CANBERRA, ACT, Aug. 17 -- The Treasurer of Australia issued the following transcript:
Note
Subjects: superannuation, house prices
Jim Chalmers:
The stakes are high at the next election for a whole range of reasons and one of them now is the future of Australia's world‑leading compulsory superannuation system. Last week the Liberals, yesterday One Nation, and again this morning the Liberals via Jane Hume put the future of compulsory super in doubt.
If any coalition or combination of the Liberals, Nationals and One Nation win the next election, their policy and their ideology on super would absolutely decimate the economic security and retirement incomes of millions of Australian workers. They share a dangerous and divisive anti‑worker, anti‑super ideology and if this plays out after the next election, Australian workers will be much worse off.
The Liberals, the Nationals and One Nation would end compulsory superannuation as we know it. Jane Hume said this morning that compulsory super was up for grabs. Yesterday, One Nation said that they don't support a broken system of compulsory super. Last week, Andrew Bragg at the Press Club compared super for younger workers as akin to super for cats and dogs. Their dangerous anti‑worker, anti‑super agenda would leave millions of Australian workers worse off as a consequence.
Labor built Australia's superannuation system and we will defend it forever from the Liberals, Nationals and One Nation who want to destroy it. If they win the next election it will be the end of compulsory super as we know it, and Australian workers will be worse off as a consequence.
Journalist:
You don't see any room for flexibility in superannuation to help those in need, Treasurer?
Chalmers:
Well, there are already very well-considered and long‑established mechanisms for people in genuine hardship to access their super early, but for good reason, those arrangements are limited and those arrangements are very focused, and that has been the case for some time now.
Now, preservation in the superannuation system is the absolute key. You know, that's why we got super to 12percent. We're paying super on paid parental leave, we're boosting super for low income earners, we're paying super on payday, because compulsory super, and preservation is an important element of that, they are absolutely key to giving Australian workers the retirement incomes and economic security that they need and deserve after a lifetime of working.
Now, the Liberals, the Nationals and One Nation are all the same when it comes to coming after workers and superannuation, unfortunately, is just their latest attack on the wages and living standards of Australia's working people.
Journalist:
Can I ask one more before you go? New polling in, I think in the Sydney Morning Herald and Age this morning suggesting a significant majority of Australians support lower house prices, that must be pretty gratifying for you?
Chalmers:
Well, first of all, let me leave the poll commentary for others. We don't need an opinion poll to tell us that there are very substantial challenges in housing, and that's why we are taking politically‑difficult steps to address those challenges, which have locked out too many young Australians for too long. I also believe that when you go beyond the misinformation and disinformation and click bait and B‑grade partisan campaigns being run against the government's sensible tax reforms, Australians understand that there is a huge generational challenge in housing, and the tax system for too long has been part of the problem rather than part of the solution.
So, we have taken these difficult steps, these difficult decisions. We have chosen the hard road of reform rather than the easy path of least resistance, and that's because if we'd left this problem for some other generation to fix, then more and more Australians, and particularly young Australians, would be locked out of housing because of this combination of a tax system and a housing market which hasn't worked for people for too long.
So, we don't need an opinion poll to tell us that there are issues in housing. We're not targeting a particular price outcome or percentage outcome. Our goal here is to make sure that there are more affordable options for more people, particularly young people and first home buyers, in communities right around Australia. And that's what we're seeing. Thanks very much, everyone.
Disclaimer: Curated by HT Syndication.
