Page 3276 - Week 08 - Wednesday, 22 August 2012
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Residents Association, the Retirement Villages Association and Aged and Community Services Australia. I received around 30 submissions during my public consultation period for the Retirement Villages Bill 2010 exposure draft bill as well as a number of comments from the community.
I also hosted a number of community forums which gave members of the public an opportunity to speak to me about what they wanted from retirement village legislation. I considered all of this input as well as investigating different approaches taken in different jurisdictions with respect to the regulation of retirement villages. The introduction of the Retirement Villages Bill 2011, as the attorney said, led to a number of stakeholders who had not previously made representations to me approaching me and raising their concerns about the bill. Other stakeholders who had previously made submissions to me in the course of my public consultation period reconsidered their position and identified their main concerns.
The consistent message received since the introduction of the Retirement Villages Bill 2011 from both residents and the industry is that legislation based on the New South Wales legislation was their preferred approach and, as Mr Corbell said, it was something that was very strongly said to him also. It was because of this strong support that I had from the industry and the residents that I made the decision in June to introduce this bill. I thank the residents association, some of whom are with us this evening, and the industry peak body, the RVA. I note that even today both of these organisations have applauded the bill and have expressed the hope that it will pass this evening.
I considered the impact the legislation has had in New South Wales, which previously had a code of practice similar to the ACT code and which has a similar retirement village market, although, of course, it is a much larger market than that in the ACT. I also note that a number of retirement village operators are familiar with New South Wales legislation as they originally established themselves in New South Wales and have moved into the ACT. These operators have largely indicated a preference for the New South Wales scheme.
Members can have confidence that this bill is based on a scheme which has proven to be functional and viable. This bill provides a number of protections for residents, most of which are already in the code of practice; however, now with more rigour. Existing protections are built on in some areas, such as improved disclosure to residents. New protections provided by this bill include the statutory charge over village land which secures the exit entitlements of residents who have paid an ingoing contribution and who have a contractual right to have some or all of it refunded at the end of the contract.
The bill also provides a recourse to residents and operators to the ACAT in the event that a dispute cannot be resolved internally or using dispute resolution processes. The bill is based on an enforcement regime which is consistent with other laws in the territory which involve contracts between parties. It avoids rewriting bargains already struck between parties and leaves enforcement of rights to the parties, with minimal intervention by regulatory bodies.
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