Yahoo Finance ‘Little b*tchy Liberals’: Keating fires up over superannuation calls
Former Prime Minister and the man dubbed the father of superannuation, Paul Keating, has blasted Liberal politicians over moves to pause the scheduled increase to superannuation.
Superannuation payments are scheduled to increase from a minimum 9.5 per cent to 10 per cent as of July 2021, and hit 12 per cent by 2025. However, several Liberal MPs have called for the superannuation increase to be paused, arguing the increase is unaffordable in the midst of a recession.
Speaking to the ABC on Thursday, Keating noted that politicians receive 15.6 per cent in superannuation payments and described it as “mean” to fail to boost working Australians’ payments.
“All this was said to me in 1992, ‘Oh if you put the superannuation guarantee on, you know you’ll just lift the cost of wages’,” Keating said.
“You know, you could hear all the small business organisations out with a handkerchief out crying.”
Senators Andrew Bragg and Tim Wilson have both called for the increase to be scrapped, while Prime Minister Scott Morrison has also said the increase may not go ahead.
"Prior to the election it was certainly my view that those were legislated changes and we had no plans to change any of those," Morrison said.
"Covid-19 has occurred, people's jobs are at risk."
Treasurer Josh Frydenberg earlier this week said he is “considering” the scheduled increase, while Assistant Minister for Superannuation Jane Hume has described herself as “ambivalent” about the increase, and said there is a trade-off between higher super and wage growth.
The Grattan Institute has also warned an increase to the superannuation would come at the cost of wage increases, with the Reserve Bank of Australia and the Australian Council of Social Services also expressing similar concerns.
However, Keating said that as wage growth stalls, increasing super could be the only way to deliver a pay rise.
He said that rather than pausing the super increase, the government should invest in infrastructure and aged care and noted Wednesday’s national accounts figures revealed that, for the first time since September 1959, the share of national income going directly to wage earners had fallen below 50 per cent.
“We’ve seen a huge increase in the profit share in the economy, and a longtime decline in the labour share of the economy, now what we’re talking about here is 2.5 per cent, 0.5 per cent a year,” he said.
In this economy, Keating said all Australians and businesses need to be pulling together.
“Instead of that, what have we got, a bunch of little b*tchy Liberals trying to knock off 2.5 per cent of people’s income for the rest of their lives,” he said.
Fellow former Labor Prime Minister Kevin Rudd earlier this week also pressured Morrison to stick to the schedule.
“This is a cruel assault by Morrison on the retirement income of working Australians, and using the cover of COVID to try and get away with it,” Rudd said.
“That is the biggest bullsh*t argument I have ever heard against going ahead with decent provisions for people's superannuation savings for the future.”
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