2024 – 25 Federal
Budget update

One of the government’s main priorities for this year’s Budget was to provide cost-of-living relief, including expanded tax cuts, energy bill rebates and student debt assistance, without adding to inflation. 

We’ve summarised the key superannuation-related changes, and what these could mean for Hostplus members and employers below. It’s important to note that some of these announcements are currently just proposals. They’ll need to be passed through parliament before becoming law.

From 1 July 2025, the government intends to pay superannuation on the government-funded parental leave pay, for babies born or adopted on or after this date. This measure means that a new parent taking time off work to care for their young family will receive superannuation payments on top of their parental leave payments. The government believes this change is an important step to reduce the impact of parental leave on retirement incomes, and to help close the gender super gap.  

$187 million is allocated to the Australian Taxation Office (ATO) in this year’s Budget to improve fraud detection in tax and superannuation. This additional funding will help to protect the integrity of your super savings.

Through the Fair Entitlements Guarantee Recovery Program, employees who have lost their job because their employer has gone into liquidation or is declared bankrupt can claim certain entitlements that their employer can’t pay. As part of this year’s Budget, the government changed the program to allow employees to pursue unpaid superannuation entitlements. This will help provide additional protection for the financial security of employees who haven’t been paid the superannuation payments they were entitled to. 

Centrelink deeming rates, which ordinarily increase each financial year, are currently frozen until 30 June 2024. The government intends to extend this freeze for a further 12 months, meaning the rates won’t increase until 30 June 2025. 

Deeming rates are used by Centrelink to predict how much income you might make on your financial assets (such as savings accounts, term deposits and shares) – regardless of any interest or income you actually made on these assets. This ‘deemed income’ is included in your income test and affects how much government income support you’re entitled to. 

Keeping the deeming rates frozen will benefit around 876,000 income support recipients, including Age Pensioners.

The government announced additional investments in aged care, home care packages and support systems to help ensure aged care services remain accessible, up to date and reliable. Carer payment rules will also be relaxed, designed to allow recipients to undertake work and study and participate in volunteering activities without impacting their income support.

The government announced additional funding in this year’s Budget to help businesses implement policy changes such as payday super. It’s an acknowledgment of the significant administrative costs these changes can pose on businesses. 

Under the payday super measure, announced in the 2023-24 Budget, employers will need to start paying Superannuation Guarantee (SG) contributions at the same time they pay wages. Currently, employers are only required to pay their employees’ SG contributions on a quarterly basis. Due to take effect from 1 July 2026, payday super will make it easier for employees to check if their super is being paid on time and in full. 

Importantly, the payday super legislation hasn’t yet been passed into law. A consultation paper was released in late 2023, and stakeholder feedback is currently being reviewed. We’ll continue to keep our employer partners informed as this legislation progresses.

The government has also invested $10 million to provide additional support to small businesses in administering paid parental leave payments.