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House of Assembly - Fifty-Second Parliament, First Session (52-1)
2010-11-23 Daily Xml
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STATUTES AMENDMENT AND REPEAL (AUSTRALIAN CONSUMER LAW) BILL

Second Reading

Adjourned debate on second reading (resumed on motion).

Ms CHAPMAN (Bragg) (16:00): COAG's objective in agreeing to establish an Australian Consumer Law was to remove overlapping and inconsistent regulation between the jurisdictions in respect of fair trading and trade practice controls. The expectation was that this would improve business efficiency, reduce red tape and improve consumer confidence. That was conveyed to us in the second reading contribution by the government in this house and also by the Hon. Gail Gago in another place. I think that is a fair assessment of what their objectives were.

The government's spin on all this, though, is a different story. The government's spin, in the words of the Hon. Gail Gago, is that this new bill will 'give effect to one of the most significant national reforms of Australia's consumer protection laws'. In explaining that this was a bill to provide national coverage of this new law, she goes on to say:

For business, the Australian Consumer Law is a step towards a seamless national economy which reduces regulatory complexity and allows for greater efficiencies. For consumers, this single national law will provide a consistent set of rights wherever goods or services are purchased in Australia.

Spin on spin comes after a press release which was picked up in September by The Advertiser, which ended up with a headline 'End of the fine print: improved laws to protect consumers' in relation to an article in which the Hon. Gail Gago as the consumer affairs minister outlined her assessment of the significance of this legislation.

I simply say to the house that the reforms proposed in the Australian Consumer Law, which we are adopting into South Australian law, are important and we will support them, but they are hardly the most significant reform in this area in Australia. In fact, when we look at what South Australia already has, there are only a few areas in which the application of this law (whilst it may make it uniform across the country) actually provides any direct benefit to South Australians. I just want to refer to them briefly because they are not unimportant; they are certainly not in the category that the Hon. Gail Gago purported to present to the public of South Australia, but they are to be supported.

Essentially, the suggestion as highlighted by this headline is that this new law will grant the power to challenge unfair contracts. That power already exists; there is a capacity to make those claims. It suggests that there will be the opportunity to challenge the validity and enforceability of the fine print, for example, on airline tickets or in telephone plans which the unwary consumer, in signing up to these purchases, may overlook in not reading the fine print or all the clauses of the new contractual agreement.

The truth is there is some capacity already to ensure that you are not bound by the obligations that sit within these, but I also alert the house to the fact that it is also important that, when anybody signs a contract, they read the contract that is put before them. Sometimes they are verbose and sometimes they are not in plain English, as is said, and therefore they are confusing to many consumers who are expected to sign them before they can participate in a service or have the product which they seek to acquire.

What this law does, though, is enable a new element, but not without some cost and time. Essentially, the new element is, rather than being able to prove that there is an unconscionable expectation in the clause of a contract, if a term, a part of that contract or a clause of it is unfair, there is an opportunity for that to be excised—that is, declared as unenforceable by a court and then excised—and the balance of the contract is still able to be enforced.

What I think members ought to be aware of is, notwithstanding the headline and the minister's press release, this still requires a party who is seeking relief under the contract to make their application, to go through a court process, etc. So, it is not as though this is just some panacea of protection that is added to the options we already have in South Australia. It proposes, and I hope it is successful in this, to make it clearer and perhaps easier to be able to establish if a clause is unfair rather than simply being unconscionable or contrary to public policy and all the other thresholds which are necessary to otherwise claim that under our current law.

The other matter is that it allows for the full refund to consumers who might cancel a lay-by within a certain time frame. Lay-bys, of course, are where the consumer will contract to purchase a product on the basis that there is usually a deposit and then, over an agreed period of time, payments are made.

This was a common form of financing the purchase of a product way before we had credit cards. I can remember that, in the 1970s, we were studying the Consumer Credit Act and the Consumer Transactions Act of South Australia—when we moved from the old hire purchase model to consumer mortgage models of lending for the purposes of buying something under a time payment—this was a common practice. It may still be quite common. I do not know how many retailers now offer lay-by.

If it has diminished, it is probably through no small advent of the fact that we have so many offers available to consumers from retailers to be able to acquire products and have interest-free repayment arrangements. You do not even have to lay-by it anymore. You can take the product with you and you may not have to pay for that product for one, two or three years, which is effectively an interest-free loan until the obligation for payment is called in.

I assume that the benefit to the retailers is that they expect that the lounge suite that you bought from them is worn out by that time and you will have to do enter into a new agreement when you come back in three years' time and have to pay up. In any event, that is one of the reforms that is proposed under this legislation which will be tidied up, but there is a time frame requirement.

There is also a cooling-off period of 10 days for people who buy products over the phone which obviously allows them to change their mind and get their money back. That is a clause which, again, tightens up our current system, under which there have been, I think, significant submissions made by businesses in certain areas of industry and retail which have sought exemption and, for good reason, have been excluded.

There is also a reduction in the hours in which door-to-door salesmen can visit houses. Essentially, under this legislation, as of 1 January 2011, a door-to-door salesman can only come and offer to sell you a product between 9am and 6pm, unless there have been prior consenting arrangements for an appointment outside of those hours. Currently it is to 8pm, and just to indicate to you whether this legislation is a great reform or whether it is a tinkering around the edges, all that this part of the legislation will do to affect what we currently have in South Australia is reduce the time that they can come by two hours a day. It is not groundbreaking, it is hardly revolutionary, and in my view it does not actually deal with what is a much bigger problem.

I do not know about other members of the house—perhaps I am not home often enough—but I do not have a lot of door-to-door salesmen coming to my house uninvited these days. I have a few people who want to push a particular voting intention in an election, I have all sorts of people turning up to ask for money, and I have plenty of uninvited advertising mail in my letterbox. However, I do not have a lot of people who come along with their little suitcase, like the old Rawleighs product man who used to come round to offer me different types of food additives to buy as a door-to-door product.

What I do get—and I am sure other members get—are plenty of phone calls, if I am home between 7pm and 8pm, from someone who is usually ringing from India, or someone who wants to do a survey, or someone who wants to sell me a product over the phone, or someone who wants me to contribute to a charity. There is a national register that enables me to register with a commonwealth body whereby I can be relieved from being on someone's list. The Hon. Gail Gago certainly mentioned it in her contribution. The Do Not Call Register Act of 2006, which is commonwealth legislation, enables you, as I understand it, to register so that your name on a list cannot be flogged off so that some charity or retail person can ring you.

This is quite an issue, I might say, because the trading of lists of names between organisations is very big business. I remember taking Australia Post to task on this some years ago because of their representation in correspondence to encourage people to go on a mailing list. The prospective recipient of this had no idea that they would become party to the provision of this information for purchase by charities and commercial enterprises for their own advertising or fundraising pushes. In any event, that federal law does provide the opportunity on a voluntary basis for you to register and not be pestered over the phone.

So it is reform, it is two hours fewer that they can come and knock on your door, but frankly that is not the big problem. The big problem now is that you can hardly ever sit down for a meal without having somebody telephone you seeking your answers to a survey, fundraising or pushing a product.

The other area is, I suppose, essentially a simplification of language and processes, and this does provide for some modification to our state system by the guaranteeing of consumer rights when buying goods and services, which replaces our current laws on conditions and warranties. Again, I do not see this as monumental, but I see it as acceptable for us to support, and hope that it will actually provide some benefit to the consumer. There is supposed to be a simpler and speedier process to enable us to have product safety law and enforcement systems.

From memory, but I will have to go back to look at the act—and I am sure I will be corrected by the minister if this is not right—there are enforcement penalty powers and consumer redress options which are based on the current Trade Practices Act and which have been incorporated into the bill. So we have some modification of what has been a very good system in South Australia, which was pioneering in its day and which has stood us in good stead. Nevertheless, there will be the introduction of this legislation in the remaining states.

I noted that when minister Gago was going public on this issue about this great reform she included in her advice to the media that the South Australian government was the second state to put the national consumer changes before its government. Victoria had already done so in the preceding months. This is typical spin of the government. The reality is that putting something to the government, after you have had your Premier go off and sign something in June 2009, attending the COAG meetings, does not do anything to deal with the fact that it needs to come to the parliament. It is the parliament that has to make the decisions ultimately on these matters.

I think it is rather cheeky of the minister to rush out and say, 'I put this issue before my own government.' What she needs to understand is that, while they might have the privilege of office and the opportunity to control the chequebook, the legislation is in the realm of this parliament. So it is hardly surprising, when we come to find where they are in the rest of the country on advancing it through the parliaments where these decisions are made, that we are pretty much ticking away at the end.

What has happened already in the other states is that Queensland, Tasmania, Victoria and Western Australia have all introduced it into their parliaments and dealt with these matters. Really, in South Australia the reality is that we are pretty much a Johnny-come-lately in dealing with this aspect.

The model adopted essentially allows a national law to be included in our state laws. We deal with the 'harmonisation'—and this is the new word this decade of having consistency across jurisdictions—in a number of ways.

The DEPUTY SPEAKER: Harmonisation?

Ms CHAPMAN: Harmonisation of laws. Everyone is going to be happy and harmonious. Everyone is going to have the same. It is the one-size-fits-all model. Sometimes we think it is a good idea to have uniform laws and all that lovely harmony so that we will transfer our own powers for dealing with something to the commonwealth. Sometimes we all just pass laws that are the same.

In this instance, it is another model and it is where there is a federal law passed, and we think it is a good one, and it has been worked up and everyone has had a say about it, so we are prepared to say we will just bring that into ours and make it part of the South Australian law. Sometimes we think it is a good idea to transfer our law-making power on a certain topic to the commonwealth, we just let them make the law and we do not make any. We just repeal what we have ever done before, we let them make the law and they cover the field, so to speak. That happens from time to time.

In the time I have been in the parliament, I have never known the reverse to happen, where the commonwealth says the states would be better off to deal with this and that it might be in their interests to take it back to their jurisdictions and recognise the differences between jurisdictions, respect those differences and enable those communities to make those assessments for themselves. In the eight years I have been here, I have never seen that. I think I was in law school in 1975. Never in that time have I known a government to stand up in this state, represented in the federal arena, where we have had something handed back; perhaps I will live long enough to see that one day, and I hope I do.

I am not a signatory to the idea that, just because everything is uniform, everyone is going to be happy. Harmonisation, I think, is rather a misnomer. We should understand that there are jurisdictional differences. Members will recall the significance of other attempts that this parliament has made with the federal government to harmonise laws and to provide for national legislation, of which we are all participants.

One was the health practitioners legislation. I see the shadow minister for health coming in, so he must be very interested in this topic. In that instance we used a different model again. The opposition insisted that the government come up with a model for that legislation which enabled us to have more control over what would happen on the future amendment, or development, of that legislation. I am glad that was insisted upon and that the government did finally accede—I hope it did—to the fact that it was an improvement for South Australia for that to occur.

In that legislation alone, one example comes to mind; that is, we discussed in this parliament the significance of making it necessary for a medical practitioner to provide a prescription for a young person who might buy what is called a plano lens, which means it is not for the purpose of being able to see better but it is for cosmetic purposes. This was very popular, apparently, particularly with young girls who would like to have cats eyes, green eyes or blue eyes, a different eye colour; it was a fashion accessory.

The health professionals of the day advised members of this parliament of the importance of the protection of the eyesight of these young people, and we insisted that it be in our legislation to require a medical practitioner, and I think there are other categories of qualified medical people, to prescribe that before they could be sold. You could not just go along to the Royal Show and buy a packet of them. We thought that was a good move.

When the national health legislation was considered for the registration of our health professionals, the other states did not have this and they did not want to have it, but it was one aspect that the minister for health in our state insisted needed to stay. So, we have ended up with all these different hybrids as to how we deal with national harmonisation and uniform laws, not always for the better, and in some we have had a national system but with a bit of ours tacked on.

Let me give you the other example of why sometimes going national is not always smart. I have already mentioned that in South Australia we have been pioneering in our own consumer protection laws, although not so much looking at streamlining and simplicity from the business point of view. Big businesses that deal with people interstate do not want to have their lives complicated by different rules and regulations in each state, but we were pioneers in the consumer protection legislation from a consumer's perspective.

Let me give you another example which, I think, illustrates where we can go wrong if we simply jump on board with what is a perceived benefit by being uniform. In the 1970s, we had legislation in South Australia dealing with children in the event that their parents were unable, or unwilling, to look after them. In circumstances where the natural parents of the children were known, there was an obligation to make financial provision for them. If the parents or guardians parted, for example, there would be child maintenance orders.

In South Australia, if someone was employed and they were obliged to pay child maintenance and they did not pay then their wages could be garnisheed by court order. We also had a special power, which the old minister for community welfare used to have, which was to place a caveat on that person's house.

In fact, it could only be removed by the minister for community welfare. It was not used very often, but, let me tell members, it was very effective because the overwhelming problem we had in the enforcement of maintenance obligations—payment for children—was the person who was not regularly employed and who did not have a salary to which you could garnishee, who ran their own business, for example, or who was in intermittent employment and who could easily avoid their obligation by simply claiming that their taxable income was X and that they just simply did not have the funds, even if they were driving around in a nice car and lived in beautiful homes.

This was the major area of default, but a caveat would sit on that person's house and, when they decided that they wanted to borrow some more money or sell their house and buy a new one or a bigger one or whatever, the chickens would come home to roost, and they could not do anything without paying their obligation to the state which had continued to make provision for the entitled party. It was very effective.

There are other jurisdictions around the country—except for Tasmania—which had very early de facto property entitlements. In fact, the first adult maintenance claims in Australia were for de factos on the basis that that entitlement was born over 100 years ago as a result of unmarried women being frequently the concubines of males in Tasmania and having children. Women were fairly scarce in the colonies, so this was a by-product of that—but I divert. I just go back to what I was saying, that is, the other jurisdictions, except South Australia and Tasmania, had a dog's breakfast, as far as enforcement went, of these obligations.

It was decided that we would have a national collection scheme for child maintenance, and it became the child support system. It is a huge bureaucracy now in Canberra. It is very expensive to run, we all pay for it as taxpayers, and I am not sure that it is much more efficient, to be honest, in a lot of jurisdictions, but especially not in South Australia.

I think that we had a good model, and that, in the haste to have a national scheme that would make sure that we caught people going across the border and to enhance the enforcement and effectiveness of what was happening in other states, they went to this model. And what have we got in South Australia? We are at the end of the line. I think that we have diminished the effectiveness of our own legal process as a result of jumping on board, all on the basis that a national scheme would be quicker, cheaper, simpler, more efficient and more accessible to the parties that we want to provide for.

In this instance, I am not confident that this system will be cheaper, simpler and easier for either business—particularly small business—or consumers. I hope that I am wrong, but, if I am not, at least it will be on the record how I think this government has over-spruiked this and, in the end, may not have given us the benefit of what is aspirational at this point, and probably unachievable, but we will see. I may be wrong and I hope that I am.

I conclude by indicating that there had been some discussion in another place on amendments on this legislation. Significant work has been undertaken to develop the Australian consumer law. We have at least been party to the development of that, and I certainly hope that it enhances what we have rather than not. The legislation will, of course, repeal significant aspects of our own legislation here which will no longer be necessary, some of which is acknowledged is outdated and probably was in need of review just by elimination, in any event.

I want to place on the record one other matter, that is, that everyone has signed up to this, including Western Australia, but Western Australia has a different model. It seems to be a practice whereby Western Australia is happy to take on the commonwealth if it does not think that a decision is going to be made for the benefit of Western Australia.

It is proud to do it and it insists upon it, not the least of which is the recent proposal for a new health agreement for the funding of the commonwealth/state contribution towards public health funding in this country about which the Western Australian government has said to the federal government, 'We simply will not accept a reduction in our entitlement of the share of the goods and services tax revenue,' and it has made that absolutely clear. However, they can still participate in the receipt of commonwealth funding under the agreement, as I understand it.

I am not yet aware of anyone taking that issue for determination by a court, but it seems that we are entitled to be different. There is often good reason for that difference, and it is important that we retain the option, on a case-by-case basis, to insist on that difference when it is there to protect South Australians and enhance a model that is better for them and not someone in Canberra.

Mr SIBBONS (Mitchell) (16:30): I rise to indicate my support for the bill. I believe that the Australian Consumer Law will provide better protection for consumers, and I will discuss a number of the elements of the ACL, beginning with bills and receipts.

The ACL will require that consumers be provided a receipt for goods or services costing $75 or more and, if requested, for goods or services costing less than $75. The ACL also provides consumers with the power to request an itemised bill when they have purchased services from a trader. This itemised bill must be provided by the trader within seven days of the request and must specify how the price of services has been calculated by the individual trader. The trader must also, where appropriate, list the materials used and the number of hours of labour involved in providing the service.

These new requirements are squarely aimed at providing the consumer with sufficient evidence of a transaction so that they are able to assert their rights under the new ACL if a dispute arises. In addition, the ACL includes new unfair contract term provisions. The law underpinning these new provisions commenced operation at the commonwealth level in respect of contracts between consumers and corporations on 1 July 2010.

The bill before the parliament today extends the operations of the unfair contract term provisions to businesses that are beyond the constitutional powers of the commonwealth to regulate. With the synchronised application of the ACL by other states and territories on 1 January 2011, the scope of the unfair contract term provisions is thereby broadened and ensures all consumers will be better protected.

The new unfair contract framework will operate to provide a more level playing field for all consumers when it comes to standard form contracts. Such contracts, usually offered by large corporations on a 'take it or leave it' basis, could include mobile phone, air travel and banking contracts. Consumers will be in a far stronger position to remedy significant imbalances in their rights as a result of this new law. All too often, consumers are disadvantaged in their dealings with big businesses by a lack of bargaining power. The unfair contract term law should go a long way to addressing the issues because in broad terms the law will enable consumers to challenge unfair terms in standard form contracts.

Where terms are found to be unfair, courts will have the power to remedy any detriment suffered by consumers. The legislation allows a court to declare an individual unfair term void; that is, the term ceases to operate when the declaration is made. The rest of the contract may remain in place if it is acceptable and capable of functioning without the unfair term. So businesses will not be unduly affected by these new reforms.

The law does not simply enable consumers to walk away from their contractual rights or obligations. The law ensures that the legitimate rights of businesses are protected. A court must decide before declaring a term to be unfair and taking into account the circumstances of doing business in that particular industry that the term is not reasonably necessary to protect the legitimate interests of the party who would be advantaged by the term, and that could be the business.

The commencement of unfair contract term legislation represents a significant step in consumer protection law in this country. While the law will be new to most of Australia, some provisions have existed in Victoria and in the UK for some time. These laws have been effective in bringing a necessary balance and greater fairness to consumer contracts. I urge members to support the bill.

Mr PICCOLO (Light) (16:36): I rise to speak in support of this bill. I will not be covering all the elements already covered by other speakers, but I wish to talk about a few things which have come to my attention in my electorate through my constituents.

The first thing I would like to speak about is door-to-door trading and telemarketing controls. Like many of our constituents we have been bothered by door-to-door salespeople during our lives. I am pleased that under this legislation South Australia will reduce weekday evening door-to-door visiting hours by two hours per day, from 8pm back to 6pm. Saturday calling hours will remain the same—between 9am and 5pm—and door-to-door trading on Sundays and public holidays be prohibited.

Telemarketing calling hours will remain separately regulated under the Do Not Call Register Act 2006, and will be allowed between 9am and 8pm weekdays with the same time limits on Saturdays, Sundays and public holidays as the door-to-door controls.

The South Australian government's participation in the development of the ACL bill also has supported the following outcomes for consumers:

the specific inclusion of second-hand goods in scope of new guarantee provisions;

appropriate penalty provisions in relation to lay-by sales controls;

allowing more effective disclosure requirements in relation to faulty goods (for example, to warn consumers of the risk of losing data from an electronic device such as a PC, camera, mobile phone);

ensuring that the return of faulty goods cannot be refused if the goods are not in their original packaging, which is often a claim made by some retailers;

ensuring significant inspection, transport and associated costs will not be borne by the consumer where a contract is terminated and the goods must be returned, often a barrier for a consumer trying to terminate the contract; and

the inclusion of appropriate warning statements when purported invoices for unsolicited goods are given to consumers—and I am sure many people receive those at times of the year when they receive promotional items purporting to be an invoice when they are not.

I would also like to point out that the ACL will institute nationally consistent provisions in relation to lay-by sales, as mentioned by the member for Bragg. Traders will be required to put lay-by sales agreements in writing. Consumers will be able to terminate these agreements at any time and must be provided with a refund on termination.

I support this bill, because whether or not the bill goes far enough it is an improvement on what we have at the moment, and that is worthy. I would just like to give a case study showing why we need to strengthen our consumer laws and why bills like this need to be supported. They recognise the fact that the consumer can live in one state, but the retailer or the producer can be in another state. I think any move towards nationally consistent provisions in our consumer law ought to be supported.

A young constituent in my electorate purchased a second-hand Nissan vehicle. Within a short period of time, the second-hand vehicle actually blew an engine and he sought to get support from the Nissan Motor Company. The company's full name is the Nissan Motor Company of Australia Pty Ltd and it is based in Melbourne.

He got some advice from the dealer where he bought the second-hand vehicle, which indicated that even though the item was technically out of warranty, it was the opinion of the dealer that the actual problem had occurred and only got worse during the warranty period. This young constituent of mine rang the Nissan customer service centre. I would suggest that customer service is one thing you do not get from the Nissan Motor Company in this instance. When it comes to consumer law, I would say that that Nissan Motor Company would be an example of how not to do customer service. If there were ever an award for the 'Corporate cad of the year', this motor company would have to be the winner of that award, and I am sure there are a few in contention.

I will explain why. This chap rings them up, gets the run-around and does not get very far and then he contacts my office, like many do—many people contact the office of their MP. I get an email from this constituent and I forward that email on to the Nissan Motor Company in Melbourne with some comments and ask them to give their version of the story. The history provided to me by the constituent is actually in the history of the email.

I do not hear from the Nissan Motor Company for two weeks, so in case the email was down, I send them a copy of the email via fax, and I do not hear from them again. I did get a phone call eventually from the Nissan Motor Company customer service centre and again, I use the term 'customer service centre' loosely because the company then said, 'We had no intention to respond to your email or your fax.' Of course I asked why and they said, 'Because we are dealing with the constituent and also under privacy law we cannot talk to you.'

This is a load of rubbish because first of all, the email came from this constituent and I passed the email on, so it was clearly in the history of the email itself that this person had actually wanted me to act on their behalf. Putting that aside, I then got quite an explicit authorisation from the constituent and I sent them another note.

I challenge any member here to ring this company and get service. I will give you their number: 1800 035 035. If you can get some service from the Nissan Motor Company, you deserve an award because all you can get is a first name of a person at the centre. They will not give you their surname. They will not give you the name of a team leader, a supervisor or a manager because they are not authorised to do so even though you want to complain about the lack of service.

They will not give you the name of any individual who actually works at the Nissan Motor Company of Australia. You cannot talk to them; you are not allowed to. When you ask them why they do not give out names, they say, 'People ring and yell at us.' That was their answer. I did say that given the lack of service I am surprised they are not getting more than just yelling because they are appalling. This would have to be the worst example of customer service I have ever seen and I have seen some bad cases, as I am sure you all have.

This company just says, 'We will not deal with you.' They have given this poor young constituent of mine the run-around, even though both he and I have said, 'Well, let's get this independently checked out by the RAA, or the Victorian version of the RAA, to see who is at fault.' They refused to. They just refused point blank. They will not enter into correspondence and they just give you the run-around. It is easier to get information from the North Korean government and to get information about what is happening in North Korea than from the Nissan Motor Company. It is an appalling example.

Why do I raise this issue today? Firstly we obviously need to improve our consumer laws which this bill seeks to do but, secondly I raise it in some vain hope of getting some justice for this poor constituent in my electorate, because he has tried valiantly. He was very reasonable; he wasn't abusive; he wasn't rude. All he wanted was to work out a process and was prepared to share the cost in repairs. Unfortunately, this repair will cost him over $10,000. This is a young apprentice who obviously needs his vehicle for his work.

To make things even worse, I contacted one of my colleagues in Melbourne who is an MP, thinking, 'Okay, I am a South Australian; perhaps they don't want to talk to South Australians.' Well, he had as much luck and success as I did. This company JUST refuses to deal with any complaints.

When you do a Google search of the Nissan Motor Company, it is no surprise: stories abound about the Nissan Motor Company and how poorly they have treated their customers to the extent that, if you talk to some of their dealers, even their dealers are ashamed about how the Nissan Motor Company in this country deals with its customers. Often, the dealer is the meat in the sandwich between the customer and the company.

I think anything that starts to improve consumer laws in this country warrants our support, as does anything that can get the Nissan Motor Company to behave as a corporate citizen should in this country. I wish you luck, and I look forward to receiving your support. As I said, if anybody does wish to contact the Nissan Motor Company, I will just give the number again: 1800 035 035. If you get past reception and get more than just a Christian name, you really do deserve a prize.

The Hon. J.M. RANKINE (Wright—Minister for Families and Communities, Minister for Housing, Minister for Ageing, Minister for Disability) (16:46): I thank members for their contributions in relation to this legislation. I thank the member for Bragg for her reminiscences as a Family Court lawyer. I am not quite sure how it was relevant to this legislation, but I am sure those in the federal government responsible for that would be interested to have her views in relation to how the system is working.

I will try as best I can to answer some of the issues raised by the member for Bragg. I think she queried the relevance of lay-bys in part of her submission to this house. There may not be a lot of lay-bys out in her electorate; I accept that and, in fact, I have discovered that what lay-bys might be is a curiosity for most men. I can say that I see many families out in my electorate entering into lay-bys, not for things like lounge suites and large items like that, but very often in large department stores, putting aside clothes for their children and Christmas and birthday presents. So, I think the issue in relation to lay-bys is relevant to many people in our community.

This legislation reduces the hours for door-to-door, which I think is a very good thing. In relation to sovereignty issues, there are a number of protections in this bill to ensure that states do not have provisions in this legislation assented to in the federal parliament that they are strongly opposed to.

In passing this bill, South Australia will join with the commonwealth and other states and territories in providing consumers the benefit of nationally consistent consumer protection laws. The bill itself will apply the Australian Consumer Law as a law of South Australia and make changes to existing South Australian legislation to give effect to this new regime.

We have heard the history of how this has come about: it was a key recommendation of the Productivity Commission's 2008 Review of Australia's Consumer Policy Framework. In passing this bill, South Australia will be responding to this recommendation and taking a step towards a key aspect of COAG's national business and regulatory reform agenda—the creation of a seamless national economy.

In December 2009, the Ministerial Council on Consumer Affairs agreed to the key principles that would underpin these new laws, and on 24 June 2010 the Trade Practices Amendment (Australian Consumer Law) Bill 2010 (the ACL bill) was passed by the Australian parliament.

The bill implements COAG's agreement to create a single national Australian consumer law. The ACL is based on the existing consumer provisions of the Commonwealth Trade Practices Act 1974, enhanced by a new unfair contract terms law; a new national product safety framework; a new national consumer guarantees law which replaces implied warranties and conditions for consumer goods and services contracts; and reforms drawing on the best practice in state and territory laws, which enhance consumer protection while minimising business compliance costs.

It is anticipated the reforms will improve business efficiency, reduce red tape, and improve consumer confidence. Indeed, the Productivity Commission review reported that an ACL could deliver between $1.5 billion and $4.5 billion in benefits to the Australian community. The ACL ensures inconsistencies that have developed over time between the commonwealth and state and territory laws will be removed. New laws, including consumer guarantees for goods and services, unfair contract terms provisions that protect consumers signing standard form contracts, and telemarketing and lay-by sales controls stand to benefit all South Australians.

To ensure consistency in enforcement approaches the Australian Consumer Law provides a number of standard enforcement tools, penalties and consumer remedies, of which all jurisdictions may take advantage. These include disqualification orders, substantiation notices, and public warning powers. The Office of Consumer and Business Affairs will be able to pursue action in court for breaches of the ACL, with civil and criminal penalties up to a maximum of $220,000 for individuals and $1.1 million for corporations. These penalties, being significantly higher than the existing penalties in the FTA, reinforce the significance of this new law and ensure consumers will be well protected against those who seek to take advantage. As I said, I appreciate the comments made by members and I encourage all to support this bill.

Bill read a second time and taken through its remaining stages.

Third Reading

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