Attorney-General Nicola Roxon yesterday tabled long awaited amendments to the Privacy Act that include a new credit reporting regime. Australia will move from the current negative reporting system to comprehensive credit reporting.The Privacy Amendment (Enhancing Privacy Protection) Bill 2012 is little changed from the draft circulated in the middle of last year. The Government has made a few alterations, in response to the recommendations of a Senate committee review, which were released in October.Most significantly, it has accepted a recommendation that the amendments include consumer remedies that are consistent with those in the National Consumer Credit Protection Act, such as compensation for consumers adversely affected by contravention of the credit reporting provisions. Courts will be given the power to order compensation in cases where a civil penalty provision has been contravened.Under the current arrangements, a credit reporting agency can include the following information in a credit file: payment on a credit contract that is at least 60 days overdue; a cheque for $100 or more that has been dishonoured twice, a bankruptcy order that has been made against the individual; a note that a credit provider considers the individual has committed "a serious credit infringement"; the individual's current credit provider status; and details of recent credit inquiries.The new scheme will allow credit reporting agencies to add the following information: the date a credit account was opened; the type of credit account opened; the date a credit account was closed; the current limit of each open credit account; and repayment performance history.The aim of the reforms is to facilitate better assessment of consumer credit risk by creating greater transparency.Information about repayment performance will only be available to licensed credit providers.The five extra "data sets" are those originally proposed by the Australian Law Reform Commission in its review of the Privacy Act in 2008. Industry lobbying to add more data, such as the amount of unused credit on a revolving credit contract, was not successful.In return for giving the industry a more comprehensive view of the consumer's credit position, the Government has included tougher consumer protection provisions in the amendment. The industry will now have to write a new Credit Reporting Code.When the Senate Finance and Public Administration Legislation Committee reviewed a draft bill last year it agreed with the large number of industry and consumer submissions that said the proposed credit reporting rules were overly complex.It said: "The exposure draft was not seen as improving clarity or providing greater simplicity. Consumer protections and industry obligations are not clearly set out. The exposure draft contains 60 new definitions, compared with seven definitions in the current Privacy Act."It said these shortcomings were a result of the draft Bill being too prescriptive."The move to a more comprehensive credit reporting regime, with the addition of new data sets, has required the implementation of a significant regulatory framework. The approach taken, which regulates the flow of information in the credit reporting sector, may have undermined the goal of simplifying and clarifying the credit reporting regime. This