End this Game of Political Football!
The Super 2000 Taskforce outlines some of its latest research.
Thursday, October 14th 1999, 12:00AM
"We know 88% of New Zealanders want there to be as much certainty as possible about New Zealand Superannuation to be able to plan for their retirement," she says.
"We are responding to what New Zealanders are saying to us," she says. "They’re fed up of the games of political football that New Zealand Superannuation has become."
"Our options range from establishing an independent body to manage retirement income, to a Retirement Income Responsibility Act, to a new accord arrangement. Whatever option goes forward, though, will have to enjoy consensus support," she says.
"Our job is to recommend a retirement income policy for the long-term which New Zealanders know is fair, and sustainable and to report that to Government in November 2000.
"A major part of that work is to look at ways to slow changes in the future and increase people’s confidence in New Zealand’s retirement income system.
"We want to make it more difficult for politicians to make changes without knowing the costs of those changes to current and future generations," says Ms Foulkes.
"So, this work is not the answer to future change, but it is a step in the right direction to making any future change less disruptive," says Ms Foulkes.
"There are some ways in which stability could be achieved that are independent of the quality of any particular retirement income policy. We’ve been working on a few of these options and getting people’s opinions about how they think they could work," she says.
"We can’t lock in super for the long term, but we can slow down the game of political football," says Ms Foulkes.
SUMMARY OF STABILITY OPTIONS
For more detail refer to Institute of Policy Studies Paper page references noted below.
A New Accord (page 12)
The success of a new multi-party Accord would be reliant on it having a broader focus, on negotiation around more general policy principles, rather than specific details, like the 1993 Accord.
Entrenched retirement income legislation (page 13)
If there were a high level of consensus among politicians about the details of New Zealand’s retirement income framework, it could be possible to entrench legislation relating to retirement income policies through a special majority in Parliament.
A Retirement Income Responsibility Act (page 13)
The Act would help to make it clear to New Zealanders the impact of any changes to the retirement income system. A new accounting system could compare the costs of different policy options.
The speed of change could be slowed down by a requirement for most retirement income legislation to go to Select Committee, preventing the taking of urgency on any legislation affecting New Zealand superannuation. Another means of slowing change would be to introduce a stand down period for policy change that would stop changes occurring within one electoral cycle.
A Contractual Arrangement (page 13)
This option would also require widespread consensus on New Zealand’s retirement income framework. This being the case then it might be possible to:
-either to formalise Government’s New Zealand Superannuation obligations as a contract, putting it on a similar footing to the commercial obligations of the Government
-or to devolve management of retirement income policy to an independent body via a trust deed that would enable operational independence within policy goals set by Government.
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