Andrew Bartlett (Queensland, Australian Democrats) Share this | Hansard source

by leave—The Democrats also will not oppose this proposal to allow the Workplace Relations Amendment (Transition to Forward with Fairness) Bill 2008 to be exempted from the cut-off. Nonetheless, the reason for the cut-off should be emphasised, and that is to prevent legislation from being rushed through without proper scrutiny. Workplace relations are, of course, immensely important politically. They were pivotal, I think we would all agree, in the last federal election. They are also immensely important in terms of the law and the impact it has on Australians—including the ubiquitous working families. That is a reminder to us all about the dangers of actually rushing through legislation without ensuring proper consideration of it.

I appreciate the new government wants to press home its political advantage and its political win in regard to this issue, but we do need to be careful that in pushing through legislation as quickly as possible and trying to force through the political gain we do not end up with legislation that is not as effective as it would otherwise be—even taking into account whether people agree with the policy aims of the government. I do get nervous when I hear the new government and the new minister, Ms Gillard, making noises very similar to the previous government about how they have got a mandate and they have to push this legislation through, they are not going to agree to any changes except, possibly, for technical amendments and the Senate should just get out of the way and let the legislation through—it does not sound terribly dissimilar.

I understand the political reason for that but let’s not forget that this is not just about politics; it is about what laws the people of Australia end up with. This legislation does not scrap Work Choices; it modifies some of it—it does not even scrap individual statutory agreements. I will not get into debating the legislation, but we will have a lot of spin and a lot of posturing over the next week. I am not naive enough to suggest that should not happen but I think that we do need to at least leave some part of our consciousness cognisant of the need to ensure the legislation is actually effective in a real-world sense in terms of what it achieves, rather than just effective in terms of the immediate political needs of the government.