Amanda Stoker (Queensland, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

I rather like Senator Walsh. I think she's one of the brighter and more capable senators on the other side of the chamber that I have got to know. But I don't find it logical when she stands up in this chamber and says that the Treasury Laws Amendment (Your Superannuation, Your Choice) Bill 2019 is a bill about dismantling the ability to collectively bargain. How on earth could it be? It doesn't take away the rights of employees to engage in enterprise bargaining processes; they still have all of those rights. All it does is provide individual employees with the chance to choose their own super fund, even whilst they participate in enterprise bargaining negotiations or continue to work underneath an agreement. If an employee wants to bargain as part of a group, that's entirely their right. But so too is it their right to put their super where they would like to put their super. You know what? If the fund that is being recommended by their chosen union is the wonderful choice that those opposite say it is, it will be the obvious choice for all of the people under that agreement. So why do you need to take away the rights of individuals to choose? It just doesn't make sense to me.

One of the things that really stuck out in Senator Walsh's presentation a moment ago is that she described the Labor Party position as being about supporting the choice of workers to do what they want with their super, but in a collective way. That reflects a fundamental misunderstanding about what choice is. Choice is something we exercise as individuals. It's not a choice when some people who are conducting negotiations on behalf of the union for the people in your workplace decide it for you. That is not choice; that's subjugation. They're very different things, and to suggest that this is anything other than an opportunity to give working people more power, more opportunity and more choice and control over their own financial future—well, as I say, I really like Senator Walsh but this is not a speech that made an awful lot of sense.

Let me explain it with an example. There is such a simple example we can use here. Sarah is a young working person. She's studying to be a teacher, but, while she's studying, she holds some part-time jobs. One of them is at Kmart, and she gets forced into having her superannuation in the fund that has been chosen by the union that has negotiated with Kmart employees—fine. Sarah also has a part-time job as a waitress, and she's got to have another fund reflecting the agreements of that workplace. Then, as she moves towards the end of her studies and into the market in her chosen long-term profession, Sarah has to get another fund—again, not of her choosing. I can't help but think that, at some point in her career, Sarah should get some choice about what happens to her money. That seems to be what's getting lost in this debate. This superannuation money is important, but it doesn't belong to industry super funds, it doesn't belong to retail funds, it doesn't belong to employers and it doesn't belong to unions. No, this money, in this example, belongs to Sarah, and every day of the week it belongs to each individual working person. If we are to live up to our beliefs, no matter what side of the chamber we sit on, it must be something about which employees are given control. It must be employees that get to choose what they do with their superannuation money.

Those opposite have tried to cast this bill as some grand conspiracy to attack unions. That couldn't be further from the truth. This change was announced as a response to the Financial System Inquiry. That inquiry recommended that all employees be provided with the ability to choose the fund into which their superannuation guarantee contributions are paid. That recommendation was echoed by the Productivity Commission's 2018 report, in which they assessed the efficiency and competitiveness of superannuation.

These changes really matter. They matter in a philosophical sense, because it has to be right that individuals should have the right to choose what they do with their own money and that, just because they choose to bargain collectively, they don't cede the right to choose what they do with their own money, any more than they should cede to someone else the right to choose what they do with their weekly wages. The knock-on effect of denying this choice to working people is that we get reduced productivity, reduced performance and reduced efficiency from our superannuation sector, and do you know who bears the brunt of that lower efficiency? Working people.

So on this side of the chamber we make no apologies for standing up for the double benefit that comes from standing up for the right of individuals to choose what they do with their own money. The first benefit is when they get to choose a fund that works for them, with fees that reflect their interests and investment plans that reflect their choices. Then the second benefit comes when superannuation funds across the market perform at a higher level because they are getting the benefits of a properly competitive market, not being hampered by these uncompetitive arrangements.

This government has taken action through the Protecting Your Super package. It has addressed the existing stock of multiple accounts that people like Sarah have faced over the years so that they don't cop duplicate fees, and stealth insurance policies that they don't even realise they've got, being deducted out of their superannuation funds every year, often eroding those smaller balances down to nothing in circumstances where it may not even have been a product that they wanted or needed. This change is the next step in undoing the damage that unwanted multiple superannuation accounts cause. It delivers real choice for individuals who would otherwise be forced to continue to go on this merry-go-round of unwanted and duplicated accounts for which they pay multiple fees, from which they get lower returns and in which, fundamentally, they are denied their right to choose what they do with their super just as they should be able to choose what they do with their weekly wage. That's a principle we on this side of the chamber are happy to fight for every day of the week.