New SMSF body established

A new association has been formed to represent the interests of the owners of self-managed superannuation funds (SMSFs).

The new body, the Self-Managed Superannuation Member’s Association, was formed by a group of Canberra-based individuals each operating their own SMSF.

According to the new association, its aims are to liaise with and lobby governments and their agencies to ensure the interests of members are understood and considered, to facilitate an element of ‘self-regulation’ in the SMSF sector and to work with the regulator to increase compliance standards and ensure SMSFs receive fair and reasonable treatment in all aspects of superannuation, taxation, social security and other relevant legislation and regulation.

The president of the new association, Peter Bishell, said it was predicated on the belief that SMSF members and trustees needed to get themselves organised to ensure their voice is heard when Treasury and other government bodies are contemplating changes to law and regulations that impact SMSFs.

“The recent report by the Commonwealth Auditor General on the ATO’s [Australian Taxation Office’s] supervision of SMSFs, the implementation of the ‘trustee declaration’ and the changes to the simplified superannuation system rushed through on June 29, 2007, give trustees of SMSFs cause for concern,” he said.

“The audit report encouraged the ATO to ensure that it recovered all necessary costs in regulating SMSFs from the funds. The trustee declaration shows that the ATO is targeting fund trustees in their compliance activities and the changes to certain simplified super regulations mean that some aspects of the new law now only apply to SMSFs. Industry funds and retail funds offered by fund managers have been exempted from certain provisions.”