Brett Raguse (Forde, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

My question is to the Minister for Financial Services, Superannuation and Corporate Law. Will the minister update the House on the progress of the government’s small business superannuation—

Ms Julie Bishop (Curtin, Liberal Party, Deputy Leader of the Opposition) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Ms Julie Bishop interjecting

Anthony Albanese (Grayndler, Australian Labor Party, Leader of the House) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Mr Speaker, on a point of order: the Deputy Leader of the Opposition, who has been warned, should be asked to withdraw that comment.

Harry Jenkins (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

There was an earlier comment that the Deputy Leader of the Opposition will withdraw.

Ms Julie Bishop (Curtin, Liberal Party, Deputy Leader of the Opposition) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I withdraw.

Harry Jenkins (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I thank the Deputy Leader of the Opposition.

Brett Raguse (Forde, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

My question is to the Minister for Financial Services, Superannuation and Corporate Law. Will the minister update the House on the progress of the government’s small business superannuation clearing house measure? Minister, what risks are there to this important election commitment being rolled out to help relieve small business of a significant compliance burden?

Chris Bowen (Prospect, Australian Labor Party, Minister for Financial Services, Superannuation and Corporate Law) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I thank the honourable member for his question and recognise his long experience as a small business person. In opposition, the Labor Party promised to reduce the paperwork burden for small business in making payments to superannuation funds and we are acting on that commitment. Currently small businesses often have difficulty in making their payments to superannuation funds when they have to make payments to various different funds for various different employees, creating a red-tape nightmare. Pending passage of legislation that will shortly be before the Senate, a free superannuation clearing house will operate from 1 July, implementing that election commitment.

Medicare has been chosen by the government to run the small business clearing house because it is well placed, as one of the government’s best service delivery agencies with significant electronic and payment processing capacity, to deliver that service while ensuring the privacy of information and the security of funds. If we get this legislation implementing the election commitment through the parliament, then we will be helping to ease the compliance burden for small business and letting them do what they do best, which is to get on with the job and employ more Australians.

When I announced last year that Medicare would run the small business superannuation clearing house, it was a decision which received strong endorsement from the superannuation and small business sectors. The chief executive of the Association of Superannuation Funds of Australia, Pauline Vamos, said:

This will lower costs for both employers and funds and allow more employees to exercise choice.

Just last week, the CEO of COSBOA, the small business peak group, said:

We think the legislation will improve the efficiency of business-to-government dealings and, as I said earlier, will help improve small business compliance with their super obligations more generally.

Even today we saw a significant agreement being announced between three of Australia’s largest superannuation administrators to make it easier to roll over funds between different superannuation funds. The administrators make it clear in their statement that the agreement flows from the opportunity created by the government decision to appoint Medicare to run the small business clearing house. So this is a good policy—a pro-small business policy. It has important flow-on benefits for efficiency and employment.

I am asked what risks there are to implementing this policy and the risks lie opposite. It might seem hard to believe that the opposition would block a small business measure, but they are planning to do so in the Senate. A pro-small business measure is being stopped by the Leader of the Opposition and members opposite. The business community has the right to ask what they have done to deserve this Leader of the Opposition. One day he is whacking a tax on business and the next day he is standing in the way of a measure to reduce small business compliance costs.

On this issue, the opposition have reached new heights of hypocrisy. Yesterday in this House, my shadow minister, the member for Cowper, criticised the government for taking so long to implement this superannuation clearing house and then said he would oppose it in the other place. They cannot even get their stories straight in one sentence, let alone one speech or one day. They criticise us for taking too long and then say, ‘By the way, we’re not going to support it.’

This all appears to be part of the Leader of the Opposition’s cunning plan. He has got it all worked out. They are going to use their numbers in the Senate to block our implementation of election commitments and then criticise us for not implementing election commitments. He has got it all sorted! He must take the Australian people for mugs. The Leader of the Opposition takes the Australian people for fools.

The former Prime Minister, John Howard, promised to reduce the red-tape burden on small business by 50 per cent, and he failed. He did not achieve that election promise. But it is not too late for the opposition. They can get out of the way and they can support the government in supporting small business. They can get out of the way and let the government implement this election commitment. If they do not, the small business community of Australia is entitled to conclude that the Leader of the Opposition puts his rashness, his obstructionism and his cheap politics in front of the interests of Australian small business.