Mal Brough (Fisher, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

There you go! Mum might be one of the highest paid cleaners and get $100,000. Do we really want that? Do we want to lose the trust of workers? The union movement has been in freefall and maybe it is because of the attitude of those sitting opposite. Today, they could have come into this place and said, 'Look, we are going to disagree on some of the finer points—we think you have properly gone too far—but we recognise that the public's trust in many of our public institutions, and in particular our registered organisations, has come to such a low that we need to raise the bar.' It is not that challenging, really. But they do not seem to be too perturbed about it.

The last issue that I wish to raise here is about coercive investigative powers, and we raised this yesterday in the debate on the building and construction industry bills. The reality is that you want people who know about dishonest behaviour, fraudulent behaviour or behaviour against the interests of workers to feel that they have the confidence to be able to deliver and to know that they can be required to deliver that data, material or evidence. In doing so, they are actually protecting the workers' interests, and we are supporting them in doing that. The policy commitment was reaffirmed by the Minister for Education, Christopher Pyne, when he said:

The commission will have stronger investigation and information-gathering powers than those that currently apply. These will be modelled on those available to the Australian Securities and Investments Commission …

That is totally appropriate. We are setting the standards. We are pitching them against an already existing body. It is about money; but, above all, it is about trust in people.

I say to those opposite: it is time to get on board. It is time to listen to your constituents, not your union mates. Yes, there is a cost to this. We acknowledge that. But it is a cost worth bearing to ensure that people can have faith in our institutions and, most importantly, that we can have faith in the people who front up to us and ask us for our hard-earned money to be part of their association.

I commend the bill not only to the House but to the Labor Party—to have a rethink. This is an opportunity lost to you. Take up that opportunity. Grab it with both hands. Perhaps the member for Moreton, who is to speak next, will have had a change of heart after this contribution and will stand before us today and say, 'I'm a changed man and I'm going back up to the southern suburbs of Brisbane and I'm going to say, "I never realised, but the member for Fisher put me straight'.'

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