NIBA’s Noel Pettersen warned months ago that the devil will be in the detail of the Financial Services Reform Bill.  Right now many experts are trying to track down the demons that may lurk in the Bill’s 550 new provisions. This is very complex legislation, in  most cases more complex than the legislation it replaces, according to lawyers Freehills.

In a commentary on the new legislation – one of a range of views to be summarised in the June issue of Insurance & Risk Professional – Freehills said many of the new provisions are two or three pages in length. “With respect to those who have worked hard on it, the legislation does seem very prolix.”

The comment is a polite cry of frustration from the normally placid lawyers, who are finding – along with their clients – that the Bill is indeed of unnecessarily tedious length.

Warning that the insurance industry “appears to have a major compliance task ahead of it”, Freehills asked if it could, in fact, be over-regulation.

“Are all the disclosure requirements to retail clients mentioned really necessary, for example, for the types of general insurance included?”

The impact of all the provisions on large financial services conglomerates will be considerable, Freehills said. “They will need to scope the impact of all of the provisions and face up to the reality that many of the financial services and financial products which they provide through one company or another in the group will be affected. Considerable work may need to be done to establish what will be required in each of these areas of activity.”