Senate inquiry into the future of financial advice

On 3 November 2011 and 24 November 2011, respectively, the Senate referred the above Bills to the Economics Legislation Committee for inquiry and report.

The Corporations Amendment (Future of Financial Advice) Bill amends the Corporations Act 2001 to:

• require financial advisers to provide a fee disclosure statement to a client when charging advice fees for longer than 12 months;
• require financial advisers to provide a fee disclosure statement and a renewal notice to a client when charging advice fees for longer than 24 months; and
• extend the Australian Securities and Investments Commission’s licensing and banning powers used to supervise the financial services industry.

The Corporations Amendment (Further Future of Financial Advice Measures) Bill amends the Corporations Act 2001 to:

• require persons providing personal financial advice retail clients to act in the best interests of the clients; and
• give priority to the interests of the client.

The Committee is due to report to the Senate by 14 March 2012. The Committee expects to hold public hearings into the provisions of both Bills in February 2012, and would like to receive submissions for both the Corporations Amendment (Future of Financial Advice) Bill and the Corporations Amendment (Further Future of Financial Advice Measures) Bill by Friday 27 January 2012. (The submissions closing date has been moved forward from 6 February 2012).

The Committee is seeking written submissions from interested individuals and organisations preferably in electronic form submitted online or sent by email to economics.sen@aph.gov.au as an attached Adobe PDF or MS Word format document. The email must include full postal address and contact details.

Alternatively, written submissions may be sent to:

Secretary
Senate Economics Committees, SG.64
PO Box 6100
Parliament House
CANBERRA  ACT  2600

More information about this inquiry and notes on making submissions are available from the APH website. The Committee secretariat can also help: phone 02 6277 3540 or email economics.sen@aph.gov.au