Legislated objectives

A government has many objectives … but how does it achieve them? Many people would give the response - “by legislation”. Well, yes, legislation is often part of the mix. However, there are many forms of legislation, and not all of them comprise just prohibitions and mandates.

With these thoughts, we turn to comments by the Financial Services Minister Stephen Jones (reported in the Australian Financial Review 9 November 2022) in relation to “meddling” in superannuation fund management. He stated that the government would seek to devise “a common, agreed objective” of superannuation, and added that (to quote the AFR report):

“a legislated objective was necessary before the government considered curtailing the generous super tax concessions for wealthy people …”

As we have often commented, legislation provides a voice for government, and can be considered to be an expression of government policy with teeth (by which we mean sanctions). But where are the teeth with “legislated objectives”?

A commentator, one Jeremy Cooper, is reported to support the idea of a “legally enshrined mission statement” (AFR, 23 November 2022). How effective would it be? Mr Cooper saw “a legislated objective as key to fostering policy stability.” This was so even though it would not bind future governments:

“… it would create guardrails and make any future changes politically difficult if they were inconsistent with superannuation’s legislated objective.”