AFA chief executive Phil Kewin confirmed to ifa that senator Rex Patrick of the Centre Alliance had proposed an amendment to the omnibus bill in which the FASEA extension legislation is contained, and that Labor would support the amendment.
“I don’t have a sense of whether there are other crossbenchers [supporting it] that would mean the bill would be passed with the amendment — if that is the case, it would mean the bill would have to go back to the lower house, which is not ideal,” Mr Kewin said.
“This is the challenge with the omnibus bill — it contains a number of different components and the FASEA extension is just one of them.”
Mr Kewin said the Greens would also propose an amendment to the bill, but he was unsure if this had broader support.
The government does not support Senator Patrick’s amendment, meaning if the amended bill was sent back to the House of Representatives, there would be further delays to its passage.
Mr Kewin said the AFA was encouraging all sides of politics to “come up with a solution” to get the extension to the FASEA deadline through Parliament.
“I respect the right of Rex Patrick to make amendments, but our focus is on getting these extensions through so advisers can continue to look after their businesses and their clients and plan accordingly,” he said.
“We would encourage whatever needs to be done to pass the bill from all sides so that advisers can get the certainty they deserve.”
The bill is listed second on today’s Senate notice paper and should be debated later this morning.
