Arch Bevis (Brisbane, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

In the few minutes that remain to me, I just want to add to the comments I was making prior to question time. I was making the point that millions of Australians have waited a long time for this day; that many Australians have suffered unfairly at the hands of the Work Choices legislation of the former Liberal government; and that that government, now in opposition, have failed to come to grips with the fact that they lost an election because the people of Australia rejected their views about these things.

For many Australian workers, the workplace, because of industrial relations practices under Work Choices—that name that dare not be spoken aloud; that name that those opposite banned public servants from using, so unpopular had it become—had become something of a house of horrors. But, when it comes to the positions that those opposite have in dealing with the legislation before us now, it is more like a house of mirrors, where there are 20 different images of the same person. That is the representation that the Liberal and National parties have given of their views on this industrial relations legislation. They say they are opposed to many of the features of the bill, but then they say they will not oppose the bill. They say that they have forsaken Work Choices, but not one of them will actually get up and say that Work Choices was wrong. In their heart of hearts, they are not only confused about their status in opposition but still tied to the discredited Work Choices legislation that hurt so many businesses and so many ordinary Australians.

There is one other example I want to add to those I mentioned before question time about the way in which these laws operated. A friend of mine operates a business in Queensland that has a highly specialised skill in dealing with their particular industry. They were contacted by a large organisation who wanted to subcontract some work to them for a Commonwealth government contract. My friend’s company employs its people on decent conditions on collective agreements. The head company that had the contract with the Commonwealth—the Howard government at the time—imposed on that company a requirement that they employ their workers under AWAs, so when they came to my friend’s company to engage them as subcontractors they told the subcontracting company they would have to put their workers on AWAs, to which my friend said, ‘We don’t do that; we don’t employ our people on AWAs.’ The head contractor then said: ‘We will not engage you. The Commonwealth obliges us to put our people on AWAs. If you’re going to work on this project you have to have your people on AWAs.’ They happen to be the only firm in Queensland with the expertise to do the job, so he spoke to the workers and the workers said, ‘We need the business. Put us on an AWA which is the same as we have and we’ll get on with the business.’ Much against their better judgement, they did. They turned up on the worksite wearing a helmet that had a BLF sticker on it, and they were then told that they were not allowed to enter the site because their helmet had a sticker on it that did not meet with the approval of John Howard’s laws and the contractor’s requirements. That was the absurdity of what the former government did.

We now have a bill before this parliament that puts fairness back into the workplace. It creates for the first time genuine bargaining in good faith. The former government said they supported bargaining, but there was no requirement for anyone to bargain in good faith and they did not. We are putting in place that fair bargaining system. We are putting the balance right. We are putting in the decent values that have underpinned Australian industrial laws since 1904. It is a bill all people in the parliament can be proud of. It is a bill that all on this side are proud of.

Debate (on motion by Mr Perrett) adjourned.