Tim Wilson (Goldstein, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Small Business) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

As the member for Goldstein—and it's an excellent way that we started this debate—it is wonderful to speak on this piece of legislation, the Treasury Laws Amendment (Payday Superannuation) Bill 2025, because, as you know, Deputy Speaker Freelander, superannuation is Australians' money. It's Australians' money. It's not the money of the Labor Party. It's not the money of industry super funds. It's not the money of the corrupt cartel kickbacks for the CFMEU. It's not there to be laundered for institutions as they see fit. It is there for Australians as they see fit. That's why we fundamentally believe that Australians should be able to use their super for simple things in the ordinary sequence of life.

Until 1992, you would have been told you were absolutely mad, absolutely stark raving bonkers, to think that it was more logical to save for your 67th birthday income than it was to save a deposit to buy your own home, because you get the benefits of buying your own home during your working life and your retirement. It's one of the foundations of economic security and one of the three pillars of retirement security. But that's not good enough for the Labor Party. They wanted to engage in a form of economic social engineering and reverse it because it helps the corrupt interests of the modern Labor movement, where they prioritise superannuation funds so that fund managers can take bigger bonuses, bigger graft and bigger components of people's superannuation money and deny Australians their capacity to buy their first home.

Not only are they trying to deny Australians the pathway to save for and buy their first home; it's even worse than that: they then want to use Australian superannuation money to buy homes that super funds own so they can rent them to young Australians so they can be serfs to superannuation funds. It is neofeudalism on a scale that we have never seen before, under the hysterical ideal that it is somehow advancing the interests of Australia.

Is the Labor Party the party of serfdom to super funds? You bet, they are! They can boast about it as much as they want in the parliament, but some of us see the con. Some of us see the trick. Some of us see the deception and some of us will never back down from calling out how much they are seeking to corrode and to eat into the foundations of the ambition and the dreams of the next generation of Australians to simply feed the interests of their friends.

Superannuation is a choice. Just to remind you, Deputy Speaker Freelander, superannuation did exist before 1992. Labor don't like to remind you of that. Before 1992, superannuation existed. And, before 1992, did you know that superannuation policies actually allowed you to cash them in to use as a deposit to buy your first home? People fundamentally understood that buying your own home was more important for your retirement security as well as your working life than having a larger balance when you turn 65, at the time, and now 67—logic! But they often deferred obligations to contribute, because people understood the biggest financial priority young Australians between the ages of about 18 and 35 had. They voted with their feet. People understood the most important thing you could do for your long term and your working life and your retirement financial security was to own your own home.

But, of course, when young Australians own their own home, guess what happens? They're proud, they're independent, they're more likely to go on and form families and be the foundation of the success of this country. They're more likely to start small businesses, lean into the future with confidence, own a share of this nation, want to defend it and conserve its great traditions and its values, and that's the one thing that directly assaults the progressive madness of the modern Labor Party. So they must attack it at its foundations at every step.

At the moment you see the insanity of the modern Labor project in their approach to housing and to superannuation. The modern insanity is where Labor likes to chuck an increasingly large chunk of young Australians' wages into a fund they control or their mates control, for their 67th birthday. Their answer to why young Australians can't afford to buy their own home, because Labor have deliberately and maliciously taken their wages and thrown them into the future in a way only they can access and control, is and then to say: 'The government should come along and own your home. We'll be the solution. The government should come in and invest in it.'

They're building out their control over homeownership while also increasing their control, because that's what the modern Labor project is. The modern Labor project is to control Australians. It doesn't matter what it is; from birth to death, they want to control you. They want to control education so they can indoctrinate the next generation of Australians to think that the state is their parents. They want to control the first job and the first opportunity young Australians get so they can control their career pathways and then go on and dictate to them how they save, how they use their wealth and how they're in a position to be able one day to go and secure their retirement. They want to take control of your wealth so they can then go on and decide and determine whether or not you own your own home, and their preference is that, if you are not in state sponsored housing, you are renting from their friends in super funds so that you are serfs to a super fund.

Then, of course, their preference is that they also control your working life by making sure that you're part of the organised labour system, and, if you choose not to be part of that system and take the diktat from organised unions and organised working organisations, you're shunned and isolated and you're not on the taxpayer's teat or you're not able to get the corrupt kickbacks and cartels that are part of the modern system that we see every day through the press reports of the CFMEU. Then, of course, when you get to retirement, all their questions are about how they impose more cost, more obligations and more responsibility at a time of your life when you can no longer earn an income, because their only pathway is to harvest anything that you have saved and sacrificed to get ahead.

That is the Labor project. The Labor project is about how they control Australians. But don't worry. To the children in the gallery who want hope and opportunity, I say there is a better way—a better way young Australians can control their money, their ambition and their destiny. It is the Liberal way, because we believe that young Australians can own their own home, control their income, control their super and control their destiny. We believe in backing Australians and any Australian who wants to back themselves. That is the lived ambition of the Liberal dream—a nation of 26 million people standing on their own two feet, appealing to their best hopes and aspiring to something better not just for themselves but for their families and their communities.

When we talk about a bill like this, what we're talking about is whether Australians own their own money or not, whether they control their own money or not and whether they can then go on and use their own money or not. But, of course, the Labor Party is not interested in achieving that. Their motivation and their objective is how they get as much money as possible into the funds they and their mates control, because, when they get that money into those funds, they can then use it for the cartel kickbacks to the unions that can then be kicked back into the campaign coffers of the Labor Party so they can sit in the chamber and then go on and vote for more money. It is the circle of cartel kickback life.

It's almost like the opening of the movie The Lion King. It's so perverse it's beautiful, because, literally, the mafia could not design a system with such legality and seemingly such lawful sanction as that circle of life. Labor Party MPs get elected. They vote for more income to go into industry super funds. Industry super funds give, through marketing expenses, more cartel kickbacks to unions. Unions donate to the Labor Party to campaign to get elected to this chamber and keep repeating the circle, the cartel kickback circle of life. That is the labour movement, whereas we look at it and say: how do young Australians earn their own money, own their own destiny and control their own future? That's what we believe in, so, when we want young Australians to have their super fund, we want them to own their own destiny.

When you look at this bill, you should be able to say that it's your money. You should control it and it should be paid with your wages. We look at it and see an empowerment for you, but we want to make sure that it doesn't impoverish small businesses on the road towards that future. One of the things the Labor Party doesn't care about is small business. With the greatest of respect, they managed to come up with a minister responsible for small business, but we know she has no say at the cabinet table. Because they're not part of the right faction or they're not part of the right union or they're not part of the right state—whatever it is—many ministers who might have something worthwhile to say are silenced on the issues that matter to the future direction of this country, and we know that from this legislation. The government's own advice from the Treasury was that this bill needed 18 months to be implemented so that small businesses didn't go broke, because there is no super on jobs that don't exist when a small business collapses. We already have record insolvencies for small business in this country. We already have the lowest private sector jobs growth in the history of this country. We already have, nationwide, eight out of 10 jobs being created only because of taxpayer revenue. This government is fuelling inflation in the process. It's using debt to finance expenditure today to prop up job numbers, which is fuelling inflation, which means Australians are paying higher interest rates because of this government's reckless fiscal policy. They pretend their economic program is working when, in fact, it is failing and fuelling inflation today. Every Australian is paying for the consequences of this reckless Labor government and its reckless spending program, and they're paying it through higher interest rates, today.

One of the worst things we could see is small businesses collapsing because the government simply won't implement this reform with enough lead time to help small businesses adjust. Deputy Speaker Young, I know you understand small business, because you've been in it yourself. When you're waiting for revenue to come in—and sometimes people aren't paying you as fast as they want, whether it is the Commonwealth, the state government, a big business or another small business who are waiting to be paid themselves—you have to finance costs from your own account. So often, small-business people, who are aspiring to get ahead and back others, have had to find ways to make sure that their staff are paid on time. They always pay their staff before they pay themselves—always. And that is always something that's lost on this government; it doesn't care. And the same goes with super. Enabling small business the breathing space to find their pathway to conform with the law has been met by the Labor Party with: 'Stuff them. That doesn't matter.'

We know from public reports produced by some of the biggest payroll companies in the world, like MYOB—companies that so many small businesses depend on—that 22.6 per cent of businesses are at risk of insolvency. And they are not just at risk of insolvency in terms of going to ASIC and saying, 'We can't do this anymore.' Not only can that potentially deny the people who run those businesses their future economic success and their capacity to afford their own superannuation. But what goes with that, if those companies go down and those small businesses go down, is their existing employees and, of course, their superannuation and their wages.

Small businesses are the starting gate of opportunity for so many young Australians. It is the first step on the ladder of economic opportunity. Small business jobs are often the first gateway to full participation in the Australian economy—the participation that we want. It is where young Australians get the skills, the training, the knowledge and the enculturation into a business environment. It is where they find their hunger, their thirst, their ambition and their dreams. When that's suffocated because Labor simply don't care—Labor's objective prioritises getting as much money as possible into super funds so that their mates can pay off cartel kickbacks and pay their fund managers bigger bonuses at the expense of small businesses—they are trading off the ambitions and the dreams of young Australians to feed themselves. It's not just immoral. It is wrong. And it's why this amendment is so important. Not only does it go to the heart of an economic transition that will help small business survive; it goes to the heart of the type of economy we want—an economy built from the foundations of enterprise, initiative and hard work rather than the socialist model of top-down corporatism and statism.

So, yes, we're moving this amendment because we clearly believe in it. We proudly believe in it. We believe strongly in backing small business every step of the way and in fighting for small business every step of the way. We will be unrelenting in standing up for small business every step of the way. If the government had any rational thought, they would be backing the amendment every step of the way.

Shayne Neumann (Blair, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I've never heard such tosh and nonsense from those opposite. The member for Goldstein thinks he's a member of the modern and moderate Liberal Party. Just that speech: railing against public or state education, claiming it controls children, and the idea that somehow superannuation—and I'll use the words he used about superannuation—is malicious, that there is denial and corruption, cartels and kickbacks, all associated with superannuation. So, when you take your superannuation at the end of your hard earning and working life and realise that it has been a Labor government that has helped you to gain your dignified and financially secure retirement, know that those opposite, in my 18 years of parliament, never once supported a superannuation guarantee increase. They delayed it again and again. The member calls superannuation 'neo-feudalism'. What nonsense! It's absolute rubbish!

Those opposite would have more credibility in their view on the Treasury Laws Amendment (Payday Superannuation) Bill 2025 if they had supported any of the housing reforms of the Labor government, such as the $43 billion Homes for Australia plan. Those opposite spent nearly 10 years in government and did nothing on housing—could barely find a housing minister to represent the portfolio. And when it came to the reforms on housing that we initiated, they voted against them. So, they've got this false dichotomy between housing and superannuation.

We want homes for Australia. More than 4,000 people in my electorate have benefited from the home guarantee five per cent. Those opposite, the Liberal and National parties, opposed it. And 55,000 social and affordable houses being built under our programs: those opposite, the Liberal and National parties, opposed it, as well as the Help to Buy Scheme and the 45 per cent increase in rent assistance. Those opposite, the Liberal and National parties, opposed these things, again and again.

So, don't come in here and give us lectures on your newfound concern about the housing difficulties of this country when you oppose it. This legislation that we're putting forward is about ensuring that superannuation is paid.

Terry Young (Longman, Liberal National Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The member for Moncrieff on a point of order?

Angie Bell (Moncrieff, Liberal National Party, Shadow Minister for Youth) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The member should direct his comments through you, Mr Chair, not directly across the chamber.

Shayne Neumann (Blair, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I'm directing them through the chair—of course I am—but I'm addressing the claims of those opposite. That's exactly what they're doing. They claim, for example, that there's a trade-off between housing and superannuation. They have failed to address this bill. Not once did the member for Goldstein address the substance of this bill—not once in 15 minutes.

This is about making sure that superannuation is paid on time, with people's wages, so they can get their superannuation when they get their salary. I think that's fair. I think if you walked down Riverlink Shopping Centre in Ipswich and asked people shopping in Kmart, or in the food court, they'd say it was a good thing, the right thing to do. And this legislation is another proud Labor reform. It means more super for workers. Yet those opposite, the Liberal and National parties, oppose it—once again.

We've already implemented a number of reforms to strengthen the superannuation system over the term of this government, including paying superannuation on government-funded paid parental leave and increasing the superannuation guarantee to 12 per cent. Only a Labor government has done that. Reaching 12 per cent was a signature policy, built on decades of reforms by Labor governments. Now we're pursuing additional reforms of superannuation.

By the way, once again we heard a speech from those opposite showing the divisions between the major political parties in this country. Superannuation is one. Universal health care is another. Public or state education is another, as well as people's rights at work. The subject of this bill is superannuation, and this is yet again a demonstration of why the public's vote matters when it comes to people's financial and economic security and dignity in retirement.

Payday superannuation is a once-in-a-generation reform that aims to tackle unpaid superannuation, creating a better system for workers and employers alike. We know that for too long too many workers have waited months to receive all their superannuation entitlement. It's been estimated that 3.3 million Australians missed out on $5.7 billion in super in 2022-23, losing on average $1,730 each year, based on analysis of the latest ATO data. It is simply not true to say that every employer pays superannuation when they should or on time. It is simply untrue, yet the member for Goldstein made that claim in the House of Representatives. It is simply untrue. And the workers of this country, young people in particular, know that's not true. There have been many parents listening to this debate who would know that their daughter or son has come to them and said, 'Mum or dad, I got paid my wages, but I didn't get paid super.' Not every employer does the right thing.

The member for Goldstein railed and said that we never support small business. I established a small business. I built a small business with the hard work, effort and cooperation of my employees, and my partners, shareholders and directors later on. I know what it's like to build a business. I know the challenges and the difficulties, but you've got to do the right thing. You pay your wages on time, and you should pay your superannuation on time. In my outer-suburban and regional seat of Blair, unpaid super costs 27,800 local workers. That's 31 per cent—nearly one in three—of the local workforce, and it cost them $1,770 each, on average, or a combined $49.1 million in 2022-23. So it's simply untrue to say that all employers pay their superannuation on time or do to right thing. Over six years, from 2017-18 to 2022-23, unpaid superannuation steadily grew around the country. In my electorate, it cost workers a total of $185.9 million in underpayments.

This reform will benefit thousands of workers in my community and boost the retirement incomes of millions of Australians. It's a signature Labor legislation. It's about ensuring superannuation is delivered on time and people can have secure and dignified retirement. It's part of our commitment to making sure people earn more, keep more of what they earn and retire with more. If you listened to those opposite, you would think they want people to retire with less. At the passage of this legislation, employers will be required to pay their employees' superannuation on payday, at the same time as their salary and wages, in line with every pay cycle rather than quarterly. This simple, practical change will mean more frequent contributions, earlier compounding returns and stronger retirement balances for millions of Australians.

The bill does three things. From 1 July 2026 it will require employers to ensure superannuation contributions are received by the employee's fund within seven business days of payday, or they will be liable for the superannuation guarantee charge. There are a number of types of superannuation, just as there are different types of toothpaste and cars. There are industry funds, retail funds, different fund managers and different names of superannuation schemes and policies in this country. But to label all fund managers as corrupt and part of a cartel, like the member for Goldstein did, is simply wrong. It is just erroneous to do that. This reform will strengthen Australia's superannuation scheme, make employees receive their superannuation contributions more often and help reduce unpaid super. Paying the superannuation contribution more frequently will mean that employees can track their entitlements more expeditiously and helps employers improve their payroll management. This change is part of a broader government initiative to boost retirement savings.

Secondly, the legislation will help the Australian Taxation Office enforce the law and more quickly identify employers not making contributions. It therefore strengthens the scheme. It means as well that the ATO will receive additional resourcing to help detect unpaid super payments earlier, and the government will set enhanced targets for the ATO for the recovery of those payments. As part of this, the ATO will draw on single-touch payroll data, which employers already report, and match it with data from super funds to detect missing payments in near-real time.

Thirdly, the bill will update the superannuation guarantee charge, which is the penalty employers face when they fail to pay super on time. Under the new framework, the super guarantee charge will apply for each payday an employer fails to pay super in full and on time. This will allow the charge to better target employer behaviour and ensure employees are compensated for delays, including through notional earnings and penalties. These are simple, commonsense changes that will strengthen our system. Workers will receive what they are legally owed. Employees will benefit from earlier and more frequent contributions. Around nine million Australians will benefit from higher retirement savings from receiving their superannuation guarantee contributions earlier and more frequently. On average this will deliver an extra $7,700 per working Australian by retirement, because being paid super sooner helps to grow people's retirement eggs much faster, thanks to the benefit of compound interest.

Now, let's look at the example of a 25-year-old median-income earner, say a hospitality worker at the Orion Springfield Central shopping centre in my electorate, currently receiving their superannuation quarterly and their wages fortnightly. With payday superannuation, the super fund will get it sooner, meaning higher earnings for the worker over their working life. It could see them being $6,000, or 1.5 per cent, better off at retirement, from the compounding benefits of super being paid more frequently.

The reality is that this issue disproportionately affects more vulnerable Australians, particularly women and younger workers, who are most at risk of a power imbalance in the workplace and more likely to miss out on their super when employers do the wrong thing. Among the hardest hit are women, who on average are already retiring with a quarter less super than men. Younger workers and low-income earners are also at risk, with one in two workers who earn under $25,000 a year having unpaid super entitlements and with almost half of all people reporting unpaid super to the ATO being under 35 years of age. That's the power imbalance that I talked about.

The changes in this bill will particularly benefit young people working in retail and hospitality and those in low-paid, casual and insecure work, who are more likely to miss out when super is paid less frequently. It will help thousands of these workers in my electorate. When a worker misses out on their super altogether, it can have profound impacts, with losses continuing to compound, leaving them with tens of thousands of dollars less in their pocket at retirement. It means a less secure and less dignified retirement, financially.

For example, an average 35-year-old worker—say someone at Riverlink Shopping Centre, in my electorate, working in hospitality or retail—with unpaid superannuation will be $30,000 poorer at retirement. When employers go bust, the impact is even worse. For an average 35-year-old working in the private sector, a liquidated business could leave their retirement balance more than $90,000 worse off in today's dollar terms. The security of retirement is really important, but if the business you're working for goes into administration or liquidation, it's a big problem to claim your superannuation.

Importantly, payday super will boost transparency for workers, particularly young people, who typically assume that their super is being paid with their wages and that people are doing the right thing. It will be much easier and faster not only for the ATO to detect and fix underpayments but also for employers and employees in the workplace to keep track of what's going on. It means they'll be able to consult with one another further.

Treasury and the ATO will continue to consult closely with industry—and they have done so, by the way, contrary to what the previous speaker said. The ATO has advised that it intends to consult on its approach and compliance for 12 months after the changes start and will seek to differentiate between low- and high-risk employers.

This legislation is important. It will make the superannuation system fairer, from top to bottom. It will mean a better deal and more superannuation for low-income workers, and I reckon that's a pretty good thing for the economy and for the people who work in my electorate.

Rebekha Sharkie (Mayo, Centre Alliance) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The $4 trillion Australian superannuation system is, overall, I think, a success. It covers around 90 per cent of workers, allowing them to plan for financial independence in their retirement; it makes financial capital available for large-scale investment in Australian infrastructure and enterprise; and it reduces some of the costs of age pensions for taxpayers. The better the superannuation system, the less we need to draw down for the age pension. So looking after workers is the right thing to do, and effective super policy does make good economic sense.

Notwithstanding this success, many constituents over the years have approached me because they have not been paid their superannuation entitlements. In fact, it has shocked me over the years—the people who have approached me. It's been very difficult for them, particularly if they are still with that employer, to raise this issue, and they're not alone. According to the Super Members Council, unpaid super is costing working Australians $110 million a week. In 2021-22, 2.8 million Australians missed out on $5.1 billion in superannuation entitlements. The Super Members Council's latest figures show unpaid super has grown to $5.7 billion a year.

This affects more men than women, as they work in industries and occupations with higher rates of underpayment and, on average, make more income than women. But the impact on women is often more acute, as they often have lower super balances going into retirement. Blue-collar workers in construction, trades and transport are most likely to miss out—and I've certainly heard from many mechanics and those working in factories in my community that have experienced this—with 41 per cent of labourers experiencing unpaid super. In other industries which experience high rates of business insolvencies, unpaid super is also more common. Retail trade and accommodation and food services have also been found by the ATO to be of high risk in recent years. The average worker will miss out on around $26,000 in super for women and $36,000 for men at retirement due to the effects of unpaid super and that compounding loss over time. My electorate of Mayo has actually been one of the worst affected communities for this, with the highest average underpayment of any South Australian electorate, totalling $33 million in superannuation debt. That affects over 19,500 workers, with an average underpayment of $1,690 per person.

Unpaid super allows non-compliant businesses to compete on an uneven playing field with those who pay their workers' entitlements and pay them on time. This bill will require employers to meet key obligations to accurately calculate employees' individual superannuation guarantee and the quantifying earnings; make contributions before the end of the seventh business day after payment of those earnings, or 14 days for a new employee; and comply with the employee's choice of fund. These reforms will go some way to protect employees by ensuring superannuation is paid in real time and not months later—or, indeed, perhaps not at all. It will reduce the unpaid debts that accumulate before some employers collapse or restructure, and it will empower the Australian Taxation Office to assess and recover unpaid superannuation more promptly. It will also hold directors accountable through stronger penalties for systematic noncompliance.

I think it must be said that the vast majority of employers in Australia do the right thing, and I think nearly every employer in Australia does want to do the right thing. It is going to make a big difference to workers like my constituent Katherine in the future. Earlier this year, Katherine's employer terminated her employment and that of several of her colleagues. They were told by the business that, while it was not currently able to pay their entitlements, they would be paid in full. After weeks of seeking payment of their entitlements, Katherine and her former colleagues contacted the Fair Work Ombudsman. Their former employer advised the ombudsman that they would be paid within the week, but they were not. They made complaints to the Australian Taxation Office regarding their unpaid wages and superannuation owed. Katherine is trying to maintain hope, but they remain in limbo, as the former employer, which is an NDIS registered provider, still continues to trade but says that it lacks the funds to pay their entitlements. With the passage of this payday superannuation bill, it will be much harder for Katherine's former employer, or others like it, to get into this situation in the first place. Employers will not be allowed to accumulate a superannuation debt under the radar because they will be required to pay within the seven days after pay day, rather than quarterly. Employees and, importantly, the ATO will become aware sooner if superannuation payments are not being paid into their fund.

There have been concerns raised that employers may not have enough time to deploy, test and implement changes pre-commencement of this act, particularly system changes. I absolutely appreciate that the timeline is tight—eight months from passage to commencement—and some challenges may remain that need to be addressed. I absolutely have sympathy for some businesses, particularly small businesses, who are worried about this additional compliance burden. We know this has been coming for some time; it was flagged in the 2023-24 budget. It must be said that workers have been waiting at a collective cost to them of over $5 billion a year in unpaid super. I feel that that loss must be addressed. I understand the ATO's first-year compliance approach will allow some leniency during this initial period for low to medium at-risk employers who are genuinely trying to make efforts to comply; I understand that this is genuinely the case.

For too long I have been raising concerns about unpaid superannuation. In fact, in 2017 in this place I introduced a private member's bill called the Fair Work Amendment (Recovering Unpaid Superannuation) Bill. My bill would have improved notification requirements of payment, or indeed nonpayment, for employers and superannuation funds and included superannuation within the National Employment Standards, providing more avenues for employees to pursue their unpaid superannuation debts. That bill contained other measures, including the ability for employers to claim salary-sacrificing super as if they were employer superannuation contributions—we needed to get that removed—and an exemption allowing employers to not make superannuation contributions to employees when they earn less than $450 in wages each month. I'm glad those issues have been addressed.

It's really important that we provide employees with every avenue we can to try and recover their super. In my experience, when I've seen notifications from employees who have tried to use the ATO to recover funds, it has not always been very successful. It's very important that we look to include superannuation in the National Employment Standards. This would mean that most employers would have that access rather than relying on the ATO to do that debt recovery. I remember seeing one form from the ATO when a constituent was owed several thousand dollars. The ATO recovered something like $2.50, an absolutely nominal amount, and said, 'We've made a recovery and we're closing the case.' We need to have a much, much better system; perhaps that's more people working in the ATO on this issue of superannuation and debt recovery, which is what it is. It makes it very, very difficult. I've heard from apprentice hairdressers, from hairdressers who are qualified hairdressers and have been in the industry for a long time, from mechanics and from people who work in retail. In some cases, they've been working at businesses that are very, very well-known businesses in my community. The level of unpaid superannuation that exists in our nation has shocked me.

In 2021, only 17 per cent, or under $1 billion, of unpaid superannuation guaranteed entitlements were recovered from $4.7 billion total of unpaid super. The 2022 Australian National Audit Office report into superannuation guarantee noncompliance found that the ATO's use of the framework was only partially effective. While 9,594 fines were issued in the 2021 period by the ATO, only 43 per cent of them required a business to pay a penalty above the unpaid amount, and less than one per cent included the maximum 200 per cent penalty. And the burden of reporting remains with workers, who report 78 per cent of recoveries, with automated detection by the ATO remaining very, very low. We need prompt and proactive compliance. Recovery action really is the best chance for people to get that super back into their balance, because we need that interest to compound. Further work will be needed in future on recovery of entitlements for workers in cases where there's business insolvency. Super entitlements are usually last in line after wages and business debts—they're certainly well behind secured debts—with ASIC data showing that, in 2022-23, 15 per cent of insolvency cases involved unpaid wages but 45 per cent of cases involved unpaid superannuation.

Just this week the Herald Sun reported that 200 workers for a disability provider will be missing out on their unpaid super following the company's collapse. It is reported that 174 staff are due a total of $264,000 in unpaid superannuation contributions, with the company having 74 unsecured creditors owed $330,000 and a net bank balance of $3,000. While unpaid wages, along with leave and redundancy pay, can be claimed under the Fair Entitlements Guarantee—the Australian government's compensation scheme of last resort—in cases where there's a business insolvency, the Fair Entitlements Guarantee does not at present cover superannuation. I think that it really should so that, in cases such as this, workers will be looked after by the FEG in terms of their superannuation entitlements. It sends a very clear message that superannuation is as important as wages.

I call on the government to take that next step and to consider amending the Fair Entitlements Guarantee to include superannuation guarantee contributions aligned with the ability to claim unpaid wages. I understand how businesses can get behind. Wages and super are some of the largest expenses that businesses experience. But we need to ensure that workers receive the entitlements they are absolutely entitled to have. This is part of their salary and it must be paid, and that is the long and short of it.

I want this bill to succeed in order to prevent more of my constituents being blindsided by unpaid superannuation. Often it's a year or so before they realise that they're not getting paid superannuation—just like my constituent, Katherine. I don't want to hear from more employees who are struggling, particularly those who haven't been able to find other work and are still in that workplace, having to have those very difficult conversations with their employers about why their superannuation hasn't been paid. I commend the bill to the House.

The House of Representatives transcript was published up to 12:02 . The remainder of the transcript will be published progressively as it is completed.

The DEPUTY SPEAKER ( Ms Lawrence ) took the chair at 09:30.