House debates
Wednesday, 11 October 2006
Superannuation Legislation Amendment (Superannuation Safety and Other Measures) Bill 2005
Consideration of Senate Message
Bill returned from the Senate with amendments.
Ordered that the amendments be considered immediately.
Senate’s amendments—
(1) Clause 2, page 2 (table item 3), omit the table item, substitute:
3. Schedule 2, items 1 to 25 | Either: (a) if this Act receives the Royal Assent on 1 July in a year—the day on which this Act receives the Royal Assent; or (b) otherwise—on the 1 July that next follows the day on which this Act receives the Royal Assent. |
5. Schedule 2, items 28 and 29 | Either: (a) if this Act receives the Royal Assent on 1 July in a year—the day on which this Act receives the Royal Assent; or (b) otherwise—on the 1 July that next follows the day on which this Act receives the Royal Assent. |
10:00 am
Andrew Robb (Goldstein, Liberal Party, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister for Immigration and Multicultural Affairs) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source
I move:
That the amendments be agreed to.
The amendments to the Superannuation Legislation Amendment (Superannuation Safety and Other Measures) Bill 2005 are necessary to ensure that all provisions of the bill remain prospective. The amendments relate to provisions that enable the trustees of the Commonwealth Superannuation Scheme and the Public Sector Superannuation Scheme to allocate actual fund earnings, including negative earnings, to members’ accounts. The bill had these provisions commencing on 1 January 2006. As this date has now passed, it is important to make these amendments to ensure that all provisions remain prospective. The amendments provide that the commencement date for the negative earnings provisions will be the first day, 1 July, of the next financial year following royal assent. If the bill completes its passage in this sitting period and royal assent is granted soon after, the new commencement date for the negative earnings provisions will therefore be 1 July 2007. These amendments will ensure that all provisions of the bill are prospective.
10:02 am
Joel Fitzgibbon (Hunter, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Assistant Treasurer and Revenue) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source
The opposition is supporting these amendments. In the broader superannuation policy context, we look forward to mark 3 of the government’s major superannuation policy proposal. We saw mark 1 in the budget and then we saw mark 2 when they worked out that they had their costings all wrong. We assume that mark 3 will be the final version, but we would have to also assume, I suppose, that there is scope for the government to change its direction yet again. I note that from time to time the government taunts the opposition in this place about our position on the government’s proposal as announced in the budget, but we are waiting for the final proposal and the final costings. We cannot be expected to respond to the government’s superannuation changes proposal until the government finally indicates that it has made its own mind up and provides the opposition with not only the appropriate costings but costings that we can be confident are absolutely correct.
Question agreed to.