Bills

Retirement Villages Bill

Committee Stage

In committee.

(Continued from 18 October 2016.)

Clause 26.

The Hon. S.G. WADE: It is somewhat surprising that the government should seek to bring this matter back to the chamber so soon after the house indicated its desire for more information. It does, though, give me a chance to update the council on what developments have occurred since Tuesday, so I suppose there is that benefit.

The minister kindly wrote to members of the Legislative Council yesterday in relation to a letter which I read onto the record on Tuesday. I think it would be fair to say that the government's version was a letter (single) signed by Mr Karidis; the letter that I had, as I understand it in identical terms, was signed by 12 people. I appreciate that the minister did not have access to my letter and assumed that it was a Property Council cluster. I can indicate to the council that it certainly went beyond Property Council members and included the not-for-profit sector.

Be that as it may, the minister has kindly given members of the Legislative Council a response to the issues raised in that letter. I think it is only fair that considering I read, shall we call it, the Karidis letter onto the record, that I also read the Bettison letter onto the record. The letter is dated 19 October (yesterday) and it states:

Dear Member

I am writing to you about a letter which I understand you all recently received, from a number of signatories on Karidis Corporation letterhead, in relation to the Retirement Villages Bill 2016...

The letter makes a number of claims about the level of consultation and recommends that the Bill be deferred. The consultation process over the last three years has been significant and has provided a compelling case for a statutory repayment period to protect the rights of residents, and also to address long-standing contract settlement issues, where estates have been tied up for prolonged periods due to delays in units being re-licenced.

The development of the Bill has been the subject of significant consultation over the past three years, in which all parties, including residents and operators, have been able to provide input. The process commenced with the Select Committee on the Review of the Retirement Villages Act 1987 in 2013, that offered all interested parties the opportunity to provide both written and verbal submissions. Based on the recommendations of the Select Committee, and further targeted consultation undertaken by the Office for the Ageing with retirement village operators and peak bodies, the Retirement Villages Bill 2015 was released for public consultation in early 2015. At this time, 13 forums were held and over 300 submissions were received.

In the development of the Bill, consideration was given to all submissions from residents, operators and peak bodies. The Government paid particular attention to feedback received from smaller and regional operators and banks on the then proposed 12 month statutory repayment period. As a result of this, the time frame was extended to 18 months. The Bill also includes provision for operators who face legitimate difficulties in repaying a resident their exit entitlement at 18 months to seek an extension of this period through the Tribunal.

I believe that 18 months is a reasonable timeframe for operators to be able to relicense a unit using reasonable remarketing efforts. This is supported by the data provided by the Property Council, which states on average the time taken to relicense a unit is 315 days.

The majority of the 92 regional and remote villages have advised that an 18 month repayment period will not affect their day to day business, as 60 already repay within 12 months or less.

The retirement village sector is extremely active and the prospect of new legislation has not slowed or deterred operators:

five new villages were registered in 2015/16; and

two new villages have been registered since July this year.

The correspondents assert 'that no new villages have been foreshadowed since the intent of the Bill became known'. This is incorrect—the Bill was released in February 2015, with significant media announcements made by operators since this time, including:

The minister then details five developments. It continues:

Cumulatively, the correspondents operate 76 villages out of 530 in the state. It is significant that only one of the signatories is a not for profit operator. The concerns raised by this group are a repeat of comments made by the Property Council, who represent a small number of for-profit operators in the state.

The retirement village industry in South Australia is heavily weighted towards the not for profit sector, who operate 74% of all villages (394) with the remaining 26% being for profit (136). The majority of not-for-profit organisations have more generous repayment schedules than the 18 month period being proposed.

We are looking to build this market now and into the future. The expectations of people for how they age are changing and the sector must be prepared for this. Consumers will choose accommodation options that meet their needs, and many who are reaching 55 years have parents still alive, some of who will be living in retirement villages. Their experiences will colour the choices they make. Will waiting over five years for repayment be a motivator to take up village living?

Any further delays in the progression of the Bill will be of ongoing concern for the 25,000 retirement village residents and to the operators of the other 454 villages following its progress. This Bill strikes a balance between the needs of all stakeholders, and will meet its aim of achieving ongoing confidence and growth of the retirement village industry and equity between operators and residents.

Yours sincerely

Hon. Zoe Bettison MP

MINISTER FOR AGEING

I thank the minister for the letter. It is a respectful communication with the council as we consider this bill. I would like to make a number of points in relation to it in the council's consideration of this bill. I should foreshadow that I will, again, be seeking the concurrence of the house to report progress, but let me show due respect to the minister by saying why I believe we need to report progress, in spite of the letter from the minister.

First of all, the minister takes us as far back as the select committee, which occurred in the previous parliament. But, I would make the very strong point to the council that the issues that are in this bill, that come from a select committee, are not in contention. The select committee did not recommend a statutory buyback, so this proposal has not had the benefit of the detailed consideration that the select committee was able to offer. The Liberal Party supports statutory buyback.

What we are concerned about is making sure that we manage the scope of the buyback in a way that does not cripple the industry and its capacity to grow into the future. In that context, I completely agree with the comments the minister made at the bottom of the second page of her letter, which is that we need to build this market now, into the future, and that the industry needs to be flexible.

How can the industry be flexible, managing growth into the future and also be flexible in terms of housing options if their financing capacity is severely constrained by a poorly targeted statutory buyback? What I implore this council to consider is in the context of making sure that we have enough retirement village units to cope with the 42 per cent increase. My calculations, which I offered to the house on Tuesday, was that in the next 20 years we will need 43 per cent more units in this sector. So, we need to be very careful that anything we do does not unnecessarily constrain the growth of supply.

I completely agree with the minister that what people of the previous generation might have seen as an appropriate housing option may not be considered to be an appropriate housing option in the next generation. That is all the more reason to keep them liquid. With all due respect to my parents who have just moved out of a little box on a campus, if a little box on a campus is no longer going to be acceptable to the next generation, why would we inhibit the capacity of an industry to redevelop its assets to better suit the needs of the next generation?

I would like to pause to stress that retirement villages are not just expensive serviced apartments on lush campuses. Many of these facilities are for people who will go into retirement with a very limited cash flow. This week, you might recall, is Anti-Poverty Week. In recognition of Anti-Poverty Week, SACOSS and COTA convened a working lunch, which I went to, in order to discuss the issues of older women and their housing needs.

The Hon. K.L. Vincent interjecting:

The Hon. S.G. WADE: Sorry, passed?

The Hon. K.L. Vincent interjecting:

The Hon. S.G. WADE: Yes, we want it passed, too. I am sorry, I did not realise that I was suggesting that I did not want this passed. We want it passed—we have already committed to passing it—but what we are debating is the scope of the statutory buyback. If the honourable member might do me the courtesy of hearing my argument on this, I think it is reprehensible if people in this house think that this is about serviced apartments and expensive units.

We have thousands of women particularly, going into retirement with a pitiful retirement income, and they will need to rely not so much on the licence to occupy model that is more popular at the moment, but I predict that in the next decades the rental model within retirement villages will be a very important model for older women without retirement income.

It is all well and good to say that we want to put this bill through without due consideration, we do not want to give regard to the possible impact on future supply. Our amendment that we put forward was primarily focusing on the needs of current and past residents, limiting the statutory buyback so that it excluded deceased estates, and in that way protected the ongoing supply of units, and I would put to those who are concerned about social justice values that that is extremely relevant when we are faced with the challenge of finding housing options for tens of thousands of women who will go into retirement without a significant nest egg.

If the minister was truly concerned about maintaining sufficient supply going forward for the 43 per cent increase, if she was truly concerned about maintaining the flexibility of the asset to be relevant to future generations, I believe she would be much more careful in legislating in this area. In relation to the focus in the minister's statements about consultation, it is a matter for debate as to whether the consultation was adequate, but to me that is not the crucial issue. The crucial issue is the lack of analysis.

The government's own policies require that a bill needs to have a regulatory impact statement, so if you wanted to think about the impact on older women going into retirement, if you wanted to think about the impact on future supply, if you wanted to think about the impact on deceased estates, middle-aged people waiting for the asset to become free, why not do a regulatory impact statement? It is a government policy. Why not test it? My main contention is not about consultation. From my party's point of view, the main concern is that we have not had an adequate assessment of the impact of this legislation. In terms of the minister's assertion in the letter that the concerns are the concerns of the for-profit sector, she said, 'It is significant that only one of the signatories is a not-for-profit operator.'

I will turn now to a letter that was dated yesterday, but I received today. This is a letter which is to the South Australian Retirement Villages Residents Association. It is signed by a representative of the Property Council, in other words, the for-profit sector, and it is signed by a representative of Aged and Community Services, which is the peak body for not-for-profits.

The minister quite rightly said that this is a not-for-profit sector. Seventy-four per cent of the operators in this space are not-for-profit. These are the people who will have particular, shall we say, mandate responsibility to provide housing options for older people of less means and, going on from my previous comments, that will tend to be women. So both the for-profit sector and the not-for-profit sector have signed this letter. What does it say? It is a letter to SARVRA and it says:

I write in relation to the current Parliamentary debate around the Retirement Villages Bill (2016). As you are aware, the Property Council of Australia, Aged & Community Services (SA & NT) and Southern Cross Care (SA & NT) welcome some of the reforms presented in the Bill. However, we have serious concerns with a number of key clauses, in particular, clause 26 of the Bill, which mandates a statutory buyback for a retirement village unit if it fails to sell within 18 months.

So, in spite of the minister's assertions, this is not the rantings of the big for-profits in the Property Council. You have the peak body for not-for-profits representing 74 percent of the industry. One of those in particular, Southern Cross Care, one of the largest operators in this field, has also put their name to this letter and also the Property Council. The letter goes on:

It is with these concerns in mind that we seek your agreement, as a representative of the South Australian Retirement Villages Association, to participate in a steering committee to facilitate an analysis of the impact of the proposed legislation. It is disappointing that the Government has either not completed a regulatory impact on the Bill, nor shared it publicly, or does not agree with its results if one exists.

It goes on to talk about the signatories in terms of the fact they represent the for-profit and not-for-profit sectors. Clearly, the industry is saying, 'Well, if the government is not going to do what its own policies say, if the government is going to show such disregard for the viability of our industry and, for that matter, the ongoing services to the people that we care about, then we will have to do it.'

What we asked this council to do on Tuesday was to pause and reflect, to not blunder in without the information that we need. The minister could have written a letter yesterday saying, 'Okay, fair cop. I will provide you a copy of the regulatory impact statement.' She did not do that; instead, she sent us an informative letter. It makes no reference to regulatory impact and no reassurance that the due diligence has been done and that they can assure us that we are not going to cripple supply going forward and leave thousands of people without a housing option that they might otherwise have. No, we are just given some useful information. There is no evidence of a regulatory impact statement and no indication that the government has any interest in testing the presumptions behind this legislation.

In the face of a government that is not willing to do what its own policies require, in the context of a letter from close enough to 100 per cent of the industry, I would hazard a guess that the people who are not members of either ACSA or the Property Council are probably in single figures in terms of operators. But let us be clear, these are the people who speak for an industry. They are saying, 'Well, if the government won't do the analysis, we are going to step forward and do it.'

In the face of the government's intransigence to properly assess its own legislation, I believe that the Legislative Council should continue to maintain its position that this bill should not progress until that information is available. I would just like to indicate, too, that whilst I still have quite a few remarks to make, be assured that I am not going to be moving to report progress until as many members who want to speak have spoken. The courtesy was given on Tuesday, and I think that is good practice, so let us continue that.

That letter has only gone to SARVRA today, as I understand it. I have had the opportunity to meet today with the president of SARVRA, and my understanding is that that letter is being actively considered. It has not been rejected out of hand. One thing I want to stress about this opportunity to pause is that, in the government's rush to get this legislation through, I have had to say to residents, 'That's a good idea, but I can't in all conscience put that proposal before the parliament because it hasn't gone through due diligence.' What a hypocrite I would be if I said, 'Yes, that's a good idea. I want to whack that in as an amendment, and, by the way, I am going to try to constrain the statutory buyback because I don't think the government has done due diligence.'

I indicated on clause 24 that, at the review stage, I was going to put down a reform opportunity which, I believe, should be considered by the review. Actually, if we are going to have a regulatory impact statement—even though it is going to be, shall we say, a non-government one—I think that is an option that should be considered by that process. I think the Hon. John Darley's aged-care transition proposals should also be considered in the context of a regulatory impact statement, and there may well be other ones.

This is an opportunity, I believe, to get the balance right, but also to get the balance right with opportunities for better outcomes for residents. Let me go to the issue that I refer to. Let us be clear, and I will be up front: the Liberal Party is, in principle, committed to this concept. It is a practice which has emerged in the Eastern States and we do not think it should be welcomed here. It is common practice for capital items in retirement villages to be repaired or replaced by the village operators. In recent years, a few operators are starting to make residents responsible for the maintenance, repair and replacement of these items, in addition to receiving ongoing resident contributions in their capital replacement funds for this very purpose.

To affirm the current norm, the Liberal team believes that there would be value in an amendment to be made to the act, similar to section 92 of the New South Wales act, which makes it clear that the obligation for capital maintenance and replacement of an asset not owned by a resident of the retirement village rests with the operator. The amendments would prohibit operators selling items of capital to residents for which the operator is responsible, thereby passing responsibility for any such items of capital to a resident under a resident's contract or any other agreement or arrangement.

Consistent with our concern that the government had not given due diligence and a cost-benefit analysis on the statutory buyback, we did not move this as an amendment at this stage. However, with the leave of the house I would want to table the amendments that we would have otherwise moved. I would hope that this, together with other items—opportunities for real improvements to residents' rights—is one opportunity to improve residents' rights. The Hon. John Darley's amendments in relation to transition to aged care are, I think, another opportunity. There may well be other issues that residents would want to put on the agenda for the steering committee and the regulatory impact statement.

If the government will not do it, somebody has to do it. In my view, it is not just an opportunity for operators to put potential improvements to the bill on the table to be assessed, it is also an opportunity for residents to put potential opportunities for improvement on the table to be addressed. Mr Acting Chair, I table the amendments. I am not moving the amendments; I am tabling them as indicative amendments that I believe should be considered as part of any regulatory impact statement. If anybody needed any convincing that we need more information before we progress this, they need only look at the government's own survey that it sent out this week. This document states:

The Office for the Ageing, [in partnership] with the University of Adelaide, has issued a retirement villages survey to gain a better understanding of retirement villages and their residents across South Australia. This survey will provide valuable insight and baseline information about South Australia's retirement villages, an increasingly important part of the housing landscape.

I agree completely. It is a very important part of the housing landscape, but what does this document say? It says that the government is looking for baseline data. In other words, it says, 'Here we are and we've put forward a piece of legislation, we've failed to do the regulatory impact statement that our own government processes require, but now that the bill, according to the government schedule, would have been passed a month ago, we're going to go out and seek baseline data.'

Is that responsible legislation? It is appalling. Let us look at the questions they are asking. Are they relevant to this bill? My word, they are. No. 14 asks: in the past four months, how many residents have moved to residential aged care, moved within the village, moved to a different village within your organisation, moved to a different village operated by another organisation, moved elsewhere, or died?

That data would be invaluable for this house. I have been relying on anecdotes. The best anecdote I have is that 3 per cent of people leave retirement villages through death. I would love to know what the responses are to this survey. Did the government do this before the legislation was brought forward? No, it did not. Let us look at some of the other questions. No. 17 asks: how many units at your village are you currently trying to relicense? That would be useful information for this house. Question 18 asks: how long on average does it take to relicense a unit in this village? The options are: less than three months, three to six, six to 12, 12 to 18, more than 18.

This is very relevant data for the consideration of this bill. Of course it is relevant because the government itself says that this is baseline data. Why would you not do a regulatory impact statement, bully the opposition when we ask that information to be provided—and apparently it does not exist—and then after the bill is meant to go through, you tell us that you are going to go out and get the baseline data. If it exists, I invite the minister to table it. I would like to ask the minister—

The Hon. I.K. Hunter: You're a fraud.

The Hon. S.G. WADE: I put this question to the minister—

The Hon. I.K. Hunter: You are a fraud.

The ACTING CHAIR (Hon. A.L. McLachlan): Order, minister! Mr Wade has the floor.

The Hon. S.G. WADE: I put this question to the minister: how many people in the last 12 months on average in South Australian retirement villages have moved to residential aged care, moved within the village, moved to a different village—

The Hon. I.K. Hunter interjecting:

The Hon. S.G. WADE: You do not—

The Hon. I.K. Hunter interjecting:

The Hon. S.G. WADE: Chair, do we want to have a debating match or do we want to have committee stage consideration? I am in your hands, Chair, but I have the call and I will put on notice—if the minister thinks he has the answers, then he can provide them.

The Hon. I.K. Hunter: Your friends won't give them.

The Hon. S.G. WADE: Excuse me!

The Hon. I.K. Hunter interjecting:

The ACTING CHAIR (Hon. A.L. McLachlan): Minister—

The Hon. S.G. WADE: Point of order: I have the call.

The ACTING CHAIR (Hon. A.L. McLachlan): Yes, you have the call.

The Hon. J.M. Gazzola: You're taking a point of order on yourself.

The Hon. S.G. WADE: I am taking a point of order because he is defying the Chair.

The Hon. I.K. Hunter interjecting:

The ACTING CHAIR (Hon. A.L. McLachlan): Minister, restrain yourself.

The Hon. S.G. WADE: I know it is disorderly to respond to interjections but what the minister is saying is, 'Don't blame us, we asked the operators'—and I am taking on trust that he actually did ask the operators, 'Please give us your data.' In that context, if they are refusing to give it, why not do a survey? 'Oh! That's a good idea, let's do a survey but let's do a survey after the bill is meant to already be through the parliament.' What a joke you are—what a joke!

The Hon. I.K. Hunter: You're a fraud—an absolute fraud.

The ACTING CHAIR (Hon. A.L. McLachlan): Minister, the Hon. Mr Wade has the call.

The Hon. S.G. WADE: This document says that this is baseline data. The minister says, 'Don't blame me, we couldn't get it from the operators.' You can do a survey.

The Hon. I.K. Hunter: And they'll fill that in, will they? They'll fill that in?

The ACTING CHAIR (Hon. A.L. McLachlan): Minister, restrain yourself.

The Hon. S.G. WADE: Let us continue. The government says that it needs baseline data. It is going to ask for it after it has put through a piece of legislation that may well severely damage the industry. We have the word of the not-for-profit sector, which is 75 per cent of the industry. The representatives of the for-profit sector, the Property Council, and a significant range of independent operators are all raising concerns.

Now, they could be wrong, and it may well be that the regulatory impact statement shows that the industry can cope with it. Okay, why don't we do one? The industry has offered to fund one with a steering committee involving residents. If the government wants to do a regulatory impact statement, if the government wants to follow its own policy, I would be more than happy to get a copy of that. I am not insisting on a non-government regulatory impact statement: I would love a government impact statement, I would love the government to do its job. It has not done so.

The fact of the matter is that I believe that nothing has changed since Tuesday. The fact of the matter is that the government has, through the minister's letter, indicated yet again that there is no regulatory impact statement. Through their survey they have indicated that we really should have done one, because we do not have baseline data, and we have an offer from the not-for-profit sector, together with the profit sector, to work with residents to do what the government should have done. I believe that there is every reason, every reason—

The Hon. I.K. Hunter: These for-profit operators, you trust them, do you?

The ACTING CHAIR (Hon. A.L. McLachlan): Minister!

The Hon. I.K. Hunter interjecting:

The ACTING CHAIR (Hon. A.L. McLachlan): Minister, the Hon. Mr Wade has the call. Mr Wade is going to give you an opportunity to speak.

The Hon. S.G. WADE: Let us put it this way: the operators could have done a regulatory impact statement, a cost-benefit analysis—whatever you want to call it—and posted it to us. They did it with local government reform this week. The Property Council does actually know how to do these things.

What they have done in writing to SARVRA is offer a steering committee that will oversee the regulatory impact statement. If the government thinks that the Property Council, ACSA and independent operators cannot be trusted to do a regulatory impact statement, then do one themselves. Otherwise, I believe it is incumbent on this council to continue with its position and to say that we need more information. I am suggesting we update that position from Tuesday. If the government is not willing to provide that information, then we look forward to information being provided by people beyond government.

I would like to reiterate that the Liberal Party has a party room position to support this legislation. The only amendment we have—we have been up front about it since day one—is that we believe that a way to protect the stability of the industry going forward is to limit the statutory buyback.

The Hon. I.K. Hunter: Let's vote on it. Let's vote on it today. Come on, let's vote!

The ACTING CHAIR (Hon. A.L. McLachlan): Minister, please restrain yourself.

The Hon. S.G. WADE: There is a risk on our part by being willing to pause and wait for the regulatory impact statement. The risk is that the cost-benefit analysis, the regulatory impact statement—whatever you want to call it—actually finds that the industry representatives, both profit and not-for-profit, have been drama queens and the impact will not be great, and that therefore the need to protect the future supply, the rights of operators, by limiting the scope of the buyback to current and future residents, rather than to deceased estates, is not necessary.

It is completely conceivable that with more information on the table the Liberal Party may even withdraw its amendment, which means even more opportunity for benefit for residents and their families. As I said, there are opportunities to pick up ideas that have been put forward by Mr Darley and by other residents' advocates directly to me. I presume they did not only come to the Liberal Party; I presume that a number of members have good ideas that have been brought to them, but are not being progressed because of the way this government is choosing to go ahead with this legislation.

I reiterate that the Liberal Party believes that we need to have a statutory buyback to make sure that current and past residents of retirement villages have their exit entitlement repaid within a reasonable time. Currently, the bill says 18 months—we accept the government's time frame on that. In relation to other elements of the bill, we believe that we need to make sure that we protect the future supply of housing options for South Australians, and in particular the operators who actually need, for their viability, to continue to provide services to their current residents.

For those reasons, we say nothing has changed since Tuesday, except we have more information to say the government has not done its job and we have an offer on the table for the non-government sector to step in and provide this council with information it needs to protect the rights of South Australians.

The Hon. I.K. HUNTER: What an astonishing performance. You have the honourable member in this place arguing that because data is not available we should halt the process and go off and get the data from the people who will not give us the data in the first place. They will not give us the data because they do not want this legislation to pass this chamber. They do not want the legislation passed and they now have the Hon. Mr Wade in their pocket doing their bidding. It is just astonishing.

The Hon. S.G. Wade interjecting:

The Hon. I.K. HUNTER: Mr Acting Chairman, I am very grateful for the latitude that you have extended to the Hon. Mr Wade and, hopefully, now myself. We are supposed to be arguing the merits of an amendment in the name of the Hon. Mr Wade and, of course, you have allowed the Hon. Mr Wade to carry on to a proposed foreshadowed procedural motion. I thank you for extending that latitude. However, the issue is about excluding deceased estates.

The Hon. J.S.L. Dawkins interjecting:

The Hon. I.K. HUNTER: We have already had that debate. I say to the Hon. Mr Wade, we can cut through all of this nonsense, all of this idiocy that he has been raving on about, although there are rebuttal points that we can come into the record on, by having a vote on his amendment. Put it to the chamber. Win or lose, I do not mind if the government's position gets up or down. Let us put the vote to the chamber and see who supports your position.

The Hon. S.G. Wade: We don't have the information.

The Hon. I.K. HUNTER: You have moved an amendment with no information? Is that what you are telling the chamber? You have moved an amendment to the government legislation with no information before you. Oh my goodness. The backflip by the Liberal team is astonishing. They have been in here since the bill was introduced in April of last year in the other place, and the following month in this place, saying yes, we support it, yes we support it, we have got some amendments we want to move, but we need to move this on, there are 25,000 residents who are waiting on this.

I could go to the issue about deceased estates and the difference that is being created by this amendment. We all know, I would imagine, people who are in this situation of making decisions about their eventual retirement and their inheritance, through their estate, and for them to know that if they are alive they will get a repayment if they move out, but if they die their estates will not collect. Do you know the level of anxiety that causes to people around planning their estate? What you are going to do with your amendment is discourage people from going into retirement villages because they will not be sure, should they die, that their estates will get a timely payback.

This backflip is just beyond me, moving away from supporting the residents of retirement villages, which I would suggest to the chamber is what we should be doing, by supporting the government's position. The Hon. Mr Wade will have us now representing the for-profit village providers. That is what he is trying to do, to slow this down and eventually stop it altogether, because that is what the for-profit village providers want to do, stop this legislation going forward. Each of you is responsible to that sector, they have all been contacting you. All of the residents' associations, COTA I heard of earlier, and there are others, want this bill passed. They have been lobbying us for months and months. I ask you not to fall into the trap set by the Hon. Mr Wade to wait further, to get more information, which will not be forthcoming because the providers will not give it to us.

The Hon. M.C. PARNELL: At the outset I thank my colleague the Hon. Tammy Franks. She has been looking after this bill during the period that I have been away. I have now reinherited the bill at an interesting time in its progress. I am eternally grateful to my colleague for allowing me to resume my responsibilities on this bill.

When the motion was put that the debate be adjourned and progress reported last time, we were a little taken by surprise. We were not aware that that was going to be on the table and we opposed the motion then. I am grateful now that the Hon. Stephen Wade has put more fully on the record the reasons why he believes a pause in the legislative process is necessary. The questions for us, if we were to delay this bill, are: what would happen in the meantime, who would do it, how long would it take and who might be affected by the delay? The Hon. Stephen Wade has said that, in the absence of a regulatory impact statement by government, industry has suggested that a steering committee might be established and that they could come up with something akin to a regulatory impact statement and perhaps further amendments might result from that.

At first blush, that does seem relatively attractive, but I am also cognisant of the fact that, as the minister said, this bill was introduced over six months ago into parliament, on 14 April this year. It has been on the Notice Paper of this chamber since 25 May, so there has been that period of six months. Most of us have thick files. Different people have written to us, and apart from perhaps a few in the industry, overwhelmingly people are generally supportive of the bill.

That says to me that we do need to progress it. There are 25,000 residents, as the minister says, who are waiting. Whilst I am not a fan of rushing headlong into legislation with too many unanswered questions, I do note that the Hon. John Darley has as one of his amendments a review clause. The honourable member very often improves legislation in this state by adding review clauses, for which I am grateful, and we are certainly going to be supporting that.

The Greens' position at this stage is that, given the length of time that this bill has been on the table, the length of time members have had to prepare amendments and the fact that I am confident that the bill as passed will have a review clause, it seems to me that the advantages of proceeding outweigh the disadvantages, so if a motion to adjourn and to report progress is moved, the Greens will not be supporting that today.

The Hon. K.L. VINCENT: Firstly, can I start by apologising to my colleague the Hon. Mr Wade, as earlier I made an interjection during his contribution to the effect of, 'But COTA wants this bill passed.' I will get to that in a moment, but I certainly at the time was talking more to myself than anyone and did not mean to get him off track. I consequently apologise to the rest of the chamber for any fuel that I might have added to the Hon. Mr Wade's fire. I certainly respect his right to make a contribution on this issue. It is one that we can all clearly see he feels very passionate about.

Members will recall that on Tuesday afternoon, I think it was, Dignity for Disability did support the council reporting progress on this bill. We did so so that members could have more of a chance to get further information, particularly in light of what is now known as the Karidis letter. However, we were already reasonably comfortable with the bill as it stands. Certainly, we would usually support reporting progress if a member or several members were not comfortable, because frankly, if I was feeling unsure or needed more information about a bill, I would hope that most members would support me to do the same if the issue warranted it.

I guess we saw reporting progress as a way to get the best of both worlds in terms of supporting members' rights to more information, but then also hoping that they would come back well informed and ready to pass the bill. For those reasons, we do not feel inclined to support further reporting of progress at this stage. As has been said, consultation on the intent of this bill has been in the pipeline for some three years, I think, minister, I am correct in saying? The actual bill has been not just before the parliament but in this place since late May, so I think that everyone has had ample opportunity to be involved in the consultation process.

While I do not want to be too much of an apologist for the government—that is certainly not my job—I also do not think it is particularly fair to be too critical of the government for not putting a perfect bill to the parliament in the first instance, because amending legislation and improving legislation is a vital part of what this parliament, and in particular this chamber, does, not just in government bills either, but in bills from all sides of the chamber.

Just going back to my somewhat unintentional interjection, in which I said to the Hon. Mr Wade that COTA wants this passed, I would like to read out an email I received yesterday from COTA, the Council on the Ageing, South Australian Branch. I assume all members have received this as well, but it is only brief so I would like to read it out for the record:

Hon. Kelly Vincent MLC

I understand that the Retirement Villages Bill 2016 has again been deferred, this time by the Legislative Council. COTA SA, as the peak body representing the rights and interests of older South Australians, urges the passage of this Bill. It is a much needed step to modernise the protections available for retirement village residents, while balancing the interests of proprietors through hardship provisions. The current act dates back to 1987. We continue to get strong representation from RV—

I assume that stands for retirement village—

residents completely frustrated by the delays in enacting a thoroughly good, well thought out piece of legislation that has already included important compromises on all sides. I am happy to provide any further information that you might require but urge you to support the immediate passage of this Bill.

Yours sincerely, Jane Mussared, Chief Executive COTA SA

Given that I think there has been ample time for a thorough and holistic consultation of all sides of for-profit and not-for-profit retirement village managers or developers, and also that the peak body representing the interests of older South Australians is now calling for the immediate passage of this bill, describing it using words such as 'good' and 'well thought out', it is incumbent on us now to pass this bill as soon as possible.

As I said, we did hope to strike a bit of a balance in terms of giving members some extra time to consider this debate by supporting the reporting of progress earlier this week; however, given other representations that have been made from bodies such as COTA I do not feel we could comfortably do that any further.

The Hon. S.G. WADE: I appreciate that other members may wish to make further comment, but as this discussion progresses I think I should correct a couple of statements that have been made. Whilst I do respect COTA as the peak body speaking for older South Australians, it is not the body representing retirement village residents in particular.

As I said, I had discussions earlier today with representatives of SARVRA, who were not ruling this out as the next step. To progress the bill and settle it today actually closes the door on the possibilities of enhancements that can be made in this round. The Hon. Mark Parnell said, 'Well, we can always see if there is an industry left in three or five years time.' I would have thought that—

The Hon. M.C. Parnell: I don't think I quite said it like that.

The Hon. S.G. WADE: Okay, a bit of dramatisation. I suggest that considering we have a 43 per cent increase needed in 20 years, and I think we had 14 per cent in the last seven years, we have a big ask in the next few years. Even the years that we are, if you like, going to stall the industry will put a significant challenge on the supply to South Australians.

Let us be clear about what the people said in the Karidis letter, and they were not speaking for anybody else, they were speaking only for themselves, and they have every right to speak for themselves. As 12 people signing the letter they said, 'We in this room, if this legislation was passed, would not build 1,000 units.' The average number of residents in a unit is 1.4 per unit, so that is 1,400 South Australians who would not have access to houses while we wait for the review to come around.

In terms of the elder abuse issues that the minister raised, I completely agree with the minister that there is a risk of elder abuse as a result of this legislation. The risk in this legislation is that families of older South Australians will be encouraged to prematurely have their parents move into a retirement village because the government is not going to buy their family home if their parents die in it, but the government is going to force the operator to buy back their unit if they die there.

I accept the minister's point about incentives. There are incentives in any statutory framework but let us not presume that the Liberal amendment creates incentives. There are incentives there that all have to be managed and watched. In terms of time frame—and I completely agree with the point the Hon. Mark Parnell made that we do not want unnecessary delay—let us be clear: what residents and advocates have said to me is, 'We're really keen to get this legislation through before Christmas.' We have five weeks before the last sitting week of parliament. I would hope that the steering committee would be able to give us an indication of the time frame—

The Hon. I.K. Hunter: Rubbish! It is going to take three months.

The Hon. S.G. WADE: I would like an opportunity to be heard. I hope Hansard can hear me because the members might have trouble. The fact of the matter is that I believe it is worth a wait of weeks rather than to stymie the growth of the industry for, potentially, years to come. I strongly disagree with the assertion—I cannot remember who said this but somebody said that this was overwhelmingly supported by the industry, if that was the case I cannot see why ACSA and the Property Council have both asked for this pause to review.

The Hon. J.A. DARLEY: I rise to indicate my support for the Hon. Stephen Wade's motion to report progress, and I do so on the basis of most of the comments he has made already. However, I suggest that this report that we would be looking for would not take months but would take weeks. If the industry is not prepared to provide the information that is necessary, and correct information at that, they do that at their peril.

The Hon. R.L. BROKENSHIRE: This is a difficult deliberation because it has been a very long time in the making to get to this point. As I said, I think in my second reading contribution, I do not blame the current minister for that because he was not the minister when all of this work was being done. However, it has been delayed and delayed and delayed and it is way overdue; it is a couple of years overdue at least, in my opinion.

Whilst I accept what my colleague the Hon. Mark Parnell said about doing a review down the track—and it is better to have review clauses than not have them, generally speaking; I am becoming more and more of the opinion of review clauses being in this sort of legislation—the reality is that whether you have a review in three years or five years, it is pretty clear and evident, just from this debate now, that it is going to be a two to three-year period after that before you get back to the stage of correcting what might be wrong in the legislation previously and the intent of the review to look at that.

This is a very important industry. It is economically important and it is incredibly important socially, particularly when we have a growing ageing population and we are going to have more demand for these particular enterprises. I have two concerns. I put my second reading contribution out before the winter recess. I was hoping this bill would have gone through before the winter recess—and I thought it was going to be—but be that as it may it did not and here we are now having to decide whether to proceed today or not.

Less than two weeks ago I had an urgent request for representation from a sector of the industry. I understand that all members, on the crossbench and opposition at least, received that signed letter. At about the same time we saw some amendments from the Hon. John Darley, after representation to him from SARVRA I understand. At about the same time as those amendments were being drafted, Family First received an email from SARVRA. SARVRA is the peak body I work with on retirement villages, and I have done so for 20 years in the parliament, because whilst I work with COTA on the general issues of the ageing, I do not believe they are the peak organisation for retirement villages.

I am advised as recently as today that the SARVRA president has spoken to the shadow minister on this and indicated that they also have some concerns but that they would see some benefit, as I understand, and I am happy to be corrected, by having a round table to try to thrash out one or two impasses that are here at the moment. We are talking about only one or two impasses. I received an email from the minister, and I would like to put this on the record, because the key debate we are trying to get around at the moment is the buyback provision. I received from the minister an email following discussions I had with the minister and the minister's adviser. The email states:

Following on from our discussions, you requested information about where in the Bill it provides that the resident can opt out of receiving payment at 18 months if they want to hold out for a higher price.

The section of the Bill is 26(5)(d)—

(d) the person to whom the exit entitlement is payable may, by written notice given to the operator of the retirement village, elect not to receive the payment at that time but to wait until the exit entitlement becomes payable in accordance with subsection (2)(a);

So in effect, if the property has not been relicensed at 18 months the resident can elect not to receive payment and await the actual relicensing of the unit, rather than be paid out based on valuation. It could be that the market is improving or there has been significant interest in the unit and the ex-resident prefers not to be paid out on valuation (18 mths) and awaits the actual sale.

We have a govt amendment to this clause (#1)—amending it to insert a timeframe within which the resident must make that election. This is to improve the clarity and reduce uncertainty for operators. The timeframe will be specified in the Regulations, allowing for consultation with stakeholders, and to ensure that it is workable for both operators and residents.

I cannot see why that cannot be in the legislation if there is some urgent work done. The Hon. John Darley said that it will not take months to do the work that the Hon. Stephen Wade was raising. If that work was expediently done, why couldn't that time frame be in the legislation? That may actually then cover some of the concerns on the lack of flexibility to both the licensee and the licensor.

The final point that I would make on this signed letter is that we have a duty to all who utilise the retirement villages to ensure that we have a growing industry sector. It rings some alarm bells that they are saying 1,000 units may not be built. In the urgent meeting that I had, I said to them that they need to go to meet with the minister as a matter of urgency and also possibly to talk to the Premier about this and see how the Premier feels about it if they cannot resolve it with the minister. The Premier is away on government business this week, so that makes that difficult. I would have liked to have known what the Premier actually thought about the concerns of the developers.

The final two points that I will make at this stage is that the Hon. Stephen Wade is saying that we could definitely look at doing this by the last sitting week. There are some inherent dangers in trying to deal with something like this in that last week because it is fairly easy for something to go wrong at that point and it slips out into next year, and that would not be satisfactory. The other point is that I have always personally supported, as has our party, a right for reporting progress. At this point in time, we believe that progress should be reported, as the Hon. Stephen Wade has said.

Having said that, I would like to say on the record that we can only assure this house that we will stick with that convention. It is terrible when we break conventions because there have been too many conventions broken in this house, and once you break a convention, it starts to undermine the parliament.

If I indicate, which I am going to, that we will support the call for reporting progress, I also say that work will have to be done very diligently, expediently and cooperatively with the agency, the minister and the sectors because SARVRA are also saying they want to put something else on the table. I think it has been appalling that all sectors of the industry that work with some dedicated officers from the department, who I personally have had confidence in, for three years, have come to this parliament at the 11^th hour, the 59^th minute and almost the 59^th second. They are probably fortunate, frankly, that there are enough members of parliament concerned about the overall situation to now be debating this, rather than the amendments.

With those words, we will support the Hon. Stephen Wade if he does call a division on reporting progress, but we are flagging that we may have to reconsider a commitment on convention after the next sitting week if things are not resolved.

The Hon. S.G. WADE: I am not proposing to move that motion yet, but I did just want to correct the record on one point. I would not want there to be any suggestion that I am misrepresenting the position of SARVRA. I will state as clearly as I can what I believe the current position of SARVRA is. SARVRA does not believe that the government's legislation, unamended, would cause significant damage to the industry, so it is not fair to say they have concerns with the legislation. For example, they are not saying they support our deceased estates amendment.

They are aware of the proposed regulatory impact statement process, the one they have written to. My understanding is that they see that that would provide an opportunity for improvements to the bill to the benefit of residents and they have not rejected the regulatory impact statement process out of hand. In other words, as I understand it, it is still under consideration. I would not want to think anything I have said was suggesting that SARVRA had concerns with the legislation. Having made those comments, I do not know if any other members want to make any further contributions. If not—

The Hon. R.L. BROKENSHIRE: I have two points of clarification. The first is that SARVRA have requested one of our colleagues to put amendments to a bill very, very late in the piece which are now before this house sitting here to be debated and considered. The second point for clarification is that I understand from discussions with the shadow minister today that the president of SARVRA has indicated that he sees some benefit for SARVRA in having an urgent cooperative inclusive round table because they do have one other issue at least that they would like to discuss.

The Hon. S.G. WADE: I thank the honourable member for the clarification because you are right. As I understand it, the Hon. John Darley's amendment is, in fact, a SARVRA proposal. The Liberal Party is not supporting it because of a lack of a regulatory impact statement. We believe it would be reckless without the relevant data. If we had a regulatory impact statement, a SARVRA proposal would be significantly enlivened. In terms of other options, yes, there are issues that SARVRA has raised that may well be able to come back into play if a regulatory impact statement was made. I think we have clarified that almost to minuscule detail, but I would not want to have misled the house.

The Hon. T.A. FRANKS: Is the Hon. Mr Wade saying that he may well support the Hon. John Darley's amendment and at what clause is that amendment?

The Hon. S.G. WADE: To be honest with you, I do not know. I am quite used to recommitting things, so I am not really that fussed about where we are in a bill. I am more than happy to indicate that the Liberal Party would support recommittal of the bill if proposals come forward that are pre-clause 26. If the government wants to indicate that they are not willing to recommit a bill, we will remember that next time they need to do that with another government bill. I move:

That progress be reported.

The council divided on the motion:

Ayes 9

Noes 8

Majority 1

Motion thus carried.

Progress reported; committee to sit again.