Penny Wong (SA, Australian Labor Party, Minister for Climate Change and Water) Share this | Hansard source

If the senator opposite did not understand what I was saying, I will say it again. We will have a fair and balanced workplace relations system based on bargaining at the enterprise level, with productivity gains as the basis for wage increases. That is the incentive for wage increases. We are not returning to a system of centralised wage fixation or of industry-wide strikes or pattern agreements across an industry. That was very clearly the approach we outlined prior to the election. We are attempting, despite the fact that the opposition does not like it, to implement our policies through the introduction and passage of the transition legislation through this chamber. I look forward to the opposition’s support for a piece of legislation which will end the wage-stripping and condition-stripping Australian workplace agreements.