Jess Walsh (Victoria, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

I think the taxation commissioner has admitted it himself, Senator Hume. A light-touch approach has resulted in less than 15 per cent of unpaid super being recovered by the tax office and has shifted the responsibility for chasing unpaid super onto workers themselves.

As if forcing workers to do the job of government agencies weren't enough, those opposite made that job almost impossible. We know those opposite just sat by when workers tried to get their stolen super back. We know they sat by while workers who reported unpaid super to the ATO were consistently given no information about the progress of their claims. We know they sat by while the ATO kept workers completely in the dark about any deals they made with employers about their hard-earned super. Where was the sense of urgency then? Where was the sense of urgency from those opposite about transparency and accountability then, when it came to unpaid super? Where were the Liberal senators who could have come to the defence of Australian workers or super fund members then? Why did those opposite sit back while $5 billion per year went missing from members' super accounts?

Well, we know why. It is because those opposite are only moving motions like this one as part of their ideological war on super. But going after the funds isn't enough for those opposite. In their war against super, the Liberal Party themselves are going straight after workers' retirement savings. They want to force workers to raid their retirement savings to buy a house, despite the consequence that will have of driving up house prices.

I will take your interjection about choice, Senator Scarr, because during COVID you did force Australian workers to raid their retirement savings to get through the global pandemic. You said this in the chamber yesterday; you're saying it again today. You're saying that it's a question of giving people a choice. I am not sure whether you actually understand what choice is.

When you champion low wages growth as a deliberate design feature of your economic plan, when you do nothing to drive down housing prices to make them more affordable, when you deny Australian workers access to pandemic support based on the industry they work in, when you leave casual workers, workers in the arts and university workers off pandemic support because you hate those sectors, when you leave workers with absolutely no support in the middle of a global pandemic, you are not giving them a choice. You are not helping them to make a choice. What you are doing is forcing them to raid their hard-earned retirement savings because you can't be bothered coming up with policies to actually help them yourself. Almost half a million Australians had their super funds closed or almost completely cleaned out as a result of what you are calling a choice; $37 billion was taken out of accounts by people who really needed those funds the most, leaving them at absolute ground zero when it comes to retirement security.

But those opposite, they don't want to stop there. It's not enough to have workers drain what's already in their accounts. Now coalition senators have even more policy ideas to go after workers' retirement savings. So apparently you do have some policy ideas, Senator Hume, on the backbench. They're suggesting that the government increase taxes on super. They've said the government should not proceed with the legislated increase to the super guarantee. They've called for the requirement for employers to pay super to be removed altogether. And, most shamefully, they've called for super not to be paid to low-income earners at all. If they cared about transparency and accountability they would own up to their hatred of superannuation.

Opposition senators interjecting—