Zed Seselja (ACT, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

Well, that is at the heart of this bill. The heart of this bill is to ensure that there is a robust regime to ensure that those types of people are brought to account. It is not against the average, hard-working union official who is doing the right thing. They would have absolutely nothing to fear from anything in this legislation. I agree with Senator Bilyk that the majority do their best and are not seeking to rip anyone off. They would have absolutely nothing to fear. But we have senior judges such as Federal Court Judge Anthony North saying that the penalties under the current act are 'beneficially low to wrongdoers'. Let's reflect on that for a moment. Federal Judge Anthony North has said the penalties you are supporting are beneficially low to wrongdoers.

Let's ignore the fig leaf that the Labor Party has tried to use to cover their opposition to this legislation. If the Craig Thomsons and the Michael Williamsons of the world do the wrong thing—and in some cases they can be criminally prosecuted—and if judges like Anthony North say that the current penalties are beneficially low to wrongdoers, then I think the Australian people would look at legislation and say, 'Why wouldn't you want to fix that situation?' Why wouldn't you want to say to the community, 'We have zero tolerance for this kind of thing?' Occasionally, and sometimes too occasionally, we see people doing absolutely the wrong thing, and we should condemn it, and there should be a robust regime and robust penalties that provide a very strong deterrent and bring those people to justice. Surely that is something we should be able to agree on here.

Senator Ronaldson interjecting—

Indeed. If you are voting against this, you can make all the arguments about things that it is actually not about, things that it does not do, but that is fundamentally what you have to answer. Paul Howes said:

I actually believe there is a higher responsibility for us as guardians of workers' money to protect that money and to act diligently and honestly.

The reality is I do not have any issue with increasing the level of requirements and penalties on trade unions for breaching basic ethics like misappropriation of funds.

And who would disagree with that? Who would reasonably disagree with that? Paul Howes, prominent union leader, has said he does not have any problem with having reasonable penalties.