On 22 September 2011 the House of Representatives referred the Consumer Credit and Corporations Legislation Amendment (Enhancements) Bill 2011 for inquiry and report to the Parliamentary Joint Committee on Corporations and Financial Services.

As outlined in the Explanatory Memorandum to the Bill, the key reforms proposed are:
• changes to the available terms and conditions for credit contracts (eg 'pay day' loans), for example caps on the maximum amount credit providers can charge;
• changes to make it easier for debtors to seek a variation of the repayments under their contract due to financial hardship;
• new requirements for reverse mortgages, including a statutory protection against negative equity and improved disclosure requirements; and
• changes intended to provide greater regulatory consistency between consumer leases and credit contracts.

The Corporations and Financial Services Committee is seeking written submissions from interested individuals and organisations preferably in electronic form submitted  online or sent by email to corporations.joint@aph.gov.au as an attached Adobe PDF or MS Word format document. The email must include full postal address and contact details.
Alternatively, written submissions may be sent to the address below.

Submissions to this committee's inquiry should be received by 14 October 2011, although with permission, the Committee for a limited time, will continue to accept submissions in the following week.

A hearing occurred in Canberra  on 24 October.   The reporting date has been confirmed as 10 November 2011. On 3 November the reporting  date was extended to 24 November 2011.

On 24 November the reporting date was extended to 29 November 2011.

On 29 November the reporting date was extended to 2 December 2011.

NB: The Senate Economics Committee is also conducting an inquiry into the provisions of this bill but does not intend to hold a public hearing.  You are encouraged to send your submission to both Committees' inquiries.

Notes to help you prepare your submission are available from the website at http://www.aph.gov.au/senate/committee/wit_sub/index.htm Alternatively, the Committee Secretariat will be able to help you with your inquiries and can be contacted as below.
Inquiries from hearing and speech impaired people should be directed to Parliament House TTY number 02 6277 7799. Adobe also provides tools at  http://access.adobe.com/ for the blind and visually impaired to access PDF documents. If you require any special arrangements to enable you to participate in the Committee's inquiry, please contact the Committee Secretariat.

Once the Committee accepts your submission, it becomes a confidential Committee document and is protected by Parliamentary Privilege. You must not release your submission without the Committee's permission. If you do, it will not be protected by Parliamentary Privilege. At some stage during the inquiry, the Committee normally makes submissions public and places them on its website. Please indicate if you want your submission to be kept confidential.