Sally Sitou (Reid, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

My question is to the Treasurer. How will the Albanese Labor government's new legislation make Australia's superannuation system fairer and more sustainable? How does this compare to other approaches?

Jim Chalmers (Rankin, Australian Labor Party, Treasurer) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I thank the member for Reid for her question but also for the really important role that she has played in ensuring that thousands of workers in her community will get more superannuation because of this government. That's because our plan to make superannuation fairer from top to bottom is now law. It passed the Senate last night. Super is a force for good in our economy. It's an important source of security for the working people of this country, and last night this government made it stronger and fairer. Already we've delivered the 12 per cent super guarantee, and we're now paying it on paid parental leave. And now we're delivering more super for people with the lowest balances and more sustainable tax breaks for people with the biggest balances.

This is an important economic reform with an intergenerational dividend. It means 1.3 million Australians will have more super because of our boost to the low-income super tax offset. It means more super for 100,000 sales assistants, more super for 50,000 aged-care workers, more super for 7½ thousand workers in Hume, more super for 7,000 workers in Goldstein, more super for 7½ thousand workers in Gippsland and more super for 8½ thousand workers in New England. These workers are getting more super despite their local member and not because of him. That's because the Liberals, Nationals and One Nation all voted for less super for workers, bigger tax breaks for the wealthiest Australians and bigger deficits. All three right-wing parties in this place do what the billionaires tell them to do, not what working people need them to do—and we saw that in the Senate again last night.

Superannuation is not safe under those opposite. The new Leader of the Nationals, just last year—

Tony Pasin (Barker, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister Assisting for Fisheries and Forestry) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

We're living rent free in your head.

Milton Dick (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Order! The member for Barker is warned.

Jim Chalmers (Rankin, Australian Labor Party, Treasurer) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

spoke about taking the super guarantee back down from 12 to nine per cent. The shadow treasurer wrote about dismantling compulsory super for lower and middle-income earners. This Labor government is delivering more super and more sustainable tax breaks. They are the same old Liberals—peddling their extreme right-wing ideology, hacking at wages and hacking at retirement incomes of the working people of this country—and now with a shadow treasurer who wants to dismantle super, privatise Medicare, end work from home and ditch the dual mandate that asks the RBA to consider its impact on employment. This side of the House is proud of superannuation. We built the thing. We are doing more than protect it from those opposite; we are making it stronger, we are making it fairer and that's what the new laws deliver.