Ulterior motives driving super critics
People will continue to inappropriately use the Treasury's estimates on the cost of superannuation tax concessions to pursue their own agendas, according to SMSF Association chief executive, Andrea Slattery.
Slattery has told a Money Management roundtable that notwithstanding a clear statement by Treasury that the Tax Expenditure Statements (TES) was neither a policy statement nor a measure of money foregone, its contents would continue to be misused by the critics of superannuation.
"The $32 billion that has alwas been touted as the cost of [the] super [tax concessions]is misleading in terms of what has been interpreted in the market," she said.
"[It] should not be relied upon for revenue but that won't stop people continuing to use it as a buffer zone to see what they'd like to see in the Budget and to create a super pool of money available to cover their own agendas," Slattery said.
Former Count Financial chief executive and now executive director at Chase Corporate Advisory, Andrew Gale said he believed that if Treasury was obliged to produce the Tax Expenditure Statements then it was incumbent on the Treasury to ensure they were accompanied by a robust set of assumptions.
"The simple facts are that if the money wasn't in superannuation then it would be elsewhere, including in shares, and that is why the $32 billion is a considerable over-estimate," he said.
Premium Wealth Management chief executive, Paul Harding-Davis echoed Gale's concerns and added that he believed the TES was being consistently used out of context and that it was incumbent on Treasury to more fully address the issue, including in the media.
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