By Dan Blackman
The federal Attorney-General has introduced draft legislation to Parliament to extend superannuation splitting to de facto couples in Western Australia.
According to the Attorney-General, Mr Christian Porter, the Bill would bring Western Australian de facto couples in line with other de facto and married couples through out the rest of Australia.
Following the breakdown of their relationships, de facto couples in all other States and Territories have been able to split their superannuation since at least 2010.
Mr Porter says that the inability for de facto couples in WA to split their superannuation was resulting in unfair and inequitable property settlements in many cases.
“This is because the court has to try and offset the value of superannuation with other assets of the relationship, like equity in a house or savings,” he said.
“This is not always possible, particularly for couples with large mortgages, or few other assets between them.”
In 2006, Western Australia provided a narrow referral of constitutional power to legislate for superannuation splitting for de facto couples, which the Morrison Government accepted in 2018.
Previous governments had not accepted WA’s referral of de facto powers because the referral did not include other de facto financial matters, including the allocation of property interests more broadly, or spousal maintenance.
The Bill also seeks to extend federal bankruptcy jurisdiction to the Family Court of WA for de facto couples where at least one of the parties is subject to bankruptcy proceedings.