‘They’ll lie again’: Barnaby Joyce takes superannuation fight to Labor

Barnaby Joyce has pointed to the prime minister’s past broken promises to suggest Labor wants to hike taxes on retirement savings, embracing the superannuation fight the government has taken to One Nation.

“We know that the Labor government, just like they lied about the changes to the capital gains tax, are looking greedily at super,” Joyce, One Nation’s treasury spokesman, told Radio National on Tuesday. “With $4.5 trillion in super, we have to reaffirm: don’t look there.”

Asked what evidence he had for the claim, Joyce said Labor had a track record of lying and pointed to Anthony Albanese’s broken election promise not to touch negative gearing , his claim he did not fall off a stage, and his insistence that his Japanese melon comments were a non-issue .

“Whether it’s the big things or the little things … they’re lies. You have to be cautious of liars, because if they lie once, they’ll lie again,” Joyce said.

Labor is eager for a fight on superannuation , using One Nation leader Pauline Hanson’s call to allow more people to dip into their retirement savings – and Liberal frontbencher Andrew Bragg’s declaration that compulsory super was a failed policy – to paint its political opponents as anti-worker.

Treasurer Jim Chalmers used media appearances on Tuesday morning to hammer home the attack after Labor used question time on Monday to keep the subject at the forefront of debate.

“One of the most important features of our superannuation system is this idea of preservation,” Chalmers told Channel Seven’s Sunrise . “This idea that with compounding investments over time, Australian workers can access the decent retirement incomes that they need and deserve after a lifetime of work.

“That’s at risk now because all three of those parties have made it clear that they don’t support the system which delivers that economic security.”

Joyce also reengaged, seizing on comments from Labor frontbencher Andrew Charlton, who targeted One Nation in a preceding interview on Radio National, saying “we had … Pauline Hanson saying it’s people’s money, and they should have access to it”.

“Well, Mr Charlton, it actually is their money,” Joyce said, adding he was concerned when government ministers described super as a national asset. “It’s actually people’s assets.”

Joyce argued the provisions for early access to super because of financial hardship were too strict and should be loosened.

“There is a form of access, and it requires, I think, 26 weeks of social security to get access. There is a really convoluted process to show stress on house payments … you need letters from banks.”

“I believe it’s 25 per cent of the year that you can get access for payments. What we’re saying [is] it should be simpler than that.”

Labor introduced a 15 per cent tax on super balance returns over $3 million in 2025, with an expected boost to federal coffers of $2.7 billion over 12 months.