Madeleine King voted very strongly for increasing consumer protections

The majority voted against amendments, which means they failed. According to Whitlam MP Stephen Jones (Labor), who introduced the amendments, they reflect a former version of the bill, which the Liberal and National Parties supported earlier this year but have now been removed. He said that:

We believe that [these amendments are] worthy of support of every individual member of this place because, without director identification numbers, the dodgy directors will continue to rip off unwitting contractors, unwitting customers. They'll continue to rip people off to the tune of billions of dollars every year.

What does this bill do?

The bill was introduced in order to:

• introduce new phoenixing offences
• prohibit directors from improperly backdating resignations or ceasing to be director when this could leave a company with no director and
• allow the Commissioner of Taxation (the Commissioner) to collect estimates of anticipated goods and services tax (GST) liabilities and make company directors personally liable for their company's GST liabilities in certain circumstances.

The ATO defines Illegal phoenix activity as when:

a new company is created to continue the business of a company that has been deliberately liquidated to avoid paying its debts, including taxes, creditors and employee entitlements.

The majority voted against a motion introduced by Whitlam MP Stephen Jones (Labor), which means it failed.

What do these amendments do?

MP Jones explained that:

Labor's amendments apply to schedule 1 of the bill. Our amendments introduce a requirement for companies accessing the fintech sandbox exemption created under this bill to submit a notice outlining the details of their service or product and giving a justification as to why such an exemption is likely to benefit the public. Under Labor's amendments, ASIC will have the power to remove a company's access to a fintech sandbox exemption or, probably more correctly, not consider a company's access to the exemption provided by this bill if they decide that they're not satisfied that the new service or product is innovative or likely to provide a benefit to the public. This is necessary and a relevant test for the bill.

The substantive bill authorises ASIC to provide wide-ranging exemptions to financial services laws—laws that have been established by this place for the express purpose of protecting customers or consumers. Such exemptions should only be granted if such an exemption is likely to provide significant benefit to the public. The regulator is being asked to make a judgement either that there is minimal risk and/or that the countervailing public interest is so great that it warrants waiving the provisions that apply to every other licensee in the market.

Read more about the bill and this exemption on the bills digest.