The Social Services and Other Legislation Amendment Bill 2013 was passed by the Senate on Wed 5.3.2014, with Govt and Opposition amendments and now must go back to the House of Reps for consideration of those amendments. The amendments concern, among other things, the commencement of measures in the Bill regarding FTB and eligibility rules, period of Australian working life residence, student start-up loans, and Pension Bonus Scheme. Under the amendments made, from 1 July 2014 (instead of 1 January 2014 as originally in the Bill), the Bill will end late registrations for the closed Pension Bonus Scheme.
The Bill had been amended in the House of Reps to delay the commencement of the Charities Act 2013 by 9 months, from 1 January 2014 to 1 September 2014. The Govt amendments in the Senate remove those amendments, leaving the Charities Act commencement as at 1 January 2014.
The Bill would replace the current student start-up scholarship with an income-contingent loan, the student start-up loan. It also contains amendments concerning Family Tax Benefits, the child care rebate, and aligning the income test treatment of account-based superannuation income streams, for products assessed from 1 January 2015, with the deemed income rules applying to other financial assets.
[LTN 43, 5/3/14]
Paid parental leave amendments removed from Bill
The Social Services and Other Legislation Amendment Bill 2013 was on Tue 18.3.2014, amended in the House of Reps. The House considered the many amendments that had been made to the Bill by the Senate and disagreed to 2 of them. In their place, 2 Government amendments were passed. They remove from the Bill the original amendments that had proposed to amend the Paid Parental Leave legislation to ease administrative burdens on business by removing the requirement for employers to provide Government-funded parental leave pay to their eligible long-term employees. From 1 July 2014, employees were to be paid directly by the Department of Human Services, unless an employer opted in to provide parental leave pay to its employees and an employee agrees for their employer to pay them. Under the Bill as originally introduced, the Government was seeking to remove the mandatory employer role from the Paid Parental Leave (PPL) scheme, and give that function to Centrelink (Dept of Human Services). The Bill now goes back to the Senate.
The Bill contains other amendments concerning for example aligning the income test treatment of account-based superannuation income streams, for products assessed from 1 January 2015, with the deemed income rules applying to other financial assets; FTB and eligibility rules; Pension Bonus Scheme; and child care rebate indexation.
[LTN 52, 18/3/14]
Social Services Amendment Bill awaits Assent
The Social Services and Other Legislation Amendment Bill 2013 was today passed by the Senate and essentially awaits Royal Assent.
- The Senate resolved not to insist on 2 amendments that the House had disagreed to.
- It also resolved to accept 2 Government amendments that were passed by the House in their place. The amendments removed from the Bill the original amendments that had proposed to amend the Paid Parental Leave legislation to ease administrative burdens on business by removing the requirement for employers to provide Government-funded parental leave pay to their eligible long-term employees. The proposed amendments to the Paid Parental Leave legislation are now contained in a separate Bill – the Paid Parental Leave Amendment Bill 2014 – which is before the House of Reps.
The Bill as originally introduced contained other amendments concerning for example aligning the income test treatment of account-based superannuation income streams, for products assessed from 1 January 2015, with the deemed income rules applying to other financial assets; FTB and eligibility rules; Pension Bonus Scheme; and child care rebate indexation.
[LTN 57, 25/3/14]