The Palaszczuk government is facing a second legislative defeat, with the public servant union to join with the opposition in lobbying the crossbench to reject a measure that would allow the Treasurer to change public servant super payouts.
Subscribe now for unlimited access.
$0/
(min cost $0)
or signup to continue reading
Together Union Secretary Alex Scott said the union, which represents the state's public servants, would oppose the proposal to change how some employees have their retirement entitlements calculated, because of the "slippery slope" it represented.
"As a matter of principle, we never think any Treasurer should ever be allowed to interfere in the superannuation of defined benefit scheme members," he said.
Treasurer Curtis Pitt was forced to defend the amendment – revealed by Fairfax Media – that had been slipped into the largely administrative Revenue and Other Legislation Amendment Bill, which would have given him the power to change the multiple used to determine how much eligible public servants receive from the defined benefits scheme at their retirement.
Under the proposed changes, eligible public servants who have rolled allowances into their salary would have the multiple used to determine their retirement payout under the fund lowered by the Treasurer.
Under an example provided by Treasury, an employee who has worked for the public service for 30 years and has a base wage of $90,000, but has negotiated to have $30,000 in allowances paid as part of their salary, would lose out on $210,000.
Mr Pitt said it was "turning an administrative arrangement into a legislative remedy to ensure it tidied up".
"It is a technical amendment and the reason it has been blown up is because the LNP continue to attack their favourite target and that is the public service. They did it while they were in government and they are doing it again," Mr Pitt said.
Mr Pitt did not speak on the amendment when introducing the bill. On Tuesday, while attempting to hose down the controversy, he said it was "absolutely absurd to suggest you would go through every clause at the introduction stage of the bill".
But Opposition Leader Tim Nicholls disputed Mr Pitt's claim it was an administrative arrangement and said he was unaware of it occurring while he was treasurer.
He accused the Treasurer of "hoping it to sneak it through and that no one would actually notice what was being done".
"This has been the practice which has been underway for a long time," he said.
"Employees understand, for example, they might have a car allowance, they might have a travel allowance, they might have a multitude of allowances – clothing allowances. And they get rolled up in superannuation, they spend their own money and that gets included in their salary – they expect that they would be paid out the full value of their salary when they retire. This is a reasonable expectation.
"Curtis Pitt has told us the fund is fully covered off, that there would be enough money to cover everyone – if he said that, why is he now trying to change how much it pays out? It is because he knows he has done the wrong thing – he has gone on a sneaky superannuation raid.
"He really is best described as Pickpocket Pitt."
Mr Nicholls said the LNP would fight against the amendment. And he has a reluctant ally in the Together Union's Mr Scott, who said he would also lobby for the amendment to be dropped.
"We are very opposed to this element of the bill," Mr Scott said.
"We are not worried about its impact, because we think it is very minor. We are worried about the concept that it would introduce.
"The bill as it currently stands would allow for a limited set of circumstances where the Treasurer could intervene – our position is a matter of principle – there should never be any circumstances where the Treasurer should intervene, no matter how small or big it is."
