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

Whilst I agree with many of Senator Hume's comments this morning on the drivers of the gender pay gap and the need to tackle this 'intractable' or 'hideous' problem in our community, this bill, the Superannuation Legislation Amendment (Tackling the Gender Super Gap) Bill 2025, is not the answer. Tackling economic inequity is core business for this government, and of course closing the gender pay gap is part of this because women must have economic security to enable them to retire with dignity.

But the Albanese government is doing much, much more to address the gender pay gap than simply putting superannuation on paid parental leave, as was identified by Senator Hume. Whilst the Albanese government are legislating to pay super on paid parental leave, we are also legislating to expand the low-income superannuation tax offset, which will benefit 3.1 million people, and 60 per cent of those are women. That is why we are legislating to oblige employers to pay super on payday instead of six months later. The government introduced the legislation to deliver on payday super, which will particularly benefit women, who are overrepresented in lower paid, casual and insecure work and are likely to miss out when super is paid less frequently.

There have also been improvements in other key drivers of the gender superannuation gap. The gender super pay gap, which Senator Hume pointed out, has reduced from 22.8 per cent in 2021-22 to 21.1 per cent in 2023-24. Improving the gender super pay gap provides better outcomes for women both in their working life and in retirement. The Labor government is working at every point across a woman's life to make sure she is earning more and keeping more of what she earns across her lifetime. We want women to earn more and retire with more—because your retirement savings are a reflection of your lifetime's earnings.

We are investing in increased wages in our critical aged-care and early childhood sectors, where women predominate. We have consistently supported increases to the minimum wage, where women predominate. We are delivering tax breaks for every taxpayer, and this is working. Under Labor, women are earning $255.10 more a year on average now than when Labor came to power. That is addressing the gender pay gap, which is addressing the gender pay gap in superannuation. The gender pay gap is 11.5 per cent, the lowest on record, compared to 14.1 per cent when we came to government, and women's workforce participation is at an all-time high.

The Liberal Party has form on attacking super, so let's not be hoodwinked by this legislation. Their answer to many things is to raid your super, and one of their election policies was to attack super on paid parental leave—to support that contribution being cashed out instead of being preserved for retirement. That is why the Albanese government will not be supporting this bill. We are taking many, many actions to address the super pay gap because we are addressing issues to close gender inequity at its core. If we are serious about closing the gender pay gap, then that is what we need to focus on, and that is what we are focused on. All of this is part of our comprehensive plan to tackle gender inequality across a woman's lifetime.

This bill might nominally put a few more dollars in the pockets of a handful of women, but it would do nothing to change the factors that drive the gender inequity at the heart of the issue. The bill is nothing more than locking the stable door when the horse has well and truly bolted. It proposes allowing a person to top up their spouse's super balance in the name of fairness. Senator Hume used an example of a couple where person A has a $5.5 million balance in their fund and person B has $500,000. I think we can reasonably assume that person A is a man and person B is a woman, given that the title of this bill is 'tackling the gender super pay gap'. The bill would allow person A to gift the modest sum of $1.5 million from their fund to their spouse's fund. I've got one thing to say about that. A man is not a financial plan. Allowing a man to gift or to roll over $1.5 million to his wife right before retirement doesn't erase the fact that he earned a whopping $5 million more than she did in superannuation over the course of their careers. It means that, after spending her entire working life reliant on a husband, she will spend her retirement relying on him too.

Loosening the rules governing spouse rollovers and spouse contributions would provide the most benefit to a very small group of high-wealth and high-income individuals. It would allow these individuals access to more superannuation tax concessions, which would increase existing inequities in the income system in retirement. It would not benefit single people, including single older women, who are often the most disadvantaged and at risk of poverty in retirement. Allowing couples the scope to roll over existing super savings from the super fund with the higher balance to the fund with the lower balance to optimise tax treatment would also be a significant departure from the existing longstanding superannuation and tax system settings, which are generally based on an individual unit rather than a couple.

We know that the super gap happens in part because women more often take time away from work to raise children. This bill does not provide a solution to the motherhood penalty. It accepts it. It reinforces the idea that women's economic security is reliant on the goodwill of their husbands. I'll say it again: a man is not a financial plan. It feels positively archaic. It treats women like they're Charlotte Lucas in the 2005 adaptation of Pride and Prejudiceaged 27 with no money and no prospects, already a burden on their family and tired. Well, I'm tired. I'm tired of the sorts of approaches that those opposite have to superannuation, to women and to tackling gender inequality.

Giving men with super balances of $5.5 million the power to gift their wives a lump sum doesn't close the super gap. Our focus needs to be on accumulating and preserving the savings of workers today, as they are earned. The fact that we are talking about super balances of $5.5 million also sets off alarm bells in my head because these are not the people most impacted by the super gap. Most people don't get close to these amounts. In 2022-23 only 103,000 people had a super balance of $2 million or more. That is not the vast majority of women in our country. This bill might even the score between a small number of couples, but it would also allow them to partake in financial planning which also allows them to minimise their tax bill. A bill that makes it easier for wealthy couples to optimise their tax arrangements and game preservation rules just sounds like another way for the rich to get richer.

A bill that empowers the generationally wealthy cannot seriously be discussed as one that reduces gendered economic inequality. It would do nothing to benefit the older single women who are at the highest risk of poverty in retirement. That is why the government does not support this bill—because it is more about giving the wealthy a leg-up than it is about striking gender inequity at its roots and because we know that a man is never, ever a financial plan.