International Law

In a recent speech the Minister for Superannuation  & Corporate Law discussed the government's priorities for superannuation reform.

He discussed the use of Management Expense Ratios as a comparison point between different types of investments including First Home Saver Accounts:

"I do have a strong interest in finding simple ways for consumers to compare costs across a wide range of investments.  One way of doing this is to require product issuers to adopt an approach based on a Management Expense Ratio or MER. By comparing the MERs of different investment options, it should be possible to determine whether a particular investment is more or less expensive than the average.

We are currently looking to use an MER type of approach for the First Home Saver Account PDS. Issuers will be required to disclose both the overall cost of an investment (in dollar terms) and the overall cost ratio (which is the average annual overall cost as a percentage of the average annual balance). Consumers will be encouraged to broadly compare the overall cost ratio for a particular FHSA against other products"

His speech also covered:

• benefit projections
• disclosure of advice
• default funds
• Lost superannuation
• Temporary Residents' Superannuation
• governance of  self managed superannuation funds (SMSF)
• Superannuation Clearing House
• tax review