Cash Distribution Framework Bill 2026, Cash Distribution Framework (Consequential Amendments and Transitional Provisions) Bill 2026
Ms SHARKIE (Mayo) (17:44): I rise to support the Cash Distribution Framework Bill 2026, which will provide a legislative framework to regulate Australian cash distribution services. Currency has been with us for centuries, for more than 2,000 years. It was the Lydians who created the earliest stamped coins.
They did that in around the seventh century BC, and the Lydian empire was in what's now western Turkiye, but that was 700 years before the birth of Christ. Then, of course, we have the Phoenicians. The Phoenicians, from 1500 BC, developed trading networks across the Mediterranean.
They were originally bartering goods, and they transitioned to weighted out pieces of copper and silver and coal and even jewellery units by around 300 BC. Over time, cities developed mints, crafting predominantly silver coins showing prominent local kings and gods as symbols they could rely on and that they could trust in. They could trust that unit of measure for the goods that were traded.
Thousands of years later, Australian coins and notes are produced by our own Royal Australian Mint less than five kilometres from this place. We too have come to rely on this currency and the symbols used on our coins and banknotes to denote their authenticity. Of course, we have the late Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II on our coins, and then we have on our notes everyone from Dame Nellie Melba.
My favourite particular note is the $10 Australian note, the blue note. On one side is Andrew 'Banjo' Paterson and on the other is Dame Mary Gilmore—true great Australians. Cash, as the previous member said, works, particularly in crisis.
When the power's out and when telecommunications are out, cash still works. Cash is important. It's particularly important in regional Australia.
It's particularly important in areas where there are emergency risks. My daughter is currently studying, and she's living in a cyclone-prone climate. I said to her, when she moved up there, 'Make sure you have just a little purse that you don't touch in case of emergency that's got cash in it, because, if a cyclone comes through and you don't have power for days, you can still at least go and buy items.' Older Australians and those living in the regions and those without reliable connectivity still rely very heavily on cash as the trusted means of transacting in our communities.
The Australian Digital Inclusion Index 2025 found that around one in five Australians are excluded or highly excluded and that around one in 10 are highly excluded from digital access. Digital exclusion rates are much higher for older Australians, particularly those aged 75 years and over, and those who did not complete secondary school. We find that this also includes public housing residents and First Nations people.
Digital exclusion remains higher outside capital cities. In South Australia, Tasmania and Queensland, access, affordability and digital availability are lower than the national average. I note my electorate of Mayo is the oldest by median age in the state of South Australia and one of the oldest in the nation.
Very many people in my community will keep cash at home and will use cash as the basis for their saving and their spending. While the gap between the digital ability of older and younger Australians is indeed narrowing, some of my older constituents, I must say, are not confident about digital banking. They are concerned about scams and they want to rely on cash and, indeed, chequebooks.
Unfortunately, banks are doing everything within their power to make sure that chequebooks are a legal tender of the past. This puts them at serious disadvantage if access to cash is lost. Regardless of digital inclusion, some older Australians and marginalised Australians do find it easier to rely on physical cash, and, in communities, as I said, experiencing emergencies and natural disasters—we certainly had that during the bushfires in my electorate—cash is king, and it's sometimes the only way that you can buy things when everything else fails.
What does this bill do? This bill is part founded on recommendations of the Senate rural and regional affairs and transport committee report, and that report was called Bank closures in regional Australia: protecting the future of regional banking. The Senate committee report and the government's response both recognised that access to essential banking services is integral to our economic and social fabric.
I just want to say, with respect to bank closures: my community has experienced too many bank closures. It's always rather galling when you get that contact from the CEO or the state manager of a particular bank to tell you that they're closing, and then, of course, in the next fortnight you read about the bonus bumper profits that they've made as a bank. I think banks have a social licence, and they should be in regional Australia.
Regional Australians deserve to have face-to-face banking services. To ensure that Australians have access to fit-for-purpose and sustainable banking services over the long term, the government has committed to draft legislation for a reliable cash-distribution regulatory framework, as part of taking action to ensure that regional communities are not left behind by banking closures, including regulated cash distribution to support access to those services so that they can continue to serve the needs of Australians.
We haven't even talked here about the needs of small business as to having access to cash. When you think of them, particularly in the regions but also in metropolitan Australia, every bank and every service station—everybody—needs to have a till, working, with cash in the till. And Australians deserve that.
In addition, the cash acceptance mandate requires certain fuel and grocery retailers to accept cash payments in person for transactions of $500 or less between 7 am and 9 pm. For this to be achieved, all of those services need to have reliable cash distribution. So what will this bill do?
It will enable the RBA to designate entities with crucial roles in cash distribution—for example, Armaguard. It will grant the RBA crisis readiness and resolution powers to protect continuity of critical cash-distribution services. It will empower the ACCC to oversee designated cash-distribution entities, including approved standard terms and service level standards.
It will also help ensure designated entities can continue, by providing critical cash-distribution services in difficult circumstances. Stakeholders, including banks—those banks still left in regional Australia—supermarkets and Australia Post have expressed broad support. The Armaguard group have argued that the legislation will cause harm to the cash-distribution industry, raising concerns about ensuring fair pricing.
But I see that the government has included provisions requiring banks and supermarkets et cetera to negotiate pricing with such services in good faith, and that provision is made for dispute resolution. I agree that we do need a new regulatory approach, so that supermarkets, fuel retailers and banks, and the communities they serve, can rely on having cash at hand—just like the Phoenicians.
It's an important step towards providing safeguards for communities—particularly regional communities like ours in Mayo—to ensure ongoing access to cash. Bank branches, as I said, have been ripped out of our regional communities. In my community, I'm thinking of Lobethal, Hahndorf, Yankalilla, Strathalbyn—the list goes on.
Our chequebooks and cheque accounts are being phased out, and we can't afford to lose cash too. We need to protect access to cash so that everyone may have access to cash, so that they have that purchasing power, when it's their preferred or, indeed, perhaps their only option. And that is why I commend this bill to the House.