Don Farrell (SA, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for the Centenary of ANZAC) Share this | Hansard source

I move:

That, in the opinion of the Senate, the following is a matter of urgency:

The need for the Senate to condemn the Prime Minister's lack of empathy for Australian workers who rely on penalty rates to make ends meet.

I rise to speak in support of Senator Cameron's urgency motion. I will read it again. He said:

That in the opinion of the Senate, the following is a matter of urgency:

The need for the Senate to condemn the Prime Minister's lack of empathy for Australian workers who rely on penalty rates to make ends meet.

It almost needs no explanation, but I shall go to the matter. You have heard the term 'fake news', I am sure. I thought it was an American concept, connected with the last presidential election, the Donald Trump election, but I have to say that I think it has now infiltrated Australia and we are now finding this concept of 'fake news' becoming insidious in Australia. I would like to particularly refer to some remarks that Senator Seselja made to this Senate last Thursday. I am reluctant to repeat his comments, because they are so wrong as I will go on to explain, but I will read you what he said last Thursday in speaking on the very sensible piece of legislation that Senator Wong has introduced to reverse a decision of the Fair Work Commission in respect of reducing penalty rates in the retail and hospitality area. Senator Seselja said:

They sold me out on penalty rates. I think we got time and a half in the nineties on a Sunday. I was young. I was 19 and I joined the SDA in good faith, hoping they would do me a good deal. It turned out like so many others in the union movement and like Mr Shorten: they sold me and thousands of other workers out as well.

I did not think this sounded right, because I have some familiarity with that union, the shop assistants union, the SDA. It is a great union, full of great officials. So I rang one of these officials—Athol Williams was his name; he has been around for a long time in the ACT—and I said: 'This statement has been made by Senator Zed Seselja. Can we get this checked out?'—because the last thing I would want to happen is for Senator Seselja to mislead this parliament, particularly the Senate. 'Is it right that Senator Seselja was sold out?' I know Senator Seselja has had his problems. He lost to Senator Gallagher a couple of years ago. He got pushed out of the ACT by Jerry Hanson. So I thought perhaps I should feel sorry for him.

So I got this information checked out. And what did I discover when I checked out this fake news? Fake news seems to be where you say something that is untrue and then, to a certain portion of the electorate or the community, it suddenly becomes truth. Was Senator Seselja 'sold out' by this fantastic union? Let's look at the facts. My mum used to say a little knowledge is sometimes dangerous. Of course, that is the case in Senator Seselja's speech. What he seems to assert is that the penalty rate that he received on a Sunday, being time and a half, was a sell-out provision. Unfortunately for Senator Seselja the circumstances back in the 1990s, when he was working for Woolworths as a 19-year-old, was that there was an award that covered the Australian Capital Territory, the relevant shop award—every state and territory had a slightly different penalty rate; it was not like it is now—and the penalty rate in the ACT followed the penalty rates in New South Wales, which was time and a half.

So Senator Seselja was receiving time and a half. We checked out the agreement he was under. He was receiving time and a half, but he was also receiving higher wages and conditions. I am not sure whether he was casual or part time; it does not really matter; the calculations are the same. If he was a part-timer, then he was about 5.5 per cent better off than if he had been under the award. If he was a casual—and you have to make a few assumptions here—he was anywhere between 7.8 and 11 per cent better off. So this senator who got up in this place with fake news claiming he had been sold out by the union was in fact better off than if he had been under the award.

The reality is that Senator Seselja misunderstood his terms and conditions. Thank God he had a union like the SDA, which did not misunderstand the situation! They got him an increase, they got him a pay rise, and— (Time expired)