Mr Abbott warned Australians, via Parliament, that compulsory super was a bad policy. "Compulsory superannuation is one of the biggest con jobs ever foisted by government on the Australian people..." Mr Abbott said on September 25, 1995. "The basic objective of compulsory superannuation is that the government is taking our money now so that it does not have to pay us a pension when we retire. "The government is making us worse off now so that it will be better off in the future." Almost 20 years on – to the month – the Abbott government struck a deal with the Palmer United Party last week to freeze compulsory super contributions at 9.5 per cent for seven years.

Prime Minister Abbott said the controversial decision to freeze compulsory super contributions would help to ease pressure on the budget and therefore make the budget better off in the future. It seems 19 years on, one voter remembered Abbott's statement almost word for word to the surprise of a couple of members of the political class. On the ABC'sQ&A program on Monday night an audience member, Thomas Clark, reminded the show's panellists of Mr Abbott's past position. He said Mr Abbott had once called superannuation "the biggest con job ever done by the government on the Australian people" and he thought the statement was made in 1995. "Is that still a view held by the caucus [sic] at the moment?" Mr Clark wondered.

Host Tony Jones quashed the statement because he couldn't remember Mr Abbott making it, and Liberal senator Concetta Fierravanti-Wells also said she wasn't aware of Mr Abbott saying so. But here's the full Hansard. "Compulsory superannuation is one of the biggest con jobs ever foisted by government on the Australian people. If the Prime Minister (Mr Keating) was a private businessman, chances are that he would be before the courts for false and misleading advertising. "The basic objective of compulsory superannuation is that the government is taking our money now so that it does not have to pay us a pension when we retire. The government is making us worse off now so that it will be better off in the future. "Over the last six months, the employer of a constituent of mine has paid $993 into his compulsory superannuation fund. The fund charged $28 in administration, bookkeeping fees, et cetera, and earned $38 in interest. My constituent should have been $10 better off. However, the government has charged $208 in contributions tax so that my constituent is actually $198 worse off over the last six months.