Gary Humphries (ACT, Liberal Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Defence Materiel) Share this | Hansard source

asked the Minister for Finance and Deregulation, upon notice, on 16 November 2010:

Given the advice provided by the department's 'Red Book' to the Minister that the 'current unfunded liability' for Commonwealth and military superannuation is $127 billion:

(1) Can an explanation be provided and substantiated as to how this figure was derived when the Future Fund Actuary estimated the liability to be $96.3 billion for the 2009-10 financial year, and the department itself was quoted on page 34 of the Matthews Review report (Review of pension indexation arrangements in Australian Government civilian and military superannuation schemes, by Mr Trevor Matthews, dated December 2008) to have estimated the figure to be $100.3 billion as of 30 June 2008.

(2) Is it not standard practice to quote unfunded liability figures as a discount value in the current year and not in nominal terms unless otherwise specified.

(3) In the department's submission to the Matthews Review, the department estimated the unfunded liability (in nominal terms) would be $147 billion by 2020 (page 19), but the latest 'Red Book' suggested that the figure is $168 billion; what has significantly changed that would account for a $21 billion increase.