Arthur Sinodinos (NSW, Liberal Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary Assisting the Leader of the Opposition) Share this | Hansard source

None of this confected outrage from you, Senator Evans; we know your form. The Liberal Party is not owned by any section of society; that is very important to remember.

I am disappointed in the contemporary trade union movement. In my maiden speech I talked about the reform surge of the 1980s and the crucial role played by people like Bill Kelty. That was a trade union movement that was forward looking and progressive, that knew Australia had to change. Reform had to happen, and they were willing to help manage the change. Things like the superannuation system that Senator Marshall spoke about were part of the fruit of that sort of partnership.

Today the trade union movement has become fearful, defensive and inward looking. The union movement today wants to mandate job security. They are not outward looking, they are not progressing. They are not sponsoring reform; they are standing in the way of reform, and that is not good for the government of Australia. Australia needs to keep reforming, particularly now that in the period ahead the terms of trade will not be rising in the way they have in the recent past. Our productivity has to go up. Our competitiveness has to go up. Our costs are 30 to 40 per cent out of kilter with the rest of the world. Some of that is the Australian dollar but a lot of it is the way our costs have gone up, particularly during the mining boom, and those costs are now locked in. We need to be more productive and more competitive. We need a union movement that is a genuine partner in that task, and that means that we have to review the Fair Work Act, among other things. It means we have to review all the ways in which regulations potentially shackle productivity and innovation.

The trade union movement today, unlike that of the eighties, seems incapable of leading that debate and that change. It is too defensive. The trade union movement today is more concerned about the perks and lurks of being involved in the superannuation sector. We need a thorough investigation of the role of unions in industry funds and in the superannuation sector. The reason for that is there are too many instances where trade union officials are doubling up. They have their day jobs as union officials and they are trustees of super funds, and sometimes, as in the case of Bernie Riordan in New South Wales, they are also chairing financial service organisations that are providing services to those superannuation funds with which they are associated. What sort of conflict of interest is that?

This is the same Bernie Riordan who was one of the prime movers in blocking the privatisation of electricity assets in New South Wales along with his good friend and now opposition leader in New South Wales John Robertson. How is that good for the government of New South Wales, one-third of the national economy, and therefore good for the state of the Australian economy? Yet today we have the Minister for Resources, Energy and Tourism, Martin Ferguson, who is one of the few Labor people who tells it like it is in the economic sector, saying that states should be looking to privatise their assets. This government should be telling the ETU and everybody else who is in the way to cooperate with state governments to get that done. This will unlock resources which can be used for other, more productive forms of infrastructure.

How is John Robertson good for the government in New South Wales? He is now virtually irrelevant as Leader of the Opposition. Doesn't it say a lot about the structure of the Australian Labor Party that in New South Wales they can have a leader of the opposition who is one of the prime architects of the downfall of the former Labor government? This is someone who oversaw the destruction of that government from the time of Morris Iemma onwards. How is that good for the government of Australia?

These are the structural problems that Labor has to face. All political parties face their challenges. None of us are exempt from criticism from time to time, but this is a structural problem that is getting worse and worse. It is because Labor in one sense became too successful at gaining power and, to paraphrase Lord Acton, power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely. The trade unions today have absolute power over the Labor Party, and that is the challenge that the ordinary rank and file of the Labor Party face. These are the people who are out there handing out how-to-vote cards; the ones who trudge up, doing their best, because they believe in old-fashioned Labor values. Then they see their party is effectively run by faceless men—mostly men these days. They think, 'There must be a better way.' No wonder so many young, idealistic people on the left have tended to shift to the Greens or other parties. They think, 'I can't get ahead in the Labor Party. The only way I'll get ahead in the Labor Party is to join a union; I'll have to be sponsored by a union.' That is not a great message to give young people.

This is a time when most young people look at unions and say, 'What can they really do for me in the modern workplace?' Senator Marshall talks about the protections provided by unions. The protection provided to every worker in Australia lies in the productivity and competitiveness of the Australian economy. That is what ultimately underwrites all the benefits that the labour movement and others have been able to get. Those benefits are there because we are a rich country—and, yes, there can be a debate about how we divide the spoils of being a rich country—but those riches were not gained by trade unions simply existing. They were gained by people working hard and having faith in the future.

Sitting suspended from 18 : 00 to 19 : 00