Your voice matters – Advocacy update May 2024

Your voice matters

Thank you, members. Hearing from you about the issues important to Australian borrowers is what makes a difference to how we advocate for positive change for our industry. From member roundtables to the surveys you’ve answered, we’ve heard from you about the continuing challenges your customers face in relation to refinancing and navigating discharges and retention activity as you help them through the biggest refinancing period in Australian history.

Your voice helped us to undertake meaningful research that resulted in delivery of the whitepaper Towards a faster, smoother home loan discharge: benefits for borrowers and which has helped us to understand trends affecting mortgage stress and the ability to refinance. Both of which we are using in our advocacy efforts with government, regulators, and consumer advocates.

Your first-hand experience on credit reports and credit reporting is also helping to provide valuable insights into the challenges and opportunities you and your customers face when considering loan options. A review of the Credit Reporting Framework was announced in February 2024, with Treasury promptly connecting with MFAA and our members to hear direct feedback that will help inform a discussion paper to be released for industry consultation in the coming weeks.

Thank you again to members who participated in our Refinancing and Mortgage Stress Survey, we are in the process of presenting survey results to regulators and consumer advocates, the purpose of which is to present the coalface insights that our members are experiencing in this environment and to push for more flexible buffers for mortgage prisoners.

We have also been very busy on other things in the last three months. Here are some other updates on our advocacy efforts:

• The MFAA has released its second pre-budget submission, focusing on four priority areas that support our purpose to empower members to prosper and thrive, and ensure Australians benefit from competition and choice.
• In February, we had our six-monthly meeting with AFCA where the health of our industry was discussed – broker-related complaints continue to remain low and account for <1% of [banking and finance] complaints.

AFCA did also advise that they are receiving more hardship related complaints for the banking and finance industry overall. If you have questions on what to do if you have a client who says they are in hardship, watch our webinar featuring Michael Blyth from the Australian Retail Credit Association.

• Related to AFCA, was the launch of the Compensation Scheme of Last Resort (CSLR) on 2 April 2024 and levy notices for the industry are now out. We’ll be monitoring the CSLR levies to ensure they remain reasonable and proportionate for our industry.

We released eight submissions since the start of the year, spanning topics from the already mentioned pre-budget submission to scams, the Banking Code of Practice to BNPL reforms. We publish all our submissions so you can read them at any time. Read our submissions.

Lastly, you may have seen that on 12 April the Supreme Court of NSW gave its decision in the Loan Market Group Pty Ltd vs. Chief Commissioner of State Revenue matter in relation to payroll tax.

You can read our response to this decision in our media release and if you have any questions, we have put together FAQs.

Our advocacy on your behalf is ongoing. We will continue to meet with NSW Government and advocate for legislative changes that make the law clear and appropriate. Our engagement with other states will also be ongoing. If you have questions or feedback, please contact your aggregator or email us at payrolltax@mfaa.com.au