Josh Frydenberg (Kooyong, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

It is a relevant point, though, to mention the money that has been received by the Greens from the union movement. But I rise to speak on this bill, which is the latest example of the Labor Party pandering to the union movement. The Labor Party is not interested in productivity gains. The Labor Party is not interested in increasing employment. It is interested only in paying back its union master. But that should not be of any surprise to us, because, if you go to the Labor caucus, you find that 100 per cent of them are members of the union and, if you go to a Labor federal or state national conference, the unions automatically have 50 per cent of the votes. Why is that important here? It is important because the union movement is only 13 per cent of the private sector workforce of Australia and just under 20 per cent if you take into account the public sector.

So what we have seen under this government—and this Fair Work Amendment Bill is just another example of this—is increased union power right across the board. We have seen increased union power in right of entry. We have seen increased union power in greenfield sites. We have seen increased union power in the ability to strike first and talk later. We have seen increased union representation on the Fair Work Commission. This is no surprise, when the Minister for Employment and Workplace Relations in this country is the former National Secretary of the Australian Workers' Union. But do not take my word for it; take the word of Kathy Jackson. Kathy Jackson, the former head of the HSU, said that the member for Maribyrnong is 'Dracula in charge of the blood bank'. That is what she said about the minister for workplace relations.

We have seen many scandals involving unions. We saw the situation with the member for Dobell. We have seen the abolition of the Australian Building and Construction Commission—a very positive institution set up by the previous Howard government that came out of the Cole royal commission. It was designed to stop lawlessness in the building sector. Across this country, particularly in Victoria and Western Australia, it was doing a very important job of providing a cop on the beat. But the Labor Party, together with the unions and the Greens, came into this place and abolished the ABCC. That was a very bad thing for Australian workplaces and for the Australian people.

This Fair Work Amendment Bill breaks another solemn promise of the Prime Minister to the Australian people. We have seen her broken promises on private health insurance. We have seen her broken promises on the family tax benefit. We have seen her broken promises on the carbon tax. And now we are seeing her broken promises on the Fair Work Act. The Prime Minister claimed that she 'consulted for hour after hour with business leaders, with union leaders, with small business leaders to get the balance right' and, 'We have built a modern and fair system that has got the balance right.' But they have not got the balance right. Again, you do not need to take the coalition's word for it; you need only look at what Innes Willox, the head of the Australian Industry Group, said in an interview on the ABC. He said that there are:

… about 160 different measures under the Fair Work Act mark one and two which are very clearly pro-union and we can't find one, not one, that is pro-employer under the Act.

That is a pretty amazing statement from the head of the Australian Industry Group. That is not a coalition MP speaking; that is the head of a major organisation in this country.

My concern about the bill before this House is that it has not followed proper process. There has not been a regulatory impact statement. In fact, when members of the department responsible came before the Senate committee they could not explain why there had been an exemption of this bill from getting a proper regulatory impact statement. Another thing that concerns me about this bill is that it does not include the recommendations that came forward from the government's own Fair Work review panel. The government hand-picked a number of people to provide a review which was supposed to lead to some significant changes to the Fair Work Act to make it more balanced and more productivity focused. What did they do? They have not taken up the recommendations.

One such recommendation was saying union bosses in the workplace should be treated as any other employee. That came out of the Bendigo TAFE case. Something very interesting also came out of the Bendigo TAFE case, and that is what a Justice of the High Court, Justice Heydon, said in the decision of the High Court about the Labor government's intervention by the minister responsible:

… the Minister's stance before and during the oral hearing has not been that of an intervener, but that of a partisan.

That is what we have from this government. We do not have from this government an independent, even hand in industrial relations. We have from this government interventions based on what is in the unions' interest. In this bill, again, we see many examples of that. For example, in this bill, the right-of-entry provisions are much more punitive and will not enhance productivity and jobs growth in our country and in our workplaces.

One of the amendments that the government would like to promote is that, where the employer and employees cannot agree on a meeting place, the default meeting place is in the lunch room. There are going to be many people sitting in their lunch rooms wanting to have their burger and fries and Coke in peace and quiet, but they are going to have union representatives come into their place, interrupt their lunch and try to sign them up. It is what you have done in terms of childcare workforces and the aged-care workforces where you have tried to boost the flagging membership of the union movement by making some payments to those sectors contingent upon increasing your membership. You are doing it again and it is outrageous. It is an abuse of power and it is an abuse of process. What about the fact that 87 per cent of the private sector workforce in this country have decided not to join a union, but they cannot eat their burger and chips in quiet? What do you say about that? In fact, this was not even a recommendation of the government's hand-picked Fair Work review panel. This is all about union membership.

What about the other recommendation that this government is seeking to implement through this legislation to make employers liable for the transport costs when unions want to use their right of entry in a remote location? You are asking the employer to pay for the union rep to try and recruit employees to join a union. How outrageous is that! Do not take my word for it; take the employers' word for it. For example, the Australian Mines and Metals Association has said that this could lead to an increase of some $30,000 in costs on some occasions, just because you want to recruit more members. Those costs will come straight off the bottom line of a company, and who will they be passed on to? They will be passed on to the consumer in the form of higher prices. By deciding to go and recruit members for your flagging unions, you have decided to pass on higher costs to the Australian consumers. I think this is absolutely outrageous, particularly when you consider that the Prime Minister had promised that she would not change the right-of-entry provisions. How about this quote from the National Press Club debate in November 2007. The Prime Minister of today said:

I'm happy to do whatever you would like. If you'd like me to pledge to resign, to sign a contract in blood, take a polygraph, bet my house on it, give you my mother as a hostage, whatever you like.

That is what she said when she promised not to change the right-of-entry provisions. Now we have seen those right-of-entry provisions, and they have opened the floodgates to the unions to interrupt the workplaces of hardworking Australians and their employers. The AWU made 156 site visits to BHP's Worsley aluminium site just in 2012. The Pluto site saw more than 200 visits from the union in just the first 90 days of the Fair Work Act. That is the evidence that there has been a graphic abuse of process by those opposite and their mates in the unions.

What about, in this legislation, your decision to legislate to create more flexible working arrangements? That is already occurring. We heard from the Fair Work Ombudsman and from the department that that is already happening, but you want to legislate for it. If you really want to legislate to increase flexibility in the workplace, why don't you extend the termination date for the individual flexibility agreements from 28 days to 90 days? That was recommended by your own hand-picked review. Why don't you do something about that?

The other change that you want to put forward in this bill is employers consulting with employees around roster changes. That is already standard practice. For those on the opposite side who do not understand modern-day awards, that is already in there. What you are on about here is opening the floodgates and making it impractical for employers to run a business, to employ people, to boost productivity and to replicate the successes of the Howard government.

What about bullying? When it comes to bullying, we take it very seriously. We take it extremely seriously, but we do not accept what you are providing for in this bill. There is nothing in this bill that says that if a union official is a bully then he should pay a price for it. We want to see an amendment that holds union officials to the same level of account. We also want employees to first seek help and advice from an independent regulatory agency, such as Safe Work Australia or the Fair Work Ombudsman. If they confirm that behaviour may constitute bullying and that alternative remedies have been considered then that must be done prior to the lodging with the commission. I have news for those on the other side: their hand-picked chair of the Fair Work review supported our policy on this.

When we were in government we had a suite of industrial relations policies which improved the Australian economy. We delivered a 22 per cent increase in real wages. We restored the AAA credit rating of this country. We paid back $96 billion of debt. On the waterfront, we doubled the speed and rate of the cranes being moved. We did all those things and we paid back all your debt that you are now burdening future generations with. But with your policies, your pandering to the union movement, your abolition of the Australian Building and Construction Commission and your reregulation of the workplace, you are taking us backwards to before Paul Keating's reforms.

No wonder you are being hounded out of office, and every business leader from here to Timbuktu is criticising you for putting unions first and employers last. By doing that you are defeating the best interests of the employees. You are hurting productivity in this country. (Time expired.)

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