Social Services Legislation Amendment (Cashless Debit Card Trial Expansion) Bill 2018

The majority voted in favour of the bill's main idea, which is to expand the trials for the cashless debit card to other places.

In parliamentary jargon, this vote was a vote to read the bill for a second time and, because it was successful, means that the Senate can now discuss the bill in more detail.

What is the bill's main idea?

The bill was introduced to:

• expand the cashless debit card arrangements to a further trial site, the Bundaberg and Hervey Bay area, to run until 30 June 2020;
• specify the class of trial participants for the area and increase the total number of trial participants overall to 15 000;
• provide for an exception from the restrictive trade practices provisions of the Competition and Consumer Act 2010 for merchants that implement product level blocking systems to identify that a cashless debit card is being used for payment and, if any restricted products are being purchased, decline the transaction; and
• limit the use of the restricted portion of a payment to prevent the portion being used to obtain cash-like products which could be used to obtain alcohol or gambling.