Stuart Robert (Fadden, Liberal Party, Shadow Assistant Treasurer) Share this | Hansard source

by leave—I move amendments (1) and (3) to Treasury Laws Amendment (2022 Measures No. 3) Bill 2022 presented in my name:

(1) Clause 2, page 2 (table item 5), omit the table item.

(3) Schedule 5, page 14 (line 1) to page 19 (line 14), omit the Schedule.

There are only two groups of amendments the opposition will move, this being the first set. Amendments (1) and (3) effectively excise schedule 5 from the Treasury Laws Amendment (2022 Measures No. 3) Bill 2022. That is the measure that allows faith based super funds to not have to meet the requirements of the benchmark that was put in place under the Your Future, Your Super legislative changes. We do that quite soberly. If we look through at the benchmark requirements that this parliament passed, it requires super funds to meet basic benchmarks of performance. If they do not, then of course they are named and they will need to inform their members that their fund is not performing to those benchmarks. If they fail a second time they are no longer able to receive contributions that are mandatory and therefore they can't be a MySuper regulated fund. This has already occurred once. Thirteen funds failed, and they all quite rightly sought to merge with other funds. Quite recently five other funds have also been named for underperformance.

It's not as if these benchmarks are onerous. In terms of Australian listed equities, the average large-scale fund will have about 15 per cent listed equities. The benchmark simply requires the super fund to meet, ostensibly, the Standard and Poor's 200 index. So if you took your money and put it into an index fund, which is a fund that just invests across the top 200 companies in Australia at the same percentages to which they are represented in the stock market and do nothing else—no active trading, nothing—that's the benchmark. It is the laziest benchmark of all if in terms of bond trading you can't meet a Bloomberg index. So they go. It's designed to ensure that your super funds aren't being ill managed or fees aren't high. The 13 funds that were named—shamed, if you like—and folded, some of them were appalling. The MUA fund was just outrageous in terms of what was going on. Quite rightly, members' money, Australians' money, is being protected by ensuring these benchmarks make these funds accountable, because super is the second-largest asset outside of Australians' homes. It's the asset that no-one pays attention to, yet it's the asset where rivers of gold flow to it under superannuation guarantee payments. Therefore setting a benchmark is appropriate. The government made an election commitment saying, 'If you're a faith-based super fund, you don't have to meet those benchmarks, because you're investing along your faith principles.' The bill says, 'If you don't meet the benchmark, we'll create another benchmark for you.'

So I sat down with APRA and said, 'If you were a faith based organisation, what percentage of the Australian stock market would you not invest in, because as a faith community you may not want to invest in munitions or alcohol or cigarettes?' The answer is two per cent. So there's two per cent of the market you ostensibly can't invest in, but suddenly that two per cent means you don't have to meet the benchmark. What the government is putting forward is saying to faith based communities: 'If you're in a faith based fund, you don't have to have as great a retirement as any other Australian, because we're going to give a leave pass to that faith based fund.' They're not going to have to meet a benchmark. 'We'll create something else for them.' APRA will create some other benchmark for them, based on what their investment strategy is.

What we're saying is that every Australian should be treated equally. Every single Australian should have the same right to a dignified retirement, and every super fund should be held to account in the same way. That is why we are moving to strike out schedule 5 to this bill—so that every Australian is treated the same way, every Australian Super fund is treated the same way, everyone can expect a dignified retirement in the same way and no-one gets a leave pass. Whether you're a person of faith, whether you believe in ESG or any other principle, the bottom line is that retirement is important, a dignified retirement is important and everyone should have the same ability to receive that.

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