House debates
Tuesday, 8 August 2006
Questions without Notice
Workplace Relations
2:46 pm
Peter Slipper (Fisher, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source
My question is to the Minister for Employment and Workplace Relations. Minister, can you confirm that the ACTU has been making false claims about the government’s workplace relations reforms? Would the minister be kind enough to outline to the House the real situation in relation to these claims?
Kevin Andrews (Menzies, Liberal Party, Minister Assisting the Prime Minister for the Public Service) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source
I thank the member for Fisher for his question. It is true that in June this year the ACTU commenced a series of advertisements claiming to be the real experiences of Australians under Work Choices. Those experiences have been investigated by the independent umpire, the Office of Workplace Services, to see whether any rights of workers were being abused. The result of that investigation was that the Office of Workplace Services, an independent body, found that these claims were phoney and misleading.
Kim Beazley (Brand, Australian Labor Party, Leader of the Opposition) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source
Mr Beazley interjecting
Kevin Andrews (Menzies, Liberal Party, Minister Assisting the Prime Minister for the Public Service) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source
The Leader of the Opposition interjects. I remind him that, in the last election campaign, he promised to put more money into the Office of Workplace Services.
Brendan O'Connor (Gorton, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source
Mr Brendan O’Connor interjecting
Kevin Andrews (Menzies, Liberal Party, Minister Assisting the Prime Minister for the Public Service) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source
What we have now is the secretary of the ACTU and the opposition attacking the umpire, the Office of Workplace Services, simply because it has revealed that these advertisements were phoney and misleading. This week the ACTU has launched a new series of ads but, instead of these being the real experiences of ordinary Australians, they are now using actors. They are now using actors in this new series of ads.
Brendan O'Connor (Gorton, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source
Mr Brendan O’Connor interjecting
David Hawker (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source
Order! The member for Gorton is warned!
Kevin Andrews (Menzies, Liberal Party, Minister Assisting the Prime Minister for the Public Service) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source
Why are they using actors? Because it was shown that what was in the previous series of ads was misleading and did not stack up. What we have here is the ACTU and the Australian Labor Party dipping their hands into the pockets of ordinary working Australians and ripping out $20 million to pay for a series of deceptive and misleading ads. That is what has happened, and that is what the Office of Workplace Services has shown.
Kim Beazley (Brand, Australian Labor Party, Leader of the Opposition) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source
Mr Beazley interjecting
David Hawker (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source
Order! The Leader of the Opposition! The Leader of the Opposition will cease interjecting.
John Howard (Bennelong, Liberal Party, Prime Minister) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source
He has got to withdraw what he said. Did you hear what he said? You called him a snivelling—I know what you called him. Even I could hear that. Everybody could hear that.
Tony Abbott (Warringah, Liberal Party, Leader of the House) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source
Mr Speaker, I heard the Leader of the Opposition use very offensive language against the minister for workplace relations and, under the standing orders which he claims to uphold, he should withdraw it.
David Hawker (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source
I call the Leader of the Opposition.
Kim Beazley (Brand, Australian Labor Party, Leader of the Opposition) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source
Just so you know exactly what I said, Mr Speaker—
David Hawker (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source
The Leader of the Opposition will withdraw.
Kim Beazley (Brand, Australian Labor Party, Leader of the Opposition) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source
I referred to the people who reported to him on those people they alleged to investigate, and only one of whom—I described them as ‘snivelling little liars’. Now, if he wants me to withdraw that, I withdraw.
David Hawker (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source
I thank the Leader of the Opposition.
Kevin Andrews (Menzies, Liberal Party, Minister Assisting the Prime Minister for the Public Service) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source
What the Leader of the Opposition has just confirmed is that he is prepared to attack the independent umpire on the orders of Greg Combet and the ACTU—
David Hawker (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source
If the level of interjections does not drop, I will deal with people immediately. I call the minister.
Kevin Andrews (Menzies, Liberal Party, Minister Assisting the Prime Minister for the Public Service) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source
These are honest Australian public servants doing their job, and they do not deserve that sort of description from the Leader of the Opposition. The only reason they get it is that the Office of Workplace Services dared to reveal the truth about the misleading ads from the ACTU. At the start of this campaign, the Leader of the Opposition and the unions said that the new laws would be a green light for mass sackings in Australia. What has happened in the last couple of months is that we have seen 100,000 new jobs created in Australia. That is what we have seen. We are proud of these laws. We are not going to rip them up and go back to the 1980s and the sort of economy that the Leader of the Opposition was partly responsible for. We are about building the prosperity of this country, and these reforms are about doing that.
2:51 pm
Stephen Smith (Perth, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Industry, Infrastructure and Industrial Relations) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source
My question is to the Prime Minister. I refer the Prime Minister to his comments on Meet the Press last Sunday about the government’s industrial relations changes:
... most of the concerns that have been raised so far have been phoney ...
Has the Prime Minister seen comments by Catholic Bishop Kevin Manning in the latest edition of the Catholic Weekly that the government’s industrial relations legislation is ‘manifestly unjust’, removes ‘fundamental measures of fairness’, ‘violates ... any reasonable notion of a “fair go”’, is ‘weighted “too heavily”’ and ‘stacks the scales in favour of the employer’?
Cameron Thompson (Blair, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source
Mr Cameron Thompson interjecting
Stephen Smith (Perth, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Industry, Infrastructure and Industrial Relations) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source
Does the Prime Minister believe Bishop Manning’s concerns are phoney?
John Howard (Bennelong, Liberal Party, Prime Minister) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source
I have not read last week’s issue of the Catholic Weekly. I apologise to the Catholics in the House for not having done so. I accept I apologise particularly to some of those opposite and behind me, but I am not surprised—may I be frank and, I hope, courteously frank to His Grace—that Bishop Manning should have made those comments. Over the years I think Bishop Manning on a number of issues has been quite critical of the government’s policies. I respect his right to do that, but I would point out that even a Catholic bishop does not speak for all Catholics in this country. I know many devout mass-going Catholics who are very strong supporters of this legislation. I know that they have absolutely no difficulty in reconciling support for this legislation with their Catholic faith. We have been talking a little bit about politics and the Christian heritage in the last few days, and I think it is very important to make the obvious statement that there is no such thing as a Catholic position on industrial relations. I do not claim any particular support of Christian doctrine in relation to it.
Anthony Albanese (Grayndler, Australian Labor Party, Deputy Manager of Opposition Business in the House) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source
Mr Albanese interjecting
David Hawker (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source
The member for Grayndler is warned!
John Howard (Bennelong, Liberal Party, Prime Minister) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source
I think many of these issues are such that, if you read the Bible conscientiously, you could probably find some passages that supported our point of view and you could find some passages that supported the other point of view. I think if we are sensible, we will not try to invoke the plot for either side of the argument. If we are to have a sensible debate on the merits of this legislation, my advice to every person on this side of the House is: let’s leave out of the debate indications by the clergy to either side of the argument. As to the substance of what I said on Meet the Press, do you know what I had ringing in my ears?
Kevin Rudd (Griffith, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Foreign Affairs and Trade and International Security) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source
Mr Rudd interjecting
John Howard (Bennelong, Liberal Party, Prime Minister) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source
It was not the words of Bishop Manning or indeed the words of somebody of the cloth who was supporting our legislation. What I had ringing in my ears was the denunciation of the ACTU advertisements by the Office of Workplace Services. We had a number of examples. We had the lady who had worked for the RSL. What Greg Combet’s ad did not disclose—there was no reference to it—was that she received a severance payment which was above what she was entitled to by law. What the Office of Workplace Services revealed—
Cameron Thompson (Blair, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source
Mr Cameron Thompson interjecting
Stephen Smith (Perth, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Industry, Infrastructure and Industrial Relations) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source
Mr Speaker, I rise on a point of order. The question was about whether he regarded Bishop Manning’s comments as phoney.
David Hawker (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source
The Prime Minister is addressing the substance of the question.
John Howard (Bennelong, Liberal Party, Prime Minister) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source
As I was saying, what was ringing in my ears—and as I remember correctly and I think I heard it correctly, the member for Perth asked me about my interview on Meet the Presswas what Greg Combet’s ad said was that the workers at the Cowra Abattoir had been unfairly treated as a result of the Work Choices legislation. What was found by the Office of Workplace Services was that the firm was losing money because of, inter alia, the drought; therefore, it had no alternative but to let staff go. I remind the Leader of the Opposition and everybody who sits behind him that, back in the early 1990s, many firms in Australia were going broke and those opposite had a very highly regulated industrial relations system.
Brendan O'Connor (Gorton, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source
Mr Brendan O’Connor interjecting
David Hawker (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source
The member for Gorton will remove himself under standing order 94(a).
The member for Gorton then left the chamber.
John Howard (Bennelong, Liberal Party, Prime Minister) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source
What I also had ringing in my ears was, having read the Australian the previous day, there was reported a case before the—
Julia Gillard (Lalor, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Health and Manager of Opposition Business in the House) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source
Mr Speaker, I rise on a point of order on relevance. The only thing not ringing in the Prime Minister’s ears is the question he was asked. All of this is strictly irrelevant, and I ask you to bring him back to the question.
David Hawker (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source
I call the Prime Minister. The Prime Minister is answering the substance of the question.
John Howard (Bennelong, Liberal Party, Prime Minister) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source
The ringing in my ears was the case of the former employee of that union in Victoria, the union that is run by—who is it?—Dean Mighell. In this case, an employee of the union was taking the union to the IRC complaining about an unfair dismissal. I wonder what law she was using. But the interesting thing is not what she was doing but what Dean’s response was. He said, ‘This is all nonsense’—he did not quite say that, but that will do for parliament—‘this is not an unfair dismissal, this is a genuine redundancy.’ In other words, when Cowra Abattoir does it, it is outrageous but, when the union does it, it is a genuine redundancy. That is what I mean by phoney.