Did the Govt needlessly abandon expert Corps Law advice?

Mike Taylor

Managing Editor and Publisher

7 December 2022

Few, if anyone, in the financial services industry wanted it gone in the first place and now there is pressure to bring back the expert panel which advised the Government on Corporations law, including that applying to financial advice.

The Corporations and Markets Advisory Committee (CAMAC) was defunded by the Government in 2014 but a Parliamentary Committee has been told that recent events warrant it being brought back to provide expert advice to Government.

The call has been expressed in a submission from the Society of Corporate Law Academics (SOCLA) to the Parliamentary Joint Committee on Corporations and Financial Services.

The same submission also separately referenced the ability of Governments to create a “legislative maze” and “the government’s penchant for ‘clutter and complexity’ and law making through regulations”.

However, on the question of the defunding and abolition of CAMAC, the submission pointed out that it was “an unanticipated and controversial development and was widely opposed by leading professional, industry and legal experts”.

It said that CAMAC had been defunded despite only one submission having supported its abolition.

What is more, the SOCLA submission argued that CAMAC had been cost-effective, noting that at the time of its abolition CAMAC’s operating budget was ‘modest’ totalling less than $1 million a year.

It said the body’s remarkable productivity was achieved with only a small permanent staff – two lawyers and one administrative assistant.