Cooper hits at trails

Trailing commissions relating to superannuation products would be banned and super trustees would be obligated to manage the costs imposed on members under the MySuper proposals, which form a central element of the latest preliminary report issued by the Cooper Review.

The report, released today, builds on many of the private briefings and statements issued by the review chairman, Jeremy Cooper, over recent weeks.

Releasing the preliminary report today, Cooper said MySuper would be a simple, cost-effective product that redefined what Australians should be able to expect from their super in the 21st century.

He said some of the proposed features of MySuper included the ban on trailing commissions, the elimination of contribution fees, a new duty on trustees to manage the overall cost to members, a default post-retirement product and a trustee duty to focus entirely on looking after members.

The preliminary report is underpinned by research commissioned from Deloitte which Cooper claimed showed that if the MySuper proposals were introduced, some default fund members could expect to pay less than half what they are paying for their super now.

“The panel emphasises that, if the MySuper proposals were implemented, those Australians who elect to have a fund that offers more choices and options, or want to manage their own self-managed super fund, would be entirely free to do so,” Cooper said.

He said MySuper would be just one offering in the super landscape but he expected that MySuper features such as the ban on trailing commissions would be recommended to apply across the board.