John Williams (NSW, National Party) Share this | Hansard source

I rise to contribute to this debate on the Fair Work Amendment (Protecting Take-Home Pay) Bill 2017. I want to talk about umpires in various industries—people who make decisions and bodies that are set up. In 1982 we had a terrible drought. It was widespread right throughout New South Wales, Queensland, Victoria and South Australia. I do not know how it was in the west. In August 1982, the Australian Workers' Union through the shearers went on strike for more money. That was their right, but the problem was that we had ewes heavily in lamb, and we had to get the wool off them. You cannot let your ewes lamb in full wool. They will get down, and they will not get up; it is as simple as that. When the strike went on, my brother, I and a couple of friends went on shearing. Then the union finished the strike and came back to work. In October 1982, the shearers of the AWU went on strike again. My late dad said: 'Next time they go on strike, sack them. I have had enough.' The sheep were poor and the drought was so severe that we had to get those sheep shorn.

In March 1983 the umpire made a decision to allow wide combs to be used in the shearing industry. The old narrow combs were about 2½ inches wide. They were convex, which means the centre of the teeth would often scratch the sheep and you would cut them a lot more. The wide combs were introduced, and the umpire said, 'You can use these if you wish too if the boss agrees and the shearers agree.' So we started using wide combs, and a hell of a blue erupted. It was March 1983, and we had to sack our shearers, which ended friendships. My brother, Peter, was a great mate of Wayne Murray, the AWU rep. Wayne used to shear for us. Peter had to go and tell him he was no longer employed It caused a huge amount of division.

Of course, the AWU, then led by Ernie Ecob, just promoted the disturbance, disruption and division. We stuck to the umpire's decision, and here we are all these years later. Every shearer uses a wide comb. Narrow combs do not exist. The argument then was that, if you allow wide combs to come in, they will break the award down and they will pay you less. That was never going to happen, because the umpire made decisions about the pay rates as well. You are never going to have the pay rates go down for shearers. Every cent a shearer earns they deserve, I can assure you from experience.

And the division was terrible. We had the police involved, blues in the pubs, threats to burn shearing sheds down, black banding our wool—you name it. It was really ugly because one side would not accept the umpire's decision. And we have moved on. I do not think you will find a shearer now in the AWU. They have their own organisation. They simply get on, work hard and do their job—and do a magnificent job. I think the first export Australia had after European settlement was a bale of wool. It is good to see the record wool prices back now after the crash of the early nineties with the oversupply. We used to have 180 million sheep. We now have just 70 million sheep in Australia.

So that was the experience for me. Of course, Acting Deputy President Sterle, you would be well aware that a separate umpire—the Road Safety Remuneration Tribunal—made a decision last year that on 4 April a pay rate for owner-drivers had to come in. What happened then? The Transport Workers Union asked the Road Safety Remuneration Tribunal to delay that order until October. The ATA and Nat Roads, trucking organisations, along with the government asked to delay it till 1 January this year. A court order delayed it. Then the Transport Workers Union went to the court and had that delay overturned. What happened then? The government got together with some support from the crossbenches and abolished the tribunal, because 35,000 owner-driver truckies had their families' future put at risk. If the Road Safety Remuneration Tribunal had listened to the TWU and listened to others, it would probably still be there today.

Here we have an umpire now established as Fair Work Australia. They were put in by Labor and the Greens in government. I am just amazed that Senator Urquhart is blaming the Turnbull-Joyce government for their decision. We did not establish Fair Work Australia; those opposite did in government. I remember being in here when the former Prime Minister was here as a minister celebrating the passing of the bill.

Penalty rates are damaging and severe to small business, but they are also essential to workers. Nurses working night shifts, police working through the night, the ambos, the fireys—all those people who do that shift work deserve to be paid more for the hours they work. But I said to a publican only a few months ago: 'Why didn't you open on Easter Monday? Why'd you shut your pub in a small country town?' He said: 'Simple as this, Wacka: I had to bring three people in to work. They were going to cost me $70 an hour.'

Senator Bilyk interjecting—

Yes, it is a small country pub, Senator Bilyk. You probably do not understand about small business and small country pubs.