Cosgrove Clayton: Financial Reporting Bill — In CommitteeText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeCosgrove Clayton: Financial Reporting Bill — In Committee[Sitting date: 19 November 2013. Volume:695;Page:14995. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]Hon CLAYTON COSGROVE (Labour): I want to put a couple of questions that were raised with the Minister of Commerce in the first speech on Part 1 of the Financial Reporting Bill. I note that he has not taken a call in the hour that we have been debating this bill. I think there has been a bit of barracking from the other side but no actual substantive speech about the legislation. The first question is in respect of the amendments in respect of charities the amendments to the Charities Act 2005. I said previously that the Commerce Committee members from both sides of the House to be fair laboured long and hard as we went through these provisions to ensure that there were appropriate standards and levels of transparency. Although we are all in favour of transparency and accountability and appropriate accounting standards for charities we all acknowledge I think that many charities are made up vastly of volunteers and many charities are of varying sizes and have varying capabilities in terms of administrative and accounting control functions. As I say although we were keen to ensure that there were appropriate standards and levels of transparency we were also keen to ensure that we were not overburdening charitable organisations with bureaucracy and with compliance costs because many of our charities such as the Cancer Society the Salvation Army and others do pride themselves on the donations that are provided by the public the vast majority of which go directly to the stakeholders that require it—whether it be medical research whether it be assisting those less fortunate—and are not sucked up into onerous administrative requirements.I do note though in new section 42B in clause 77 that there are some very substantial penalties for those who fail to comply. It states: “A charitable entity and every officer of the charitable entity commits an offence and is liable on conviction to a fine not exceeding $50000 if—(a) the financial statements of the charitable entity referred to … fail to comply”—with relevant standards in summary—“and the charitable entity or officer (as the case may be) knows at the time that the financial statements accompany the annual return when it is sent or delivered under section 41 that the financial statements fail to so comply.” No one would disagree with that in terms of somebody knowingly committing an offence and knowingly contravening not only the legislation but their obligations. But what I would like to hear from the Minister of Commerce is the view he has from the submissions which presumably he has read as we did on the Commerce Committee as to whether he still believes that those penalties substantial as they are are pitched at the right level and are appropriate.Further to that and just as important are the transitional provisions in clause 78(1) and (2)—there have to be appropriate levels of transitional provisions. More so I think for the charitable sector. We had submissions from I recall churches and others. Many of the churches have individual entities. They are not one conglomeration; they are individual incorporated societies or entities around parishes or whatever. For many of those organisations there will be a substantial transition to move to these standards—even though from memory there was substantial support for them—to further professionalise the financial standards and transparency of charities. It will not be as a business if you like with one entity transitioning across. It will be many entities andsub-entities within those charitable organisations. So I would be grateful if the Minister would look to take a call and in this Committee stage just for the record in the future give us some assurances around those two issues.