It’s only a week since the Federal Government released its proposals on simplifying regulation for corporate and financial services, and the Australian Securities and Investments Commission (ASIC) already plans to make regulation a bit easier, too.

As part of its Better Regulation initiatives, ASIC has released two consultation papers on the obligations of Australian financial services (AFS) licensees under the Corporations Act.

ASIC Executive Director Regulation Malcolm Rodgers says the regulator is undertaking this process to simplify aspects of the policy and to communicate policy objectives more effectively.

“These changes are designed to make it easier for licensees to comply with their general obligations,” he said.

The consultation papers propose updating policy statement 164, “Licensing: Organisational capacities”, which outlines what ASIC looks for when assessing an AFS licence application and checks the ongoing compliance of licensees with general obligations.

The main proposals include improving the communication of ASIC’s policy, applying consistent organisational competence requirements, clarifying the category of people ASIC looks at for organisational competence purposes and referring to various international principles and Australian standards.

One consultation paper is Updating PS164: Meeting the general obligations, which sets out ASIC’s general approach to the AFS licensee obligations relating to compliance, risk management, representatives and resources.

The second paper is Updating PS164: Organisational competence, relating to the organisational competence obligations.

ASIC invites comments on proposals in the consultation papers by February 28 next year. It aims to issue the final policy statements by the end of May.