Curran Clare: Securities Trustees and Statutory Supervisors Bill — In Committee 
Curran Clare: Securities Trustees and Statutory Supervisors Bill — In Committee 
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CLARE CURRAN (Labour—Dunedin South) 
: 
 I will do my best to shout into the microphone more often. In respect of Part 2 of the Securities Trustees and Statutory Supervisors Bill I would like to refer in particular to the provision that applies to retirement village statutory supervisors. I would like to return to that issue particularly given the fact that the Minister of Commerce is the Minister in the chair. I refer particularly to the provision that the retirement village statutory supervisors come within the ambit of the licensing regime that is established by the bill. This I think does remain an important issue and a slightly thorny issue if I can use that expression. It is one of the reasons why we still continue to question this. 
I am still grappling with the complexities of the issues that came before us at the Commerce Committee. Clauses 9 to 18 empower the Securities Commission to licence persons to be trustees in respect of debt securities statutory supervisors in respect of participatory securities and trustees in respect of unit trusts. The commission may also licence persons to be statutory supervisors of retirement villages. We note that the Financial Markets Authority will take over this role when it is up and running. That is one of the reasons why we have questions—particularly given the submissions that came before the Commerce Committee and the kinds of thorny issues that arose around the impact on the residents of retirement villages—and one of the reasons why we thought this issue and this particular legislation should be parked at the select committee. 
As I have said there were a number of submissions on that point. We did support the inclusion of retirement village statutory supervisors in the licensing regime because to exclude them meant that the residents of those retirement villages would receive less protection. Although we think that is anomalous and undesirable we are also concerned about the potential impact on the residents of retirement villages. As we know those people are on fixed incomes and the importance of determining what additional costs that regime may impose on retirement village residents was important because those costs could be passed on to the residents. 
We still remain somewhat conflicted by the impact of the new regime and why we think that that issue still needs more consideration which is another very good reason why it should be parked. I repeat that we support the legislation but we have concerns about that issue. I want to continue to reiterate those concerns around the potential and direct costs to retirement home residents. 
I speak as the member of Parliament for Dunedin South. There are a number of retirement homes there and I think the impact of anything that will raise costs for those residents is pretty important. It is possible that a licensing regime would increase the number of statutory supervisory firms in the market. That would lead to increased competition which could affect base rates charged by statutory supervisors and lead to an overall reduction in fees. So there is that possibility but there is also the possibility that it could end up increasing fees and that is one of the reasons why Labour remains concerned about this.