Labor taunts Government to bring on a poll over retirement savings for the rich and cuts to welfare

CHRIS Bowen has taken Tony Abbott’s bait and wants to fight head on about superannuation.

Shadow Treasurer Chris Bowen addresses the National Press Club in Canberra today. Picture: Ray Strange. Trans.Ref. PD467370

LABOR today tossed down the gauntlet for a 2016 election campaign fought over cushy tax perks on the superannuation accounts of the rich.

“Bring it on,” said Shadow treasurer Chris Bowen at the National Press Club in Canberra in his Budget reply address.

“Labor is always delighted to fight an election on superannuation, one of our proudest creations.”

A Labor proposal to end tax concessions for big superannuation savings — depicted as mechanisms for tax minimisation rather than to push retirement savings to practical levels — has been attacked by the Government.

The changes would remove the tax-free status and levy 15 per cent on annual account earnings over $75,000, and reduce the income threshold for the 30 per cent tax rate from $300,000 to $250,000.

Prime Minister Tony Abbott today branded it as “one of the fundamental differences between the Coalition and the Labor Party”.

“We respect people’s savings. We don’t think that superannuation is government money, we think it’s your money,” said Mr Abbott.

“(Opposition Leader) Bill Shorten wants to tax your super to fill his $58.6 billion budget black hole. He regards your super as his piggy bank to break open whenever he needs money and I just think that’s dead wrong.”

However, Labor argues the removal of the tax concessions on multi-million dollar accounts was a better way to cut spending than reductions to welfare and family payments. And it points to Treasury forecasts showing the foregone revenue from the tax concessions will outgrow the cost of the age pension in just over four years.

And Mr Bowen accused Tony Abbott of hypocrisy as he had already touched superannuation by removing retirement savings assistance for low income earners and freezing the superannuation guarantee level at 9.5 per cent.

“I am quite sure that when the superannuation guarantee is next due to rise, he will find an excuse to stop that happening as well,” said Mr Bowen.

“As a backbencher, Tony Abbott called superannuation a con-job. In his book Battlelines, Tony Abbott proposed ending superannuation tax concessions all together!

“He specifically said: ‘It could be simpler and fairer for the revenue provided in superannuation concessions to be provided as a pension instead’.

“He suggested that superannuation concessions be abolished and the money be used to also abolish the assets test on the age pension.

“The irony is acute. Now he wants us to believe he will never touch superannuation concessions as he argues for a tougher assets test.”

Mr Bowen said Labor would back at least five Budget measures:

• The change to taxation of holders of working holiday visa holders;

• The abolition of the large family bonus;

• The removal of the zone tax offset for fly-in fly out workers;

• Changes to work-related car expense deduction methods;

• The implementation of the “No Jab, No pay” policy.

He expanded on the Opposition’s proposals for teaching courses aimed at boosting the workforce in areas of new technology.

And he proposed a board to decide assistance for entrepreneurs, saying Australia punts more on one Tuesday in November on a horse race than we invest all year in innovative new start-up businesses.

Mr Bowen said: “This is all about jobs.”

“It’s why I want a Treasurers Entrepreneurs Council, it’s why we want greater investments in education and a focus on preparing the next generation for the wave of change that’s approaching our nation,” he said.

“This can’t be an afterthought or a passing thought — it must dominate our thoughts about policy and investment.

“What we have announced so far in the field of entrepreneurialism and innovation is just the start. It remains a focus for us in our policy development. “

Originally published as Labor taunts Government to bring on a poll over retirement savings for the rich and cuts to welfare