Graham Perrett (Moreton, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

I commend the member for Brisbane for his contribution to this debate on the Fair Work Bill 2008, truncated as it was with question time. There was certainly a lot of passion and a lot of horrible stories in his speech. If there was one message that was delivered loudly and clearly on 24 November last year, the members in the House at the moment would know very well that Australians do not like it when people mess with fairness. That is what the election results showed, and if the current opposition had been good students of history they would have known this lesson. It happened before when Stanley Melbourne Bruce and his government changed the industrial relations laws. What happened? His government was thrown out and he lost his seat. History repeated itself in 2007 when John Howard went on with his extreme industrial agenda and tried to change the industrial relations laws. He lost his seat. It is a significant slap in the face for a Prime Minister to be thrown out of his own seat. It does not happen very often. It has happened twice in our history. Why? Because the government of the day tried to fiddle around with fairness.

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