Andrew Leigh

BRENDAN O’CONNOR MP
SHADOW MINISTER FOR EMPLOYMENT AND WORKPLACE RELATIONS
MEMBER FOR GORTON
 
ANDREW LEIGH MP
SHADOW MINISTER FOR COMPETITION AND PRODUCTIVITY
SHADOW MINISTER FOR TRADE IN SERVICES
SHADOW MINISTER FOR CHARITIES AND NOT-FOR-PROFITS
MEMBER FOR FENNER
 
MURRAY WATT
LABOR SENATOR FOR QUEENSLAND
 

WHILE THE LNP DITHERS ON DIRECTOR IDS, DODGY DIRECTORS KEEP BURNING THEIR CREDITORS

 
Reports this week that Longman One Nation candidate Matthew Stephen sold his company to an Irish backpacker who had left the country two years earlier are a stark reminder of the need to crack down on dodgy phoenix activity.

According to one report, Matthew Stephen ‘claims he is no longer responsible for the payment of a $13,769.99 debt, imposed by the Northern Territory local court as damages for a substandard tiling job in 2014, because he sold his company in August 2016 and the new owner agreed to take on the remaining liability’.
 
Mr Stephen reportedly lodged documents with ASIC two months after receiving the court judgement against him. He claims that the company has been sold to a person who is now in Ireland, and has not yet been located.
 
Labor’s phoenixing prevention package, was announced on 24 May 2017. Our proposal for mandatory director identification numbers has been backed by the Australian Institute of Company Directors, the Australian Small Business and Family Enterprise Ombudsman, the Productivity Commission, the Tax Justice Network, the Australian Chamber of Commerce and Industry, Master Builders Australia, the Australian Council of Trade Unions, the Australian Restructuring Insolvency and Turnaround Association, the Phoenix Project (comprising experts from Melbourne University Law School and Monash University Business School), and the Australian Institute of Credit Management.
 
Too many subbies and homebuyers have lost out from company collapses and alleged phoenixing activity.
 
Yet the Turnbull Government still fails to act.
 
In the time since Labor announced our policy, you could have flown from Brisbane to Dublin and back 213 times.
 
TUESDAY, 24 JULY 2018

Authorised by Noah Carroll, ALP, Canberra.