Jane Hume (Victoria, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I move:

That this bill be now read a second time.

I seek leave to table an explanatory memorandum relating to the bill.

Leave granted.

I table an explanatory memorandum, and I seek leave to have the second reading speech incorporated in Hansard.

Leave granted.

The speech read as follows—

The Tackling the Gender Super Gap Bill goes to the heart of fairness, equity and recognition of the sacrifices made within Australian families. It represents a step towards ensuring that every Australian can look forward to a dignified and secure retirement, especially women.

This Bill amends superannuation legislation to give spouses the option to split their collective superannuation balances evenly between them. The partner with the higher superannuation balance will be able to roll over an amount from their fund to their spouse's super fund, to make the two funds more even.

Financial security in retirement should reflect a lifetime of shared contributions, not just paid employment. This Bill is a proactive measure designed to tackle one of the most persistent and unfair challenges in our superannuation system: the gender super gap.

While estimates vary, women retire with significantly lower super balances than men, between 20-25% lower. Why? It's rarely the result of personal choice, but rather it stems from deep-seated structural realities in our society.

According to the Workplace Gender Equality Agency, one-third of the gender pay gap can be attributed to time spent caring for family and interruptions in full-time employment. Women are more likely to take time out of the paid workforce to care for children, to care for elderly parents, and to shoulder unpaid responsibilities that keep families, and indeed our economy, running.

When one partner, typically the mother, takes time away from work to raise children, her superannuation savings often halt for years, even decades, while her partner's continues to grow. This is the 'motherhood penalty' in action, leaving women financially vulnerable in their later years.

As the Prime Minister himself has acknowledged, "No mother should be penalised for taking time away from work to do the most important job there is".

And let's be honest: those decisions, those sacrifices, benefit both partners in a relationship.

They are not individual choices, they are family choices. So why should the financial security that comes at the end of life reflect only one person's income, rather than the partnership that made that life possible?

This Bill creates a simple and voluntary mechanism for fairness, making it possible for couples to split their superannuation balances evenly.

The person with the larger balance can add to the super fund balance of their spouse using money already in their super, rather than through making additional contributions from outside of super, so that they can both enter retirement on an equal footing.

It's important to understand that this bill is splitting super balances—not super contributions.

There is a mechanism already exists to make contributions on behalf of a spouse, however, its take-up is astonishingly low, with only 1.1% of Australians using it in 2021-22. Why? Because the process is clunky, complex, eligibility is very limited, there's a lack of awareness, and critically, there are no real incentives for most people to use it.

Splitting balances—using a roll over from one fund to another—is a genuine structural change that will directly tackle the gender super gap, one of the most systemic structural failures of the superannuation system.

And it uses existing mechanisms to do so.

Already in Australia, equitable splitting of superannuation is considered in divorce proceedings. This used to require a court order, but that is no longer the case. There are now standard forms and recognised tax treatments of a rollover amount from the super account of one partner to another at the end of a relationship.

So why not allow it to occur during the relationship? Why not make this proactive, voluntary planning a simple and accessible part of the whole system from the outset, allowing couples to make these decisions for themselves?

Let me be clear—this bill doesn't force anyone to do anything. It simply gives families the option to share what they've built together, in recognition of unpaid labour, broken work patterns and professional sacrifices that so often falls to women.

This Bill explicitly recognises the economic partnership at the heart of most families. It empowers couples to plan for retirement together, allowing a more even distribution of superannuation during the accumulation phase.

To maintain integrity in the superannuation system, this Bill includes guardrails and limitations on how this mechanism can be used.

First, the amount transferred from one spouse to another is not considered to be a contribution, rather is treated as an amount "rolled over". This distinction is important to ensure that the amount transferred between spouses does not attract or avoid any additional taxes.

Second, the amount rolled over from one spouse to another retains its original characteristics; specifically it retains the original fund's proportion of concessional and non concessional components. This is an important guardrail because it means that when someone dies the money transferred doesn't have additional tax benefits for beneficiaries.

Third, the ability to roll over an amount from one spouse to another is not available to those transferring from or to a defined benefit scheme.

Fourth, the ability to roll over from one spouse to another is not available to those already in a pension or drawdown phase. Both spouse's funds must be in accumulation phase.

Fifth, the mechanism can only be used by individuals who have only one superannuation account. This is an important integrity measure to avoid potential unintended consequences for persons that have multiple funds.

Sixth, the amount that can be rolled over from one spouse to another is limited in two ways:

(1) The amount rolled over cannot leave the original fund with a lower balance than the receiving fund, and;

(2) The amount rolled over cannot cause the receiving fund to have balance higher than the transfer balance cap

For example, if Person A has $5.5million in their superannuation fund and Person B has $500K, Person A can roll over up to $1.5million to Person B, bringing Person B's balance up to $2.0million (which is the general transfer balance cap for the current financial year).

Alternatively, if Person A has $2million in their superannuation fund and Person B has $500K, Person A can roll over up to $750K to Person B, bringing both balances to $1.25million.

The limits on the amount that can be rolled over from one spouse to another are a ceiling, not a floor. Spouses may choose, for whatever reason, to roll over an amount that is lower than the spousal redistribution limit. If within the rules, a couple has the opportunity to make their balances equal, but it is entirely up to the couple how much they want to transfer between them.

For instance, a couple could choose to do a one off, single lump sum roll over, or alternatively take the opportunity to utilise the mechanism each year to make spousal redistribution roll overs of smaller amounts, or not do it at all.

This is all about choice; allowing couples to manage their collective retirement savings to reflect their collective choices throughout their lives.

The benefits of this reform are clear and far-reaching.

This Bill is about more than just superannuation, it's about closing the gender super gap.

Even though the gender pay gap on average weekly earnings has closed from 18.5% in 2014 to 11.5% in 2025, the gender retirement gap remains stubbornly wide.

Tax office data shows that the difference between average super balances of men and women over every age category, was 26% in 2014. In March 2025, Minister for Women Katy Gallagher reported that women still have 21.3% less super than men.

When you unpack the tax office data further, the gap is worse for older women approaching retirement.

This contributes to the alarming fact that women over 55 are the fastest-growing group experiencing homelessness in Australia. As members from both sides of this place have rightly observed, the relationship between lower retirement savings and homelessness for older women is direct and clear.

While the difference between men and women's super balances is lower for women in their 20's and 30's, between the ages of 40 and 64 the gap is most pronounced, averaging 23-24%. This gap has hardly changed over nearly a decade of data.

This inequality serves no-one and reflects the structural inequalities within our society.

Let me be clear: the goal here is not to penalise men or privilege women. It is about acknowledging the value of caregiving and ensuring that those who take on these vital responsibilities are not financially disadvantaged in retirement.

A more equitable superannuation system benefits not just women, but families, communities, and the economy as a whole. This is good for wives, good for husbands, good for families.

The gender super gap isn't going to close on its own. It requires deliberate, equitable policy interventions like the one set out in this Bill.

The changes to superannuation that have been proposed and contemplated by those opposite are only about how the government can get their hands on more Australians super.

But those sorts of changes do nothing to support the integrity of the system, it only risks it.

If Labor wants to do something for super, they should be looking at making the system fairer.

It is a well acknowledged fact that more work is needed to equalise super balances between men and women. Including just recently by Rebecca Pritchard, a Senior Financial Planner with Rising Tide, she said more changes were needed and that "A lot can be done on the gender side of things. The gender superannuation gap is still hideous".

This Bill is an opportunity for the Parliament to improve retirement outcomes for all Australians and help tackle the gender super gap.

Let's not accept a system that punishes women for caring for their children. Let's not allow inequality in retirement to be inevitable. We can change it, and why not do it now?

I urge this Parliament to support this Bill for a fairer, more dignified retirement for every Australian.

I commend the Bill to the Senate.

I seek leave to continue my remarks later.

Leave granted; debate adjourned.