Productivity Commission Inquiry into consumer policy

The Productivity Commission expects to release its draft report on consumer policy by late July/early August 2007.

The Commission is to report on:

• ways to improve the consumer policy framework to assist and empower consumers, including disadvantaged and vulnerable consumers, to operate effectively in increasingly complex markets;
• ways to better harmonise and coordinate consumer policy across jurisdictions, including by reducing reliance on industry-specific regulation and making greater use of general consumer regulation;
• any areas of consumer regulation that are unlikely to provide net benefits and which could be revised or repealed; and
• the extent to which more effective use could be made of self-regulatory, co-regulatory, consumer education and consumer information approaches and principles-based regulation.

The Commission has completed its intial public hearings.