Labor targets super in bid to cool housing market

The Australian 12:00am April 21, 2017

David Crowe

Bill Shorten will target a $24 billion “explosion” in borrowing in a new bid today to tackle housing affordability, pledging to stop property investors using their superannuation funds to take on debt and drive up prices.

The Labor policy is being backed by the head of the government’s financial system inquiry, former Commonwealth Bank chief and Future Fund chairman David Murray, out of concern at the wider risk to stability from the increasing use of super fund debt.

Mr Murray said last night the government should move quickly to follow Labor and put a stop to the use of super fund debt to buy residential property, given the way the borrowing could “magnify” risk across the sector.

With the polls putting Labor comfortably ahead of the ­Coalition, investors might be tempted to take on more debt in their super funds and pour more cash into property between now and the next election, seeing as this is their last chance to do so.

“The government should at least follow with banning the leverage for residential property and do so as soon as possible so you don’t get a rush for deals,” Mr Murray said.

Mr Shorten and Labor Treasury spokesman Chris Bowen will outline a suite of new policies today, including a hit to foreign investors who buy residential real estate. The plans are likely to infuriate owners of self-managed super funds that hold about $650bn and are ­increasingly using debt to help ­finance property investments, an avenue that is closed to most retail or industry funds.

Mr Bowen is concerned that super fund debt has swollen from $2.5bn in 2012 to more than $24bn today, most of it in real property ­assets, according to advice from the Parliamentary Budget Office and findings by the Australian Taxation Office.

Labor’s statement today will vow to halt the use of debt by all super funds to “help cool an overheated housing market” where it has been too easy for self-managed super funds to borrow to buy ­property.

The Reserve Bank warned about the debt in its submission to the inquiry commissioned by Joe Hockey and led by Mr Murray, who issued a report in 2014 calling for a halt to the practice.

“If allowed to continue, growth in direct leverage by superannuation funds, although embryonic, may create vulnerabilities for the superannuation and financial systems,” Mr Murray said in the final report.

He recommended the restoration of a “general prohibition” on super fund borrowing but SMSF owners — a group the Coalition sees as part of its natural political base — fiercely resisted the push. Scott Morrison rejected the recommendation in October 2015 after more than a year of debate.

Labor’s move today will aim to steal some of the Coalition’s thunder on housing affordability, a key theme in the May 9 budget, after Mr Shorten and Mr Bowen moved ahead of the Coalition on the issue last year by announcing curbs on negative gearing.

The Coalition remains divided on negative gearing and the discount on the capital gains tax that investors pay when they sell their properties, with Finance Minister Mathias Cormann arguing against any changes, while the Treasurer avoids ruling out adjustments to capital gains tax.

Mr Shorten and Mr Bowen will target foreign investors by doubling the fees they pay to the Foreign Investment Review Board for ­approval of residential property purchases, raising about $100 million a year in additional revenue.

A foreign buyer pays about $5000 to FIRB on a purchase up to $1m but this would rise to $10,000 under the Labor plan.