Inside Anthony Albanese’s bold new plan to raid YOUR superannuation following sweeping election victory

Anthony Albanese’s emphatic election victory has given him a mandate to introduce controversial policies, Labor’s national president says, as the government’s pushes a radical superannuation tax.

For the past two years, Labor has been trying to tax unrealised gains on super above a $3million threshold, putting a bill before Parliament.

But key crossbench senators late last year rejected the Labor plan to impose a 15 per cent tax on assets above this level, even if they had yet to be sold.

The change – which is still Labor Party government policy – would be a radical departure from the usual practice of only applying a capital gains tax to something once it has been sold

Labor’s national president Wayne Swan, a former treasurer and deputy prime minister, said Labor now had a mandate to implement policies it had taken to the last election.

‘There’s no question the government’s got a broad mandate for policies that it put before the people,’ he told Daily Mail Australia. 

These wide-ranging policies include the plan for taxing super, but Mr Swan was coy about the move.

‘Yes, but I’m not mentioning any one in particular, there’s a whole lot of them,’ he said.

Despite saying Labor has a political mandate, Mr Swan – as the chairman of Cbus Super – declined to defend the merits of the government’s controversial superannuation tax policy.

‘I’m not going to mention any particular piece of legislation but I think the government has a mandate for matters that it has taken up openly and publicly over the last three years,’ he said.

‘The government has a general mandate for policies that it previously put forward and continues to advocate for.’

Labor is set to have at least 86 seats out of 150 in the House of Representatives and is likely to gain more seats in the Senate, making it easier for the government to get legislation passed that had previously stalled.

Combined with the support it is likely to get from the Greens, Labor appears to have carte blanche to implement it’s policies. 

‘If you want to look at change elections post war, this one is probably the best,’ Mr Swan said.

With 15 House of Representatives seats still in doubt, an even bigger lower house tally would give Labor its biggest ever landslide since 1943 when John Curtin was wartime prime minister.

The ABC’s retiring election analyst Antony Green also predicted the Coalition would lose seats to Labor in the Senate.

‘Labor looks set to gain three seats at the expense of the Coalition which will aid the passage of legislation,’ he said. 

The new legislation to tax unrealised gains on super rather than the capital gains tax practice of only taxing something once it’s been sold would be revolutionary. 

No other country in the world has even tried this policy on retirement savings – known in Australia as the Division 296 tax – and those with a self-managed super fund could be forced to sell assets like real estate to avoid the unrealised gains tax above the $3million threshold.

Former US vice president Kamala Harris lost last year’s November presidential election to Donald Trump after going to the people with a Swedish-style policy to apply an unrealised gains tax to the ultra-rich with assets worth more than US$100million.

Three weeks after the Democrat lost the election, senators in Australia declined to pass Labor’s Treasury Laws Amendment (Better Targeted Superannuation Concessions and Other Measures) Bill 2023.

Climate 200-backed independent David Pocock expressed concerns about taxing unrealised gains. 

The Greens wanted the threshold reduced to $2million from $3million.

Labor also wants to double earning taxes to 30 per cent for super balances above that $3million threshold.

Saturday night’s election victory for Labor was the biggest surprise since 1993 when incumbent prime minister Paul Keating triumphed, despite being the opinion poll underdog as his Liberal opponent John Hewson proposed a 15 per cent GST during a time of high unemployment.

‘It is the best victory, probably bigger, I think, than really ’93 in a whole variety of ways,’ Mr Swan said.

‘If you wanted to look at change elections post war, ’93 was pretty significant, unexpected and large.’  

Labor’s victory in that election also occurred a year after the debut of compulsory super.

Treasurer Jim Chalmers was previously the chief-of-staff to Mr Swan when he was treasurer and deputy prime minister.