Lisa Darmanin (Victoria, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

It's my pleasure to continue my remarks from earlier today in this debate. Those opposite in the coalition want to delay payday super. They say that it's too much too soon and that it will overwhelm business. Well, in a contemporary payroll environment, that argument does not withstand scrutiny. Payroll software is automated, digital reporting is routine and businesses already run payroll cycles weekly or fortnightly. The idea that contributing to a worker's retirement savings with the same regularity as their wages is somehow an unreasonable ask belongs to another era. The longer we wait, the more workers will miss out and the harder it will be to recover unpaid superannuation for them.

This is also a matter of intergenerational fairness. Every delayed contribution widens inequality between generations, entrenches disadvantage and undermines confidence in our system. Payday super addresses this directly, ensuring that younger Australians receive the value they have earned over the entirety of their careers. Superannuation is fundamentally workers' money. It is not employers' cash flow, and it is not optional. When it is unpaid, workers lose not just wages but future security. Payday super fixes that. It ensures accountability, protects workers, rewards honest employers and strengthens trust in the system.

Those opposite have a very long record of opposing superannuation reform not on the basis of economics but on the basis of ideology. They opposed its introduction, they delayed the increase of the super guarantee to 12 per cent and they proposed allowing people to raid their retirement savings for short-term problems, undermining long-term security. Let's not forget the dark chapter of superannuation management under the Morrison government during the COVID-19 pandemic. We saw Australians being encouraged to raid their super early to the tune of $20,000, leaving a gaping hole in their future retirement savings. In total, $36 billion was withdrawn from the system then. Over 700,000 Australians effectively depleted their super accounts, and 70 per cent of those people were under 30. It was a shocking case of kicking the can down the road. We will not even begin to see the impact of that decision until 2050. Twenty-five years of compounding interest went down the drain. For early career workers, the impact of that $20,000 cashout will be far greater than the lump sum withdrawn.

In closing, those opposite have consistently treated superannuation as something optional, something secondary, something disposable. Workers deserve better than ideological objections. They deserve policy that is rooted in fairness and facts. Our retirement income is internationally respected. It stands alongside Medicare and universal education as a defining pillar of Australian social policy. But no pillar stands forever if it is not protected and built on. Payday super will improve retirement balances particularly for women, carers, part-time workers, young people and workers in fragmented industries. It will create accountability where there has been ambiguity. Dignity in retirement begins with every pay slip linked contribution every fortnight. What you earn now grows for tomorrow. This is a long-awaited reform. Workers have asked for it, regulators have recommended it, economists have modelled it and now the parliament has the opportunity to deliver it.