John Murphy (Reid, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Speaker, my question is to the Minister for Financial Services and Superannuation and Minister for Employment and Workplace Relations. Will the minister update the House on how the government is standing with working people to build a stronger economy today and to provide them greater financial certainty in retirement? Minister, what other policies are there, and what would be their impact?

Bill Shorten (Maribyrnong, Australian Labor Party, Minister for Financial Services and Superannuation) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I thank the member for Reid for his question. I can inform him and other members of the House that this Gillard Labor government is doing much to improve retirement income savings of all Australians. The list bears repeating. We are increasing compulsory superannuation from nine to 12 per cent. We have abolished the 15 per cent tax that 3½ million people were paying on their superannuation contributions if they earned less than $37,000. We did that on 1 July last year. This is on top of us putting downward pressures on fees and charges in superannuation. This is on top of us abolishing the 70-year-old age discrimination bar against people over 70 getting super. This is on top of us today, barely an hour ago, lifting the concessional caps for people over 60 and 50. We are a government getting on with the business of looking after people's superannuation, and we have announced our plans to further depoliticise the long-term issues of superannuation from the day-to-day hurly-burly.

But the member for Reid did ask me about other policies which are in existence in this place. I regret to inform the House and those listening that 16 May this year was a dark day in the history of Australian superannuation. It was the day that the Leader of the Opposition said he would freeze, he would jam, he would halt the increases in superannuation at 9¼ per cent and not increase them to 10 per cent. What do those opposite have against 8½ million Australians getting a better retirement income? It gets worse than that. The industry knows it is a problem. John Brogden, the leader of the Financial Services Council called the opposition's announcement 'a bitter disappointment, a blow to the retirement savings of all Australians'.

But unfortunately, member for Reid, it gets worse. This mob opposite cannot keep their hands off superannuation. They are proposing to put a great big new tax on low-paid people's superannuation. They want to say, 'How stupid is that policy?' If you have take-home income, if you earn less than $37,000, your effective tax rate is 9½ per cent. But the brains trust opposite want to lift the tax on the super, which you cannot access, to 15 per cent! The effective tax rate is 9½ per cent that people earning under $37,000 pay on their take-home pay, but that mob opposite want them to pay more on compulsory savings. Whoever invented that idea should get the boot.

But it is also stupid because those opposite want to put more pressure on the age pension. If the average Australian does not have money saved, then we are going to need to pay more in taxes. Despite the blandishments of the opposition, there is no free lunch when you are in government; you have got to do the right thing. But worst of all—not only do I not trust them to just freeze super; they will never increase super—this mob opposite would give money back to Rio Tinto and Gina and rip-off 3.6 million people with their great big new tax on superannuation.

John Murphy (Reid, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Speaker, I ask a supplementary question. In view of the minister's unsettling assessment of the coalition's superannuation policies, I am prompted to ask him: how critical are superannuation policies for our male and female workers and what else is the government doing to support both working men and women?

Bill Shorten (Maribyrnong, Australian Labor Party, Minister for Financial Services and Superannuation) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Let me reassure the member for Reid, who is rightly concerned by what the mob opposite would do because they cannot keep their hands off the workers' superannuation. There are four things that come to mind instantaneously of what Labor is doing to look after working women. We want to make sure that low-paid women workers in Australia—there are 2.2 million of them who earn less than $37,000—do not pay a great big new tax on superannuation.

But it gets better than that. We all know that Australians do not have enough money for their retirement. That is why we want to raise it from nine to 12 per cent, but that mob opposite would rip off the average worker 8½ million. They have never seen an employee they did not want to kick! But we are doing more than that. We have paid parental leave. It is not the Rolls Royce scheme for 'women of calibre', which I know some in the opposition like. And what is more, when you look at everything we are doing for working women—paid parental leave; we have lifted the tax-free threshold to $18,000—I tell you what: if you are a working woman in Australia and you are not rolling in income, the best bet on 14 September is vote Labor to look after your conditions if you are a working woman in Australia.