Glenn Sterle (WA, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

Senator Back, I am not arguing with you. No-one would ever argue against Senator Back's credentials. We may have a difference of opinion about this bill; I have no doubt about that.

But I know darn well how it is when you come home from Darwin; you are absolutely buggered; you have been doing ridiculous hours—because in the wild west fatigue management was 'keep driving until you fell asleep at the wheel or go home'. And you come home and see bills. I remember the famous old bills they used to have in the eighties, with a picture of a finger with a ribbon around it on the corner because it had not been paid. I have not stopped working but I have not paid my tyre bill or my fuel bill, and it is building up.

Why do we have to sit here and continuously watch coalition governments that unfortunately want to at every opportunity attack unionised labour and unionised sites? Not only that; what about the indignity where an employer has come to an arrangement with their workforce and done a collective agreement, with the union helping out as the third party? Guess what? 'We better not give them any government work'. I do not suggest for one minute it is every member opposite, but I tell you what: there are a lot of them. And I will be absolutely gobsmacked if I ever hear one on the other side get up and defend workers. And, if any of you were employers, I would expect you to defend your employees. What difference are they to the construction workers on these sites. (Time expired)