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Test driving policy
The Australian Labor Party (ALP) signalled it would be using feedback from the Conference of Major Superannuation Funds (CMSF) on the Gold Coast to test drive the policies it intends to take to the next federal election.
The announcement suggested the ALP was still at least six-to-nine months away from releasing firm new policy with respect to superannuation.
Federal Opposition Leader Kim Beazley used his address opening the conference to outline the six key elements making up the ALP’s broad approach, and to announce that his two front-benchers dealing with financial services and retirement incomes, Senators Nick Sherry and Penny Wong, would be putting a discussion paper to delegates.
He said the ALP would then listen to feedback from delegates before finally developing its policy.
However, the six key elements Beazley said would form the foundation of the ALP’s policy did not enlarge significantly on those already announced by the ALP — the automatic consolidation of superannuation accounts, the institution of retirement income forecasts and payroll payment facilitation.
The Opposition Leader did concede the ALP would be retaining the Government’s co-contribution and contribution splitting arrangements.
The Federal Government almost immediately attacked the ALP’s position, with the Assistant Treasurer, Peter Dutton, describing the ALP’s policy prescription as being a “reheating” of ideas previously announced by former Federal Opposition Leader Mark Latham.
“Rather than generating new ideas, Labor has dug up Mark Latham’s old election policy announcements and repackaged them with the standard Kim Beazley waffle,” Dutton claimed. “It’s nothing but a reheated announcement from a reheated Labor leader.”
The Assistant Treasurer claimed the major planks of the ALP’s policy prescription would be costly to implement and in a number of instances were already being addressed by the Government.
Despite the Government’s attack on the Labor policy pronouncement, the strategy was welcomed by the Investment and Financial Services Association, with chief executive Richard Gilbert particularly supportive of Labor’s commitment to the co-contribution regime and contribution splitting.
He said Beazley’s announcement represented a firm statement that financial security in retirement was a priority, and that Labor acknowledged sound policy principles were necessary as Australia faced its demographic date with destiny.
AUTHOR
Mike Taylor
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