Pat Conroy (Shortland, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

I'm really pleased that I can make a contribution on this excellent motion of the member for Indi on noncompliance around payment for the superannuation guarantee. It's an issue that impacts on every electorate. But you'd expect me to draw attention to the statistics for the seat of Shortland, which I proudly represent in parliament. There are 15,714 residents of Shortland who are underpaid or will receive no payment of their superannuation guarantee. Fully 31 per cent of workers in Shortland suffer underpayment or non-payment of their super. This is a disgrace. The total amount per year is $30 million, and the average underpayment is $2,000 per worker per year. If you consider that, the compounding impact of that is massive. If you're going without $2,000 of super per year and that compounds through your 30- or 40-year working life, that is massive. It is robbing workers in my electorate, which is a low-SES region. I've got the poorest town in all of New South Wales in my electorate, the town of Windale. Just imagine the loss of that income for those workers. It is a crime, and I will return to that particular issue in a minute.

This is a startling statistic and that's why it's so important that urgent action is taken, and the Senate report is an excellent contribution. I welcome the fact that Minister O'Dwyer has at least drawn attention to it. I think the government aren't going far enough, but at least they're drawing attention to it. It starts with ATO compliance. If the ATO took this as seriously as they took nonpayment of GST, it would change pretty quickly. But I don't solely blame the ATO. They've had 4,000 staff cut under this government—and when an organisation loses 4,000 staff, it's pretty hard to do anything well—but this is a massive issue, and ATO compliance is the start of it. Moving to the single-touch system will help, but we really need to understand the scope of this and really understand the trials and tribulations that people go through to try to recover their payments.

I had a constituent come to me. She had worked for an accountant and found out that her accountant employer was underpaying her super. She left that job, because of being ripped off, and she now works for another accountant, who is helping her, pro bono, to recover her money. They actually made a submission to the Senate inquiry, and well done to them for making that submission. They were able to walk me through five years of talking to the ATO to try to recover this money, and the ATO couldn't even tell them how much was owed. The ATO would dribble out records; it would dribble out payments from the non-compliant accountant. It was a nightmare for people who were reasonably well educated, who were in a good position, because they're accountants, so they were in the system, to try to recover the funds. The system was absolutely abysmal. That's why urgent action is required to make the ATO take it seriously, to give the ATO the resources to recover the funds, to really try to help the 15½ thousand people in Shortland who are suffering underpayment of super, and to recover the $30 million that impacts 31 per cent of workers.

I'm going to go out on a limb and be controversial: this is theft. Often employers, when they get in a bit of trouble—and I understand that some might do it innocently—think that the easiest thing to not pay is the super, because it's the thing that workers don't notice immediately because it is paid in arrears. It is the easiest thing for them to start cutting down on. They might kid themselves that when business picks up, when sales come through, they'll pay it back, but it is theft. I would put to you that a worker who stole $2,000 from their employer would be facing jail time pretty quick smart if they got caught out. So why don't these employers face jail time? I'm not talking about an accidental underpayment; I'm talking about when an employer, in a concerted fashion, knowingly fails to pay super. That is theft from their workers and they should face jail time, just as any worker who steals from their employer should face jail time for knowingly stealing money. Until we do this seriously, until we lock up the employers who are the worst of the worst, who knowingly steal money from their workers, then this issue will not be solved. I know that's controversial, but this is theft and theft should face punishment. The due punishment should be jail time if it's serious enough.

I applaud the member for Indi for raising this issue. The ATO need to get serious about this. They need to pursue the 15½ thousand cases of underpayment in my electorate, and we need to lock up employers who do this regularly.

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