Brendan O'Connor (Gorton, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Employment and Workplace Relations) Share this | Hansard source

It didn't work out particularly well over time! At the time, he was a very excited Prime Minister. He came in and decided to announce fundamental changes—radical changes, I think you could argue—to industrial relations laws in this country that ultimately became pejoratively known as Work Choices. None of those provisions, of course, were in any way communicated to the electorate prior to the 2004 election.

It is fair to say that the government has been so timid in this area because it has been traumatised by Work Choices and so has taken it a little softer, but the intent is always there. The malevolent intent of the government when it comes to attacking working people in this country never ceases to amaze me. That is why I am always sceptical when I hear the government say that, for example, there are to be changes that reflect the expressed commitments made before the election. Of course, when you look at the detail, that is not the case.

With respect to some of the matters, I have to say I agree with the minister that, for example, looking at greenfield agreements is an important matter. That is why I spoke to APO, large mining companies, unions relevant to that particular sector and academics who are experts in industrial relations legislation. We also looked at what we could do to reconcile any outstanding differences wherever possible. We were open-minded and sought to genuinely listen to the concerns of industry and see whether we could find a way forward. Whilst we do disagree with these amendments, I wanted to put on the record the efforts that we made without prejudice to the crossbenchers in order to see if we could facilitate some resolution to these matters.

With regard to greenfields, we understood the concerns of industry about the indefinite nature of greenfield agreements. We understood that there may be a way forward that could provide greater certainty for the mining industry and for industries that use these vehicles for new sites, new investment and, most importantly, new jobs. Therefore, we were open-minded to the submissions made to us in relation to these areas.

As a result, we put to the government and indeed to the crossbenchers within the Senate a mechanism that I think was balanced in that we believed it was a fairer proposition than what was being put forward by the government. Let me go to the greenfield agreements provisions that were in the government's proposed legislation.

The significant legislative change to greenfield agreements would have the effect that this would establish a new process for negotiation of a single enterprise greenfields agreement by extending good-faith bargaining to negotiations of these agreements and provide a three-month negotiation time frame for the parties to reach agreement. An employer would be able to apply to the Fair Work commission for approval of its agreement where agreement cannot be reached with the relevant employee organisation in that period. The existing approvals test under the Fair Work Act would be retained with a new requirement to ensure that the agreement is consistent with prevailing industry standards.

You might have picked up the concern I might have with such an idea: you would call something an agreement when there is actually no agreement. The actual instrument that was referred to in this proposed provision would be a document that was drafted by the employer. Yes, there would be a very limited period of time to seek to have discussions around that document and, provided it passed what is an ill-defined term—the 'prevailing industry standards'—it would go ahead as a ratified industrial instrument where the Fair Work Commission would have no choice other than to approve it irrespective of the fact that it is not agreed and irrespective of the fact that it was entirely written by the employer.

The government's proposed amendments to greenfield agreements, in short, paved the way for employers to essentially negotiate with themselves. That is the fundamental inequity of the provision. The opposition opposes these amendments, because the bargaining process will not be improved by simply removing one party—namely, unions—from the negotiating table, where these amendments give employers the absolute advantage in negotiating.

After an employer agrees to bargain with an employer organisation, the employer at any time could issue notice to commence a three-month notified negotiation period. This countdown clock does not stop once it starts. An employer, in effect, could essentially walk away from the negotiating table and simply wait for those three months to expire and at the end of those three months, having merely looked in the mirror and had a good chat, the employer and only the employer could take a proposed agreement the Fair Work Commission for assessment and approval. Now where is the equity in that? Where is the genuineness in allowing the parties to reconcile outstanding differences? How could it possibly be reasonable that one party to a two-party agreement has the entire authority to determine the outcome if you cannot reach agreement? Is not a very strong position to be in. If you are the other party, you are wondering how much leverage do I have here? You do not have a lot of leverage because all the other side has to do is to say, 'Well, I thought about that, genuinely I have, but I don't think I can accede to that request,' and do that for three months and then, lo and behold, head it off to the Fair Work Commission—

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