It has now been 50 days since the Budget and Kim Beazley still refuses to back the Government’s superannuation reforms.
Yesterday at the Virgin Blue Small Business Summit Mr Beazley had an opportunity to back:
- Abolishing the end benefits tax for people aged 60 and over where their superannuation benefits are paid from a taxed fund;
- Extending the co-contribution scheme to the self employed;
- Allowing the self employed to claim a full deduction for their superannuation contributions; and
- Dramatic simplification of the superannuation system.
He was silent. Just as he has been silent every day for 50 days since the Government announced generational reforms to simplify and streamline superannuation.
Instead, he announced a massive new bureaucracy to administer superannuation payments which could lead to an increase in lost superannuation.
What will this massive new bureaucracy cost, and how will it be paid for? We don’t know. One source of funding would seem to be the workers’ superannuation money – another slug for those struggling to build up a retirement nest egg
Just as workers have a right to decide where their pay is banked, so too do they have a right to decide where there superannuation is invested. By adding in this new bureaucratic arrangement Labor is trying once again to thwart workers’ rights to manage their own money – it’s Super Choice “rollback” by stealth.
Every day that a worker’s superannuation money moulders inside Kim Beazley’s bureaucracy is a day that worker doesn’t receive interest – interest that adds up over a working life.
Labor’s clearing house will also wipe out the many private sector companies that are already providing this service to small businesses across the nation.