Page 3017 - Week 10 - Wednesday, 14 August 2013
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their own needs in retirement and not be a burden on the public purse by simply having to rely on age pensions.
We as a federal party have long been on the record as saying that in government we would revisit concessional contribution caps and co-contribution benefits for low income earners as soon as the budget is in a strong enough position to afford it, because we have also seen over the last six years the running down of the budget by federal Labor. This, of course, impacts on local residents and, in particular, local self-funded retirees.
The federal Liberal Party have said they would release a policy on how best to encourage increased super savings by Australians in an appropriately targeted and fiscally sustainable way closer to the election. The fiscally responsible time for us to make the final judgement on this is when we know the true position of the budget. The secretaries of Treasury and finance released the PEFO yesterday, so I look forward to seeing that policy. I know a lot of self-funded superannuants in the ACT are looking forward to that policy, because they know that under the Rudd-Gillard years their savings have been eroded. They have seen their cost of living increase, and many of them find themselves very much constrained in what they are able to do.
For those who do not know, since Kevin Rudd was elected Prime Minister in 2007 the cost of living has soared. Over the past five years under Labor we have seen across the nation, as an average, increases in electricity prices by 94 per cent, gas prices by 62 per cent, water and sewerage rates by 63 per cent, the cost of medical and hospital services by 41 per cent, the amount of rent people are paying by 30 per cent, the cost of insurance by 45 per cent, and public transport fares by 24 per cent. That is an outstanding effort by a government to cripple people with the cost of living.
It is important that we make sure we constantly assess the impact on people. That is why this motion brought forward by Mr Doszpot today is very important. It is a shame members opposite will not support it. They worked their way out of it, and it was interesting. I do not think Mr Rattenbury mentioned self-funded retirees in his speech. I do not think he mentioned them at all. As for Mr Barr, saying things like, “It is not fair to make such statements,” well, that is a stunning bit of repartee. Mr Barr recites a list of things they may or may not have done and then attacks Mr Doszpot for inaccuracies and uninformed opinion. That is very strong debating technique!
Federal Labor cannot be trusted on super, just as local Labor cannot be trusted on their promises about rates not tripling. Both local and federal Labor are having a huge detrimental impact on self-funded superannuants in the ACT. Over the past five years at the federal level Labor has increased taxes on super by more than $8 billion, predominantly targeting low and middle income earners, despite a pre-election promise of no change to super. Another broken promise from federal Labor. Those charges included a $3.3 billion Labor cut to super co-contribution benefits for low income earners, reducing the co-contribution benefit from $1,500 down to $500. And after promising never to tax super payments for the over-60s, Labor is now proposing such a tax, albeit through the back door.
After promising to re-increase concessional caps to $50,000, they are now proposing to increase them only to $35,000. The increased Labor taxes on super announced on
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