sustained criticism<\/a>, especially from self-managed super fund operators, which claimed some people with big holdings in illiquid assets could be forced to sell up in order to raise the cash to cover the change in the notional value of their balances.<\/p>\nChalmers rebuffed suggestions that the original proposal was a mistake, arguing the government was responding to \u201cgenuine feedback\u201d.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt was the advice that we were acting on, that that was the best way to go about it at the time,\u201d he told reporters in Canberra.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe asked for the best, most-workable alternative to that, and that\u2019s what we\u2019re announcing today.\u201d<\/p>\n
In a statement, Keating \u2013 the architect of Australia\u2019s superannuation system and a critic of Chalmers\u2019 original proposal \u2013 described the revised plan as a \u201chuge policy achievement\u201d.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt is reform of a kind that shares substance with necessity. Necessity that every government since 2007 has conveniently overlooked or simply regarded as too difficult,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
The government failed to pass the superannuation tax plan in the last parliament and was yet to resurrect it after its thumping election win in May, fuelling speculation it was weighing up changes.<\/p>\n
Treasury officials last week confirmed the department had conducted fresh modelling on the impact of the changes and that the prime minister\u2019s office had become directly involved, further heightening expectations of a potential overhaul.<\/p>\n
On Friday, Albanese insisted there were \u201cno changes\u201d to the policy, echoing the type of language he used before revising the stage-three tax cuts in early 2024.<\/p>\n
As part of the changes announced on Monday, the government will apply a new, higher 40% tax rate on earnings for balances larger than $10m.<\/p>\n
The $3m and $10m thresholds will be indexed to inflation, addressing a key criticism of the original proposal that more people would be captured as super balances increased over time.<\/p>\n
Chalmers said the revised plan would still only affect fewer than 0.5% of savers \u2013 or roughly 80,000 accounts.<\/p>\n
Asked how long he had been working on the changes, the treasurer said: \u201cSome time\u201d.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019ve taken our time to work through the issues. We didn\u2019t react quickly to every editorial or every criticism from every quarter,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
The original proposal was expected to raise $2.7bn in its first full year.<\/p>\n
The revised plan will instead raise $1.6bn in its first year in 2028-29, which includes the $435m cost of the low-income superannuation tax offset over the forward estimates.<\/p>\n
The Albanese government needs the support of either the Coalition or the Greens to get the legislation through the Senate.<\/p>\n
The shadow treasurer, Ted O\u2019Brien, said the opposition would consider the details of the new proposal before agreeing a position.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe treasurer has been chewed up and his tax plan has now been chucked out,\u201d O\u2019Brien said. \u201cThat is a win for everyday Australians.\u201d<\/p>\n
The Greens economics spokesperson, Nick McKim \u2013 whose party has previously pushed for the super balance threshold to be lowered from $3m to $2m \u2013 welcomed the extra help for low-income earners.<\/p>\n
People who earn between $28,000 and $45,000 could retire with an extra $15,000 in their savings, according to Treasury estimates.<\/p>\n
But McKim said the other changes represented a \u201ccapitulation to the wealthiest people in the country and a slap in the face to everyone else who pays their tax straight out of their pay packet\u201d.<\/p>\n
\u201cLabor has stripped out the tax on unrealised gains and indexed the $3m threshold, a gift to the super-rich that will cost the budget billions.\u201d<\/p>\n
The Tasmanian senator also appeared to criticise the decision to index the threshold despite previously advocating for it.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis new model will give a green light to the richest 0.5% to keep hoarding investment properties,\u201d he said. \u201cNo capital gains tax will have to be paid as long as they don\u2019t sell their properties and, even then, less than half of the profits will attract tax.\u201d<\/p>\n
Chalmers said he had a \u201cconstructive\u201d conversation with the Greens leader, Larissa Waters, on Monday morning, ahead of the announcement.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Albanese government has backed down on its contentious superannuation tax plan, dumping the proposal to target unrealised…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":75297,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[14],"tags":[138,246,111,139,69,244,245],"class_list":{"0":"post-75296","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-personal-finance","8":"tag-business","9":"tag-finance","10":"tag-new-zealand","11":"tag-newzealand","12":"tag-nz","13":"tag-personal-finance","14":"tag-personalfinance"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/75296","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=75296"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/75296\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/75297"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=75296"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=75296"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=75296"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}