STATUTES AMENDMENT (POLICE SUPERANNUATION) BILL

Final Stages

Consideration in committee of the Legislative Council's amendments.

(Continued from 29 April 2008. Page 2956.)

The Hon. K.O. FOLEY: I move:

That the Legislative Council’s amendments be disagreed to.

We reject the amendments which, in effect, provide for the board to nominate a class or combination of class of investments based on ethical investments and saying that consideration of the impact of the investments on society and the environment be made available to members. We reject that. That is a very broad definition of what might be an ethical fund. I accept that there is a growing view amongst people that they would like to have access to ethical funds. That may be something that the government will consider at some further point.

We would possibly give consideration to having a product available for members should they want a particular ethical fund but, given the problems in creating an ethical fund (by definition, what is ethical and what is not) and given that the success of Funds SA and the whole scope of merging various funds into Funds SA is to give us some scale for purchase—remember, Funds SA is a manager of managers and we have conservative, growth, balanced and cash funds—to try to configure an ethical fund from the available products is not something that I am particularly keen on doing.

Having said that, I am looking at whether or not we can make a product available through Super SA, whether there are options available to us, so, short of creating such a product ourselves, we are looking at whether or not we can contract with a current provider of an ethical fund that can be utilised or purchased through Funds SA or Super SA. Therefore I reject the amendments.

Mr GRIFFITHS: I wish to make a brief contribution to this motion. When this was debated in the house, the Police Association was keen for the bill as presented to be supported and that is why we did not move any amendments to it. It was during the debate in the other place that the Hon. Mark Parnell moved these amendments. After ongoing discussion within the Liberal Party, it was decided at that time to support the amendments as they related to ethical and superannuation options.

I remember that debate occurred in the house when the member for Ashford moved that the Economic and Finance Committee investigate options for ethical superannuation. Being part of that committee, I have had the opportunity to review the reply to that suggestion. I am unsure who they came from, but two letters were provided to the Economic and Finance Committee that alluded to the fact that, as part of the review of managers of the various funds under the control of Funds SA and Super SA, consideration should be given in some cases to the ethics involved in the various companies that they might decide to pursue and for fund options.

Based on previous discussions with Mr Pryor from Super SA, I understand that less than, I think, 2 per cent of people who are members of the Triple S superannuation scheme actually decide consciously to make an investment choice. Most choose the default option, which is a middle of the range risk approach. I am aware also of a poll being conducted by which people could seek the opportunity for an ethical option within the government superannuation scheme, and a reasonable number of acknowledgements were made on that website.

Certainly from the discussions that I have had since the amendments were supported in the other place, we acknowledge that the government has some concerns about this. The Treasurer has pointed out that there is a cost associated with following this option, and potentially that cost would have to be borne by all members of Triple S and other government superannuation schemes. I am pleased, though, to hear that the Treasurer will ensure that some investigation takes place to provide an option for ethical superannuation in the future. However, in considering all these issues and given the importance within the Police Association for the bill to be passed through parliament as quickly as possible, the opposition has decided not to debate the point and it will support the government in its position at this stage. We look forward to a further review in the future.

The Hon. K.O. FOLEY: I thank the member for that. I had better retract my earlier comments about the amendments and the quality of the legislative output of the upper house. In this instance, it was bad.

Motion carried.

The Hon. K.O. FOLEY: Mr Speaker, I draw your attention to the state of the house.

A quorum having been formed: