Anthony Albanese (Grayndler, Australian Labor Party, Prime Minister) Share this | Hansard source

I am asked about the ABCC and why my government supports abolishing the ABCC. I am also asked about donations in the construction sector. Let me tell you a little story about donations in the construction sector involving Hanssen Pty Ltd, which has donated at least $175,000 to the Liberal Party since 2014. In October 2016, Marianka Heumann, a 27-year-old German backpacker, tragically fell 13 storeys to her death on a Hanssen worksite. Employees were forced to continue working while Ms Heumann lay on the ground, covered with a sheet. Hanssen's company was fined $60,000 for health and safety violations, which Hanssen dismissed as a 'legal technicality'. This is what the judge said:

(Mr Hanssen) was blinded by his hatred of the applicants in preventing the taking of logical, rational and reasonable steps of entry and inspection that would have protected and assisted his employees. That was not to their benefit.

In 2018 the company was taken to court—by the union, not by the ABCC—for being knowingly involved in the underpayment of a backpacker under an alleged sham contracting arrangement. The case went to the High Court. It found that the backpacker employed by labour hire company Personnel Contracting was an employee covered by an award, not a self-employed contractor, as he had been designated. He'd been earning 25 per cent less than the award. You'd think that the ABCC might have taken action on that.

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