected to move to bring on debate in the Parliament, despite the bills also being the subject of consideration by the Senate Economics Committee.
A number of submissions to the Senate Economics Committee, including that from National Australia Bank/MLC, have urged an extended implementation period for the FOFA bills and their alignment with the introduction of the Government's Stronger Super changes, particularly MySuper.
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