The Coalition has entered the political fray over superannuation, re-litigating the argument that the retirement savings scheme should be used to help people buy a home — but has stopped short of announcing any policies.
Shadow Housing Minister Andrew Bragg will give a speech later today where he is expected to float ideas about how super could be used to boost home ownership ahead of retirement.
"We don't want to become a nation where renting in retirement becomes mandatory," Senator Bragg told ABC News Radio on Tuesday. "We want to have a country where people can live in their own house … if their superannuation can help them do that, then we should look at that."
Senator Bragg said multiple options had been canvassed by the Coalition, including using super as collateral for a loan, or withdrawing a lump sum for a house deposit. But he said he was not advocating for any particular solutions for now, ahead of his speech at the Financial Services Council.
"You could keep the money in the system and it could operate as a collateral or an offset," he told ABC News Radio. "You could take it out to pay off a mortgage or to pull together a first home loan."
While stressing that the Coalition had not settled on its formal policy, Senator Bragg insisted there was a need to look at different ways super could be used to help people buy their first home. "I think most people would want their well-paid politicians to be pushing out the boat on some ideas that might be able to help them achieve their goal of home ownership," he said.
The Coalition's policy at the last two elections was to allow people to withdraw $50,000 from their super to put towards a house deposit. Senator Bragg did not say if the opposition would keep that policy, but admitted a "credible critique" was that it was more likely for people in their mid to late 30s who would have accrued that amount, and therefore the policy would not have significantly helped younger people.
Superannuation has become a political flashpoint in recent weeks, with One Nation releasing a policy that would allow people to divert funds from their super to pay their rent or mortgage. That policy would permit people to keep 3 per cent of their salary that would otherwise go to super for a three-year period — which would be $2,300 per year (or $44 per week) for a person on a $90,500 salary.
Some critics have said the measure could be inflationary in the short term and would impact the compound-interest growth of super savings in the long term.
Labor slammed the One Nation policy and has declared the next election will be a "referendum" on superannuation — a key creation of the Labor Keating government in the 1990s.
Under the government's first home super saver scheme, people can make voluntary contributions to their super, allow it to accrue interest, and later withdraw up to $50,000 of that money as part of a home deposit.