When the government unwisely chose to allow early access to superannuation withdrawal, which will of course damage people’s entitlements when it comes to their retirement, which will reduce the liquidity of superannuation funds, and distort the market investments that are made in the future by superannuation, Labor warned about the potential for fraud. Not only Labor, but the superannuation industry wrote to the minister on 1 May, on the very day that this fraud was uncovered, the minister wrote back and said nothing to see here.

It’s very clear that this suspension is not only necessary, it could have been foreseen and indeed, was foreseen by the superannuation industry and by Labor when we raised these issues in the national Parliament.