Kim Carr (Victoria, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister Assisting the Leader for Science) Share this | Hansard source

The Fair Work (Registered Organisations) Amendment Bill 2014 has been introduced in a hail of publicity in the final two weeks of sittings this year, along with the ABCC legislation. We noticed in the press today that the government has sought to play up how significant these matters are. I heard on Radio National today how busy we would be discussing these questions. Of course, the reality is very simple. This is a government that has no substantive legislative agenda. This is a government that has essentially stumbled through this year. It went to a double dissolution in June—it had a truncated and somewhat stunted budgetary program prior to that—in a desperate bid to clean out the Senate from the ravages of the crossbench, as the government saw it, only to find that that double dissolution turned out to be very bad for the government. The government has now been reduced to a majority of one. We have a Prime Minister who came into office just over a year ago full of hope and vigour, with great expectations of what he would achieve, only to find that those hopes and those expectations have been dashed, as we realised that this Prime Minister is a captive of the extreme right wing of his party and now has very little to say about the future direction of the country—unless it is actually approved by the extreme right wing of his party.

This morning, we had publicity around this bill and, of course, the ABCC bill. We have noticed in the last couple of weeks that this government has become increasingly hysterical in the language that it has used. Because it lacks a legislative program of substance, it now has to resort to the good old sturdy stand-bys of conservative governments—that is, racism and xenophobia, with a touch of a union bashing. That is really the hallmark of the government now, and this bill, of course, is very much part of that agenda.

The government has nothing to say about jobs and nothing to say about the circumstances under which ordinary Australians find themselves, in terms of declining economic opportunities. It has nothing to say about the fact that we have the lowest labour market participation rates in 30 years, that real wages have stalled and that living standards are declining in this country. It has nothing to say about the fact that we are shipping jobs offshore like it is going out of fashion. It has nothing to say about what the real circumstances of this country are. This is a desperate attempt to frighten the living daylights out of people by mocking up these proposals to try to suggest that, somehow or other, this is a government that actually stands for something other than the extreme right-wing agenda that, of course, gave Mr Turnbull the keys to the Lodge. Those were the terms on which he secured the Liberal Party leadership from Mr Abbott, and he could only act on these matters. So the great issues that he had made his name from, in terms of producing a progressive Australia, all went out the window in the desperate exchange that he made with the right wing of the Liberal Party so that he can appear to be running the government.

We just heard from Senator Reynolds the classic formulation of the proposition that the government advances. Those opposite say: 'We really like unions. We really think unions are good.' But, of course, it is a vision of unionism very different from what most Australians see as the role of trade unions. There is a vision of trade unionism on the Liberal side which essentially sees trade unions performing a tame cat role—acting like some sort of voluntary association, like all the other great interest groups of the country. But, in terms of having the industrial capacity to defend the rights of workers on the job, well, of course the unions are not really to be treated in that way, under this government's mentality. We do not have any talk about unions having a political role—that is regarded as illegitimate. What unions are really about is being some sort of voluntary organisation where you have a cup of tea and a bit of a chat every now and then, and you do not actually do anything about preserving real wages. You do not do anything about ensuring occupational health and safety. You do not do anything about defending working-class life in this country. That is not the role of unions, according to the Liberal Party; the role of the unions, essentially, is this legal fiction about the right to organise but not the right to actually do anything. This bill is a further extension of that proposition.

We have heard a lot about the misdemeanours and the various malfeasance actions of an isolated group of trade union officials, many of whom this minister has come into this chamber and waxed lyrically about, when matters are actually before the courts—only too happy to abandon the sub judice principles and blacken people's names, even those people who have been acquitted. We do not hear any acknowledgement that people actually are brought before the courts. Nor do we ever hear anything about the facts when people are acquitted of the crimes that she is accusing them of. And they are crimes, if they are proven, and that is the whole point.

This is a bill that does not really take any interest in making better workplaces or ending union or corporate corruption. It is not about that. And we make the point again and again that the labour movement has no room for corruption, no tolerance for corruption, wherever it occurs. It does not matter if it is a union official or a company executive; we take the view that that of course is not the intent of this bill in any event. That is the ruse. That is the device to use to establish a further step forward in a union-busting, antiworker agenda, as coalition governments have done for generation after generation.

There is a standard pattern here: establish a royal commission, make all sorts of sensational allegations, and then the reality is—take Cole, for instance: how many people were actually convicted of any offence, despite all the claims? What we see is this measure to establish a registered organisations commission, headed of course by a Liberal Party appointment. The new commission would have even greater powers than those available to the general manager of the Fair Work Commission. This is a bill that seeks to advance the antiworker agenda of this government, seeks to criminalise legitimate trade union activity. It is not about dealing with criminal offences, because these proposals here in themselves do not acknowledge that there are currently laws against criminal activity.

What we have here are in fact measures pertaining to penalties which are much higher for civil contraventions. As I said, it is about criminalising normal activity. These sanctions are essentially onerous and unfair. And we see the circulation of the government speaking notes, and not just amongst the government senators—Senator Macdonald and Senator Roberts now. I guess it is clear that the government speaking notes have now been distributed to One Nation; it is very clear, because they use exactly the same rhetoric, exactly the same examples, exactly the same circumstances.

What we have here is a simple proposition that the registered organisations act—and the government never acknowledges this—already prohibits members' money from being misused in favour of particular candidates, for instance in internal elections. The current laws in this country already allow for criminal charges to be laid where funds are stolen or obtained by fraud. Already our legislation in this country allows for the fair work commissioner to share information with police where that is appropriate. It already provides statutory penalties where orders of the Fair Work Commission or the Federal Court are unknowingly or recklessly contravened. We already have laws in terms of registered organisations about judiciary duty akin to the directors of the corporation law. That already exists at law. The current act already requires officers to disclose their personal interests.

Now, we acknowledge that it always needs to improve. But you have to actually acknowledge what the law is at the moment—what it is that you are seeking to improve. That is why we are proposing a whole series of amendments, including limitations on donations to make it consistent with the electoral act, and we have a contingent notice of motion provided for a series of amendments that we will propose in that regard. We will not support this bill, however, unless there are proper amendments. And of course we acknowledge that this is a bill that really is not about genuine reform; it is about the political agenda by this government, desperate, trying to cover up the fact that it has no broad agenda.

And now One Nation, which claimed that it came to this place as the enemy of the elites, has now demonstrated just how deeply antilabour and antiworker it is. It masquerades around its hostility to the elites but it has in fact become a tool of the elites. One Nation appeals to freedom of rule of law. But of course all of that rhetoric is shallow and empty, and it has been demonstrated to be such, because One Nation is in fact acting as the cat's paw for the Liberal Party in its antiworker, anti-union agenda. One Nation is of course about busting open the labour movement, who are the only bastions in this country to defend ordinary people against what are the abuses of corporate power, the abuses of the extraordinary capacity of the corporations in this country to actually take advantage of the current law.

These are the circumstances that need to be assessed when we are looking at these agendas, because now we have a party—the party of Work Choices—having yet again entered into this array of measures. And they have made it very clear in their other legislative agenda. They have made it very clear in the way they have conducted themselves in this parliament. We have seen the royal commissions established, as the historic pattern has shown. We have seen the deeply partisan actions of the government-appointed commissioner Mr Dyson Heydon. We know that the whole thing was an attempt to stigmatise the labour movement, to stigmatise leading members of the labour movement and to seek electoral advantage in so doing.

But of course the government was somewhat embarrassed by these measures and chose not to actually mention them too much in the last election. The reason for the election was not discussed—and that is a very simple proposition here—because they know that within the trade union movement there is very deep hostility to this. Even more important is that the Australian people understand how significant the trade union movement is to the history of this country and to the future of this country in ensuring protections of ordinary people's rights. This is a government that spent $60 million on its tainted royal commission. We know it was about hounding Labor leaders, that it was about hounding trade union officials and a transparent political agenda—which of course is not a surprise to anybody. We know that the Australian people are a wake up to these measures, just as they were to the Howard government's WorkChoices and the so-called Australian workplace agreements. In 2005 the Liberals sought to pretend that workers pay and conditions were protected by law. They in fact said at that time that wages were actually too high! Then they introduced various measures to freeze wages—to affect the consequences of their policies by reducing living standards and cutting wages. This, of course, was part of a much more detailed program of union busting.

We know the public is a wake up to this and we saw this in the submissions to the various inquiries into this bill. That is why this bill has been knocked back several times in this chamber. It is quite clear that between the union movement and employers there is an understanding of how dangerous these measures are when they are used by a hostile government that wants to undermine the capacity of workers to organise and defend themselves.

It is not just a question of the intransigence of the chamber; it is the fact that the government itself understands deeply it needs to accept a whole series of amendments because this bill is deeply flawed. If this bill was genuinely about reform, it would acknowledge what is happening within the police services across the country and their capacity to investigate crimes. It would acknowledge that the Australian Crime Commission already has coercive powers to investigate crime. These are the appropriate agencies to deal with criminal matters. They are not industrial relations bodies. It should be left up to the people who are actually responsible for dealing with criminal matters; it should not be about criminalising trade union activity.

What the shadow minister, the member for Gorton, has foreshadowed on behalf the Labor Party is a whole series of amendments which are designed to provide stronger penalties, but which would exempt volunteers. Earlier I heard Senator Reynolds say, 'Of course, we can't have ASIC regulate registered organisations.' Doesn't that give a lie to the proposition that there should be equality of treatment between company directors and trade union officials? Shouldn't the same body do it? What we are hearing today is: 'Oh no we can't possibly do that because we need a specialised political police to organise union-busting activities.'

There have been important electoral changes of ensuring proper accountability to democratic principles, including disclosure of electoral donations by companies or banks. I would dearly love to see details of the way banks operate and how they influence the political direction of this country. I would dearly love to see the operations of companies in, for example, the recent scandals involving franchise chain stores; I would dearly love to see the level of political engagement that they have had. I would also love to see the Australian Securities and Investment Commission have the power to investigate serious contraventions of the act. I would have thought that, if the government were serious about equality of treatment before the law, it would accept these amendments.

Given the sort of misconduct we are talking about, we would expect the government to engage properly with the opposition on these matters rather than seek a blatantly political attack on unions, as we have heard today and as we have heard again and again, as this government desperately tries to cover up the fact that it has very little to say about the future directions of this country. We are saying that we should not have different standards for workers and employers. We acknowledge that, and that is why our amendments go to that question.

In 2012 is that the present Leader of the Opposition, as the minister for employment, introduced reforms to various laws regulating registered organisations. Those changes acknowledged that the penalties could be tripled for breaches of a Fair Work registered organisation. The legislation required education and training and responsibilities of governance to be provided to officials of registered organisations, both employers and unions. It enhanced the investigative powers available to Fair Work Australia, including giving the general manager of Fair Work the power to share information with federal and state police. The reforms corrected a serious flaw in the regulatory regime, which had been introduced by the former minister for industrial relations—who was, of course, Mr Tony Abbott.

The rhetoric and the misinformation peddled by the government never acknowledges that there is a history to these matters and that there are quite strong provisions within the current regulatory arrangements. If the government was to be honest about this arrangement, it would acknowledge that its real agenda is about destroying the union movement and about trying to destroy the links between the trade union movement and the Labor Party. We are proud of our relationship with the unions of this country. Unlike the Liberals, we actually acknowledge the critical role that unions play in defence of working people and in the advancement of a progressive and fair economy. Unions have driven fundamental social and economic reform in this country and every benefit has flowed to the people of this country—the eight-hour day, annual leave, sick leave, weekend penalty rates, workplace safety laws, equal pay for women, Medicare, superannuation. How many of these measures were supported by the parties of town and country capital in this country? Not one of these social justice measures was ever supported by a conservative political party in this country. We have to acknowledge some simple and basic principles are at stake here—the principles of a fair Australia, a just Australia, and an Australia in which everybody has rights, which can be defended in the workplace or at the ballot box. This bill seeks to undermine that fundamental industrial and political principle.