Chris Bowen (McMahon, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Treasurer) Share this | Hansard source

You can build on that great Labor reform of superannuation. You can take the superannuation guarantee from nine per cent to 12 per cent and let people save for their own retirements with the help of the government. You can help low-income earners save for their retirement by giving them a low-income earners superannuation contribution, which is something this government has taken away. You can actually say to older people, 'We will continue to ensure that you are paid superannuation.' That is something the previous Labor government did and the Liberal and National parties voted against it. They are in no position to lecture anybody. At the time, the Liberal and National parties voted against the policy to let a superannuation guarantee compulsory be paid people over 70. It was an outrageous decision by the Liberal and National parties, passed in this House with the support of the then members for Lyons and New England.

Those changes—the increase in the superannuation guarantee and allowing low-income earners the benefit of a contribution from the tax system, which was some support as people under $37,000 save for their retirement—would have added $500 billion to the savings of the Australian people by 2037. More importantly, we know that those measures would have reduced the number of people on the full age pension by half by 2050. That is how you make the age pension more sustainable. You work with people. You assist low-income earners to save for their own retirement. You say to lower income earners—the carpenters, the plumbers, the cleaners—that they actually deserve a tax concession on their superannuation. If it is good enough for high-income earners and millionaires, it is good enough for cleaners and others in this building, and right across the country, to get a bit of assistance in saving for their retirement—but not according to this government, not according to the member for North Sydney, not according to the member for Kooyong, and not according to the Prime Minister. They say, no, the only way is to cut. We are going to make you work longer, and we are going to give you less when you are eventually allowed to retire. Well, there is a better way.

I welcome the fact that the Treasurer, in his remarks a few moments ago, for the first time recognised there are alternatives. You bet there are. There are a heap of alternatives, and you are going to see them. There are better ways of saving for the future. There are better ways of dealing with demographic change. It is not all about making people work harder and longer. It is not all about taking things away from people. It is about helping people save for their own retirement, giving them a dignified retirement and giving them a chance to live in retirement without reliance on the full age pension. It is about helping people to use the superannuation system to build on our strengths, to build on the strength of that great Australian financial system and our great financial services providers, who know how to invest for the future and how to maximise people's retirement incomes. That should be available to every working Australian and not just those who can afford to get financial advice and those who get massive tax concessions from this government. It should be available to those who are able to work hard and save for themselves and provide for themselves—but they get zero support from this government. All they get are lectures about being leaners and not lifters. All they get are lectures about being takers and not makers. All they get told is that they are a drain on the public purse. How dare they expect an age pension. How dare they expect an age pension that actually increases with growth in Australian wages and the Australian economy. How dare they expect the Australian government to look after them. How could they expect such a thing. How could they expect to get any support from this government.

Well, they cannot expect to get any support—not from the member for North Sydney, who is so out of touch with the aspirations of ordinary Australian people, nor from the member for Kooyong, who lectures them and says they do not deserve a tax concession if they are low- and middle-income earners—and who takes it away from them—and whose main focus is providing more tax concessions to people on high incomes and less to people on low incomes. It says it all about the priorities of this government, which has brought down a flawed document in an attempt to sell their own unfair and flawed budget—a flawed sales job that is about to be supplemented by taxpayers' funds on an advertising campaign—a document brought down a month after it should have been, in breach of the law, in breach of the Charter of Budget Honesty Act. The Treasurer of Australia is in breach of a law he is meant to be administering. He says to the Australian people: 'I will enforce the law.' Well, how about you start complying with it. How about you actually start by complying with your own law instead of beating your chest about enforcing the law on others. You can start by complying with it, and you can start with a bit of honesty. We are not seeing any in this document. (Time expired)

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