Gavin Marshall (Victoria, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

I am disappointed that the opposition and Senator Fielding are not going to support all of the amendments. Senator Fielding indicated that he was concerned with some of the stories that he heard during the inquiry, and he should be. He should be concerned because this is an industry where there is massive exploitation. This Senate has looked at this issue over the last 20 years. There have been Senate inquiries, there has been legislation and there has been a lot of bipartisan work done by this Senate to try to address the exploitation that happens in this industry. But it has not worked. What we have done in the Senate up until now has not been enough. It is not because of a lack of effort from those who try to implement the basic fundamental laws that give these people protection from the exploitation. It is not through lack of effort; it is through a lack of legislation. It is through a lack of ability to rid this country of this severe exploitation and of those who wish to exploit this type of work.

The stories that we heard in the Senate inquiry are real stories; they are genuine stories; they are about the most vulnerable people—from non-English-speaking backgrounds, from lower socioeconomic groups. This is the only work many of these people can get, and the nature of this industry allows them to be exploited. We have a responsibility and an obligation as legislators to legislate to have a practical effect to end that exploitation. We can argue about the powers and whether they go too far. In the normal sense of things, that is the proper political debate that we have in this place, but when we know that there is exploitation going on, and that is not disputed, we have an obligation to fix it. If we have to go further in this particular industry than we do for any other industry, we should do so.

Senator Fielding, I would ask you to reconsider. If you think it has gone too far and if we find that, all of a sudden, outworkers are driving BMWs, wearing gold chains and buying multiple houses, I will come back in this place and say, ‘You’re right; we went too far,’ but I suspect, even with the amendments that the government proposes, there will still be massive exploitation. I am hopeful that these amendments, as a lot, will take us a large step forward in ending the exploitation which has been well known and well documented by the Senate. We have tried to legislate in a bipartisan way before to get a good result, but it has not been enough. We have to take the extra step, we have to go further, because I do not want the Asian Women at Work group, Fair Work Australia and all the people who have constantly come to the Senate committee process and told us their stories, inquiry after inquiry after inquiry, to keep coming back, telling us their stories and asking us why we have not been able to fix the problem.

I just want to emphasise again: it is not because of the lack of effort, commitment or dedication of those who care about that industry and try to fix it. You have met those people—you know how dedicated they were. It is because there is a lack of legislation and a lack of power to give those people the right to do those investigations, the right to just give those people the most basic, minimum standards. That is what we need to do. I ask you, Senator Fielding: reconsider and support the whole tranche of the government’s amendments.