Govt protecting industry funds, says Opposition

The Federal Opposition has accused the Government of choosing to ignore the elements of the Cooper Review that would have disadvantaged industry superannuation funds and the way they operated.

The Opposition spokesman on Financial Services, Senator Mathias Cormann (pictured), raised the Government’s failure to endorse the recommendation that would have prevented superannuation fund directors sitting on multiple boards.

He also referenced the Government’s intention to do nothing about default funds via the implementation of MySuper until 2013.

The Federal Opposition’s spokesman’s reference to multiple directorships aims directly at industry funds where certain figures sit on the Trustee boards of both major funds and bodies over-arching those funds.

He said the Federal Opposition was concerned the Government seemed to have either opposed or ignored many of the recommendations to strengthen superannuation governance arrangements.

“Why would the Government not support a recommendation to require independent directors on superannuation boards?” he asked. “Why would the Government not support recommendations which say that directors should only sit on one board and not multiple boards, which goes to the issue of conflict of interest.

Cormann said the answer to the questions was that the Assistant Treasurer, Bill Shorten, had let his union bias get in the way of public interest.

Cormann made clear that the Federal Opposition would not be simply rubber-stamping the Government’s approach to the Cooper Review recommendations and would be urging reconsideration of the governance arrangements and the need for better competition in the default superannuation market.