Treasurer aims to give people 'a long lead time', but Tony Abbott rules out changes to superannuation in his first term

This article is more than 6 years old

This article is more than 6 years old

Joe Hockey has called for a national conversation on increasing the age at which people can have access to their superannuation.

Speaking on the ABC’s Q&A program on Monday night, the treasurer said there needed to be a national conversation on retirement savings and the “preservation age”, which is currently 55 for people born before June 1960 and rises incrementally to 60 for people born after June 1964.

"It is on my mind, and it's on Tony Abbott's mind," Hockey said.

"...I suspect it will be in this term, because I think what we're trying to do is give people a long lead time.”

Hockey said plans to increase the pension age to 70 by 2035 were an example of the government giving a “long lead time”.

Asked in Sydney on Tuesday for his personal view on when people should be able to access their superannuation, Hockey replied: “My personal view doesn’t matter on this particular point, what matters is policy and government and I say again, we’re not changing super in this term of government, we’ve said it before, we’ll say it again.”

He added: “Any suggestion there’s this new wave of policy reform in superannuation is wrong.”

On Monday night, Hockey said plans to increase the pension age to 70 by 2035 were an example of the government giving a “long lead time”.

Speaking at Parliament House on Tuesday, the prime minister, Tony Abbott, ruled out any changes to superannuation this term of parliament.



"We are simply keeping our commitments when it comes to superannuation … we went into the election saying ... we weren’t proposing to make any changes to superannuation in this term of parliament … a period of stability when it comes to superannuation is right and proper and there won’t be any changes in this term of parliament," he said.

The opposition leader, Bill Shorten, said Hockey, "in a breathtaking act of arrogance", was contemplating making people wait longer to access their own money.

"Get your hands off people's superannuation," Shorten said.

Hockey also conceded the $7 co-payment to visit a GP could be called a tax but denied admitting it was a tax previously.



“Given that, of the $7, $2 goes to the doctor, I didn't know doctors in that situation are receiving taxes, but your call,” he said.

“You want to call it a tax, you can call it anything you want, you can call it a rabbit, I don't mind.”

Hockey repeated his defence of the government against accusations it had broken pre-election commitments not to introduce new taxes.

“That's absurd because we went to the last election promising to introduce a levy for the paid parental leave scheme. We said emphatically that the taxes would be lower under us than they are under Labor and if you have a look at the budget papers it actually shows that the taxes are lower under us than if Labor were re-elected,” he said.

Hockey was taken to task by one audience member who said he should have cut more in the budget. The treasurer said he thought the government had cut enough in an attempt to reduce spending which ballooned during the global financial crisis.

“What we've done is we've said, right, we want the economy to grow as fast as it can over the next two to three years. If we cut hard, government expenditure over the next two to three years, it will have negative impact on the economy and we want this to be a growth budget,” he said.

Hockey said the government had been “upfront” with the Australian people before the last election and criticised the Labor party for proposing to block many of the government’s measures.

However, he stopped short of saying the government would go to a double dissolution election.

“I am frustrated with the behaviour of the opposition. I suppose they would say they were frustrated with us when we were in opposition, but Labor is opposing $5bn of the savings and cuts they took to the last election,” he said.

Hockey said Labor opposing cuts now would only make the pain greater in the future.

When asked if the government would go to a double dissolution Hockey replied: “We don’t want to go to a double dissolution, we’ve only just been elected. We’ve been in 12 months.”









