Accountancy-based dealer group Count Financial has used its submission to the Cooper Review to warn the Government against using superannuation to advance policy objectives beyond promoting retirement incomes adequacy in Australia.
The Count submission, lodged with the Cooper Review this week, says that the success of the Australian superannuation system is owed to the sole-purpose test, which allows super funds to be run solely for a very select number of reasons, commonly the provision of retirement benefits.
“To use the system to advance other policy objectives would in a way dilute this critical test, so a superannuation fund trustee may no longer be solely focused on the provision of retirement benefits to a particular member, but potentially the provision of these benefits, subject to a range of other policy requirements,” it said.
The Count document said that such a move would risk disengaging some individuals from the superannuation system, given the potential uncertainty about what would be driving trustee decisions, and also the uncertainty surrounding whether other government policy objectives would change over time.
The Count submission also strongly opposes government-mandated investment, arguing that governments should not have influence over a particular investment or asset class, including infrastructure.
“Trustees should continue to be able to choose investments from their fund purely on the basis of the needs of their membership, and the provision of retirement benefits to those members in the most appropriate way,” it said.
