SG amnesty needs urgent legislation

FEDERAL Parliament must pass urgent legislation to encourage small business owners, including pharmacists, who may have underpaid staff superannuation guarantee (SG) contributions to come forward, the Government believes.

Voicing support for the Treasury Laws Amendment (Recovering Unpaid Superannuation) Bill 2019, Liberal Party Senator, David Van, said the legislation would provide an opportunity for business owners to “make good on their obligations to their employees, without beating them over the head with a stick and surrounding them in bureaucratic paperwork”.

Van told the Senate that the Treasury estimated 7,000 more employers could come forward to rectify underpayments, if the current amnesty is legislated.

“This amnesty does not let employers off the hook and does not leave employees worse off,” he said.

“The amnesty is designed exclusively to benefit employees.

“Employers will only get the benefit of the amnesty if they pay their employees superannuation entitlements in full with significant interest.

“This simply provides an opportunity for employers to review their compliance history, to come forward in good faith and to pay anything that is owed before the ATO begins using its new enforcement tools.

“Employers with historical superannuation underpayments who fail to voluntarily disclose those underpayments during the amnesty period and are found to be non-compliant by the ATO will be subjected to a minimum penalty equal to 100% of the superannuation guarantee charge.”