Don Randall (Canning, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

My question is addressed to the Minister for Employment and Workplace Relations. Is the minister aware of the most recent industrial disputes data for the state of Western Australia? Is the minister also aware of support for a return to pattern bargaining? What impact would this have on the Western Australian economy, specifically, and on the national economy?

Joe Hockey (North Sydney, Liberal Party, Minister Assisting the Prime Minister for the Public Service) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I thank the member for Canning for his question. I note that the unemployment rate in 1996 was 9.1 per cent in Canning; today it is 4.8 per cent. I am pleased to report that the latest disputes data confirms that just 0.3 working days per 1,000 employees were lost in Western Australia in the final quarter of 2006. Now, that is a massive 430 times lower than the peak under Labor in 1991. That rate is the lowest rate ever recorded by the Australian Bureau of Statistics. It is also the case, of course, that Australia has the lowest level of industrial disputation since 1913—since records were first kept.

That is good for the economy of Western Australia and it is good for the Australian economy. Under Work Choices, the Howard government has said that it is unlawful to take industrial action in support of pattern bargaining. Work Choices is about genuine bargaining, not copycat bargaining. Yet the Deputy Leader of the Opposition, on two occasions now, has refused to rule out, under the Labor Party, the return of pattern bargaining. On Meet the Press on the weekend, and on The 7.30 Report, the Deputy Leader of the Opposition went out of her way not to indicate that the Labor Party would continue with our policy in relation to pattern bargaining.

So the Labor Party believes in the one-size-fits-all approach to industrial relations. Before the Baird committee in Western Australia last week, the Reserve Bank Governor, Glenn Stevens, had pattern bargaining in mind when he said:

I do not think it is any secret that if, for some reason, labour markets became much more rigid, much more prone to very large wage increases, which were not related to productivity and which flowed across industries the way they did many years ago, that that probably would constitute something of a problem for managing resource booms like we presently have.

Craig Emerson (Rankin, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Service Economy, Small Business and Independent Contractors) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Dr Emerson interjecting

David Hawker (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The member for Rankin is warned!

Joe Hockey (North Sydney, Liberal Party, Minister Assisting the Prime Minister for the Public Service) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

So the Reserve Bank Governor is saying that pattern bargaining—one-size-fits-all bargaining—can have a negative impact on the economy. It can push up inflation and it can push up interest rates.

Julia Gillard (Lalor, Australian Labor Party, Deputy Leader of the Opposition) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Ms Gillard interjecting

David Hawker (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The Deputy Leader of the Opposition is warned!

Joe Hockey (North Sydney, Liberal Party, Minister Assisting the Prime Minister for the Public Service) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

So what is the Labor Party’s position? Go straight to the paymaster of the Labor Party, Greg Combet. He said, in November last year, that the ACTU has developed a comprehensive policy which naturally supports the rights of workers, delegates and the union to pattern bargain across an industry. If you are looking for potential economic vandalism look no further than the Labor Party and its current policy to reintroduce pattern bargaining, because pattern bargaining can have a negative impact on inflation by pushing it up and it can have a negative impact on interest rates by pushing them up. We are about a strong economy; the Labor Party is about protecting its union mates.