Katy Gallagher (ACT, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Finance) Share this | Hansard source

) ( ): I rise to speak about the Fair Work (Registered Organisations) Amendment (Ensuring Integrity) Bill 2019 today. This is a bad bill and Labor will be voting against it. But this is a dangerous bill—dangerous because it will erode the ability of unions to represent their members and keep them safe, dangerous because it further singles out one group of organisations across civil society and treats them differently to others and dangerous because it directly attacks, in a legislative form, and seeks to dismantle the rights of working people in this country to organise and be represented as a collective movement.

Those opposite will say it does none of these things, but that's not the truth. The bill will erode the organisational capacity and capability of unions to represent their members. Let's not forget that this is the government of Work Choices. This bill is Work Choices in a different form but with exactly the same outcome in mind. If unions are not able to operate or are crippled by regulation so they are unable to do the work they need to do for their members, it will deliver exactly what this government wants. We know this government thrives on division and prioritises the driving of wedges between political opponents. It would be easy to look at the bill in isolation and see it in this way. But this legislation and the union bashing that comes with it is, I think, actually part of a much more sinister and underhanded agenda of this government, an agenda which seeks to demonise and isolate those organisations and individuals who seek to disagree with or actively agitate against this government. It is coordinated, it is planned and it is being rolled out right under our noses.

We have a Prime Minister who governs for the 'quiet Australians', an ill-defined group that includes those who are too busy to follow politics. Sometimes quiet Australians are referred to as the 'quiet masses' or the 'quiet army'. Anyway, you're left without any doubt that to be quiet is to be revered by this Prime Minister. It may surprise the Prime Minister, but my guess is that many of those quiet Australians are union members or people who rely on unions to support them and to speak up for them. The Prime Minister doesn't seem to like those who speak up. Take the environmental movement. Our Prime Minister refers to these people as anarchists who engage in economic sabotage with 'indulgent and selfish practices' and who deny the liberties of Australians before threatening to crack down to them. The Prime Minister has referred to street protests as an insidious threat to our society. We have a Prime Minister who demeans the role of politicians and the important work done by the Public Service by referring to the 'Canberra bubble' in negative terms. He's redefining a Prime Minister's traditional accountability to the public by simply refusing to answer questions in press conferences by writing them off with the 'Canberra bubble' defence when it is actually he who presides over and controls the agenda of that bubble. And don't forget the Prime Minister's warning to senior business leaders who would involve themselves in debates and campaigns across civil society. He wanted to make them quiet and instructed them to stick to their knitting.

This government is all about quietening down participation in public life, and it knows that unions get in the way of this. The government doesn't just want Australians to be quiet; it wants them to be silent. Now, with the typical mindless marketing guff that passes for policy in this government, we have before us a bill that purports to be about ensuring integrity—but this bill does no such thing. It's a silly name for a bill with a sinister purpose. It's not about integrity. It's about quelling political dissent and making Australian workers stay quiet, compliant and obedient—quiet about fair pay, quiet about conditions, quiet about safe workplaces and quiet about taking collective action or bargaining wage outcomes together as a group.

This bill seeks to impose on one part of civil society a set of standards that the government are unwilling to apply elsewhere, least of all to their frontbench. It takes a special kind of gall for this ethically adrift government to stake out political ground in the integrity stakes. If they really wanted to do something about integrity in Australian public life they'd be legislating to mandate a bit more integrity closer to home. Where is the 'ensuring integrity in Minister Taylor's fake documents' bill, or the 'ensuring integrity in grasslands assessment and investigations' bill, or the 'ensuring integrity in Minister Dutton's au pair migration for mates' bill, or the 'ensuring integrity in Minister Robert's $38,000 home internet bill' bill, or the 'ensuring integrity in the NDIS' bill, or the 'ensuring integrity in robodebt' bill, or the 'ensuring integrity in the half a billion dollars in contracts to Paladin' bill, or the 'ensuring integrity in spending $185 million reopening and then closing Christmas Island' bill? Where are all those bills? More fundamentally, where is the Liberal and National parties' commitment to integrity in government more generally? Where is their policy framework for rooting out, investigating and exposing corruption? Where is the proposal for a national integrity commission with teeth?

This government doesn't care about integrity. It cares deeply about silencing its political opponents. We have a government that refuses to take responsibility for anything, regardless of the fact that it has been in government for seven years and three terms and with three Prime Ministers. Their first response to any issue or challenge facing the government is to blame Labor. There was a time when the role of the Prime Minister was to unite the country, to encourage social cohesion and to provide leadership. Where have those days gone?

This is a government that doesn't have a plan. It doesn't have a plan for the economy, with economic growth at its lowest level since the GFC, household living standards declining and wages growing at one-sixth of the rate of profits—the worst wages growth on record. Yesterday we found out that low wages growth is now the new normal. There are now 1.9 million people unemployed or underemployed. Household debt is at record levels, and business investment and consumer confidence are down. Productivity is declining, and the government have, uniquely, managed to deliver skill shortages and wage stagnation at the same time. This government doesn't have a plan. It doesn't have a plan for skills, productivity, climate change, aged care or health care. Where's your energy policy? Where's the plan or vision in education? How is the government going to provide dignified support for Australians who are ageing? How is the government going to deal with escalating costs in child care? How is the government going to deliver the dream that is the NDIS, instead of using it as a vehicle to bolster the budget bottom line? Where is the plan with the federation as we head into 2020? Why is there a delay in implementing the banking royal commission recommendations? And what has happened with the integrity commission? There were promises made, before the election, of a hopelessly inadequate body, and there is silence after it.

The only plan this government has is to undermine, attack and dismantle, through the incumbency of government, the features of our civil society which have been fundamental to the success of and trust in our democratic processes, and that means unions and their leaders are well and truly in its sights. This Senate, if it votes to support the government with this bill, will be complicit in that. We know they won't stop with this bill. They'll be back. Of course they will. This is a government without values, ideas or principles that guide it. They will be back with legislation to continue to attack or dismantle whatever organisation or group they disagree with. This bill strikes a knife right in the heart of the role of organised labour across Australian society. Unions have always been at the heart of democratic progress in this country and they have always been at the heart of the Australian Labor Party. This government knows this. Their blind hatred of their political opponents is what's motivating them with this bill. The bill is political. It's a political attack against the Labor Party and it's a political attack on union members.

For as long as I've been a member of the ALP, we have had to fight conservative politicians in their never-ending campaign to curtail the power of organisations that represent working people. That's been over 24 years for me, and I know these battles were being waged long before I joined the ALP. Unions have been a force for good, for fairness, for equality, for inclusion and for diversity in Australia. They have delivered all of the workplace conditions most Australians enjoy, and history shows Australian trade unions have been at the front of all campaigns to expand democratic rights—the right to vote, the right to an eight-hour day, rights for First Australians, equal rights for women and removal of discrimination.

This government, through this mean and menacing legislation, is wanting to break apart the strength of that collective movement. That's what really drives this government and that's what's motivating this dreadful bill. Sure, they will dress it up with talk of inappropriate behaviour by some union officials, which no-one in this place, including the Labor Party, endorses in any way. But make no mistake: the big play here is to begin to dismantle the collective strength of working people. In the new world of Morrison's desire for a quiet and compliant Australia, unions get in the way. Today, with a smaller, more conservative-leaning crossbench, the government is now within arm's reach to deliver on this long-awaited agenda.

Unions in Australia today are not simply a product of a democratic system—they are champions of future democratic change and an essential safeguard against backsliding. Today, Australian unions are working to secure gender pay equity, tackle workplace discrimination, stop the exploitation of migrant workers, and uncover and deal with wage theft. They campaign to prevent workplace deaths and provide support to those families who, unfortunately, lose loved ones.

In 2019 alone, 138 Australians have been killed at work. I wonder how many of those people opposite have sat with the families and friends of those who've lost their lives in avoidable workplace accidents. It's not many, I imagine. I have, and I'll never forget it—the sound of a mother crying for a lost son, devastated and blindsided that this could have happened in Australia. I will never forget that meeting, nor the presence of the union that sat beside her and the pain that that woman was in. It chilled my blood, and it was all avoidable.

If this bill passes, it will provide unprecedented power for any person with a sufficient interest to interfere in the operation of unions. In the other place, the government failed to provide any clear indication of who would have a sufficient interest. It could be a powerful businessperson, such as prominent Liberal Party donor and industrial law-breaker, Gerry Hanssen, who is said to be driven by a blind hatred of unions. It could be a corporate lobbyist or even the relevant minister. Under this bill, anyone with a sufficient interest will become empowered to seek the disqualification of a union official, request the deregistration of a union or ask for a union to be placed in administration.

The government has tried to claim that the bill gives unions the same treatment as corporations—what a ridiculous comparison. We would never see corporations wound up on the basis that their directors made an administrative error or some technical breach of a workplace rule. All the time we see senior executives of large companies not only keep their job after serious accidents or wage theft but then go on to claim large bonuses.

Many of the speakers in this debate have raised the issue of Westpac—23 million breaches of the money laundering law and links to the sexual exploitation of women. The response to this from the government has been: 'This is a matter for the board.' How inadequate, and what double standards. We know now, today, they will continue to run their protection racket for the banks by refusing Labor's very legitimate call to have Westpac recalled to the House Standing Committee on Economics. What a surprise! A corporate entity is facing these extraordinary charges of the most serious offences that involve the lives of children, and what is the government's response to this? Will they recall them to face questioning by the community's elected representatives? It doesn't seem so. These people are untouchable.

The word 'integrity' is being used a lot in this debate. The standard definition of 'integrity' is 'the quality of being honest and having strong moral principles'. The government attacks the organisations which represent nurses, teachers, flight attendants, scientists, shop assistants, retail workers, construction workers, aged-care and community-care workers and public servants—indeed, all of the workers in this building. Just open the pages of the newspaper this week—if you still have papers—and you will be confronted with examples of the double standards with which this government's so-called integrity agenda operates.

I've already made mention of Westpac and the lack of response from government other than to provide protection for them, but look at the results of the Registered Organisations Commission—the dodgy organisation that investigated a 12-year-old donation to the AMWU. Considering the timing and the subject matter, presumably under some political direction, it has just suffered a massive defeat in the Federal Court—two years of taxpayers' money wasted, with more to come and with news, of course, that they will appeal. The cost to taxpayers, once this is finished, will be in the millions.

And of course this is the same organisation whose initial raids were leaked to the media by the responsible minister's office. Don't for a minute pretend that this wasn't a politically motivated raid. Everyone knows it was. Incredibly, under this bill we are debating today the same organisation will get dramatically increased powers. The passing of this bill this week on those grounds alone, if it does occur, will be a very dark day for Australian democracy.

We have a bill before us that, amongst other things, will impose tests on unions, union officials and union members that are not imposed on other organisations or corporations. We have ministers in this government who will be able to control whether or not amalgamations and mergers go ahead, regardless of what the members of those democratically elected organisations have voted to do. The bill will allow others to insert themselves into who runs a union and how it's run. Under this bill, anyone with a sufficient interest will become empowered to seek the disqualification of a union official, request the deregistration of a union or ask for a union to be placed into administration. The government has tried to claim that the bill gives unions the same treatment as corporations. This is a ridiculous comparison. We will never, ever see corporations treated the same way as unions are being treated by this bill.

This bill should not be passed. Any member of this place who cares about democracy should not support this bill. And, if this bill does pass, we will not become quiet. We will continue to fight for the rights of working people and to fight for the rights of unions to organise, represent, challenge, agitate, disagree, lobby for change and work to build a better society. We will always stand with working people, as we have done before, and we will build our campaign and continue to fight for change right up until the next election. This bill is dangerous, and it won't be the end if the Senate supports this Prime Minister's anti-working-people agenda. There is no doubt this Prime Minister supports a quiet Australia, but his real agenda here—and we will resist this every step of the way—is to create a silent Australia. We can't allow that to happen to our democracy, and I urge the Senate to reject this bill.