Malcolm Turnbull (Wentworth, Liberal Party, Prime Minister) Share this | Hansard source

I think I have explained to the House before, the approach that Lucy and I take to our investments. They are allocated by a financial adviser and, for the most part, they are concentrated in managed funds were we have no say in the underlying assets. That is for obvious reasons, so that it is accountable, it is transparent, but it also involves any personal involvement that can create conflicts of the kind that honourable members and the public would be concerned about.

As far as 7-Eleven is concerned, it is a part of the Japanese index, so any fund that has an investment in the Japanese index, as most big managed funds do, will therefore have a derived and very small investment. The honourable member asked the question. Many honourable members opposite have superannuation in AustralianSuper. Unless there has been a very recent change, they will find AustralianSuper has an investment in 7-Eleven's holding company. I would also note that perhaps many honourable members opposite would be very familiar with, if not invested in, Cbus, which is the Construction and Building Unions Superannuation fund. It is backed by the CFMEU. Indeed, Cesar Melhem was a director of it until 2013. According to Cbus's total private equity holdings as at 30 June last year, Cbus held investments in a number of distressed opportunities funds, Siguler Guff Distressed Opportunities Fund III and II. Those funds are obviously ones which invest in distressed assets.

The reality is that all of these big managed funds have a variety of assets and the important thing is they are accountable—

Dr Chalmers interjecting—

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