Claire Chandler (Tasmania, Liberal Party, Shadow Assistant Minister for Foreign Affairs) Share this | Hansard source

I always enjoy a contribution from Senator Ayres with his misty eyed recollections of his time in the union movement. We've heard them many times in this chamber, and I suspected, when I saw him stand up tonight, that we were about to get one again. Indeed, we did.

I'm glad, Senator Ayres, that you recognised in your contribution this evening that some bad behaviour has occurred. I'm glad that you again recognised that there are some bad cultural issues in some elements. I'm very pleased to hear you recognise that. But we had another government senator revert to the standard Labor talking points of blame shifting, while neglecting to address the very serious issue that we are examining here—the threat that Labor has proposed to the very existence of the body that can regulate that very same bad behaviour that Senator Ayres referred to—the Australian Building and Construction Commission.

Here we are, into only the third sitting week of the Labor government, and we are already seeing Labor capitulating to the bidding of their union masters. Instead of concentrating on the issues affecting everyday Australians, like the cost-of-living pressures being felt by households around the country, Labor have focused their attention on appeasing their union mates. At a time when Australian families are doing it tough, this is what Labor are proposing as one of their bright new ideas.

I've been listening to the contributions of other senators in this place this evening. I'm sure those good Australians listening to the contributions at home would be quite shocked at what they're hearing, although, it should be said that all the stories here this evening in relation to certain behaviour from the union movement aren't matters of public record. I remind those Australians listening at home that the ABCC was established for very good reasons. It was established to curtail union lawlessness, to protect construction workers from thuggish behaviour and intimidation and to stop the harassment of workers, particularly women, both on and off work sites. But, as we have heard here this evening, there are some truly terrible instances which paint a clear picture as to why this body, the ABCC, is essential to protect those who work in these industries from the sheer thuggery of some individuals in the Australian union movement. As many of my colleagues have said this evening, and I will make a couple of remarks on this myself, there is no greater example of that than the truly disgusting and despicable actions of the CFMMEU.

As we've heard throughout this debate, CFMMEU officials have previously been caught out cursing at and spitting at individuals and threatening to gang rape and even kill women. A CFMMEU official was jailed for assault and once told a female inspector she was an 'F-ing S' and asked her if she had brought kneepads as she was going to be 'sucking off those F-ing dogs all day'. CFMMEU delegates were accused of harassing the daughter of a builder when they picketed a work site. The picketers were accused of harassing the daughter of the builder when she entered the site in her car by commenting on her appearance—her breasts and her bottom—and making inappropriate sounds towards her. They allegedly called her a 'daddy's girl' and a 'blonde bimbo', and they said: 'Here comes the freeloader, living off your dad. That car belongs to us because daddy pays for it.'

These are truly horrific stories. This behaviour would not be tolerated in any workplace around this country. Taking all of this into consideration, I just do not understand how in the world the Labor Party think it is appropriate to abolish a body as important as the ABCC for keeping this sort of union thuggery and bullying in check, to ensure that it does not occur in Australian workplaces. The Labor Party don't want to listen to the cases of the many women who have been relentlessly harassed by the CFMMEU and don't even want to listen to the High Court of Australia, which ruled unanimously against that union in a case brought by the ABCC—the very body we're discussing here this evening—about the union's lawlessness in the construction sector. The High Court found in the 2022 Pattinson decision that the CFMMEU was a 'serial offender' that engaged in whatever action and made whatever threats it wished without regard to the law. It had contravened laws on approximately 150 occasions. The court said it was:

… well-resourced, having more than sufficient means to pay any penalty the court might have been disposed to impose.

And it treated penalties for serious breaches of the law as just the cost of 'doing business'.

These are the people that the Australian Labor Party, this government, is prepared to defend and side with—the law-breakers and the thugs—over Australian construction workers and businesses. By promising to abolish the ABCC, they are condoning the CFMMEU's vile record of appalling treatment of women. Everyone deserves the right to go about their work in a safe environment. But the government seem to think that this doesn't apply to those working in our construction industry. It is an absolute shame. The ABCC is the last line of defence between a strong building sector and the chaos and the delays that are caused by a union-run Labor government. Since the ABCC was re-established by the coalition in December 2016, the commission has proved effective at tackling union excesses head-on.

Our construction industry is a key component of Australia's economic recovery from the COVID-19 pandemic. I note that we've had a few heckles from the other side of the chamber about the fact that, apparently, we on this side don't understand anything about the construction industry and don't support the construction industry. I find that very hard to believe after the very strong support that the former government provided to that very industry over the last term of government as we were dealing with the COVID-19 pandemic. But, by promising to abolish the ABCC, Labor are putting that economic recovery at risk. For what? Why are they doing this? It's because they are beholden to their masters in the union movement, and heaven forbid the ABCC does its job effectively and holds unions to account for their atrocious behaviour. The CFMMEU, or its representatives, are respondents in 37 matters currently before the court. Almost $2 million in penalties in the current financial year have been awarded against the CFMMEU and its representatives.

On the other hand, while the unions are running around racking up fines and disrupting workplaces, the ABCC has secured over $5 million in recovered wages and entitlements for construction workers since it was re-established in 2016—something that I would have thought those on the other side of the chamber would have been in strong support of—and have made over $13.4 million in progress claims for subcontractors since 2019. This body is doing good work. To those listening at home, you shouldn't believe the rhetoric from those on the other side. The ABCC is a good thing, and it just shows that it is an essential function for Australia's building and construction industry to combat union thuggery, end violence in the workplace, and work to recover the wages and entitlements of hardworking Australians.

So, the question one must ask oneself is, why is this a priority for this Labor government? Well, it shouldn't come as a surprise that the CFMMEU was one of Labor's biggest financial donors in the financial year 2020-21, providing them with nearly $1 million in payments. And now here they are, the Labor government, pushing to abolish the ABCC—the very body that has tried to ensure that the CFMMEU ceases their lawless and thuggish behaviour on Australian worksites. This in no way passes the pub test. Does this government really think Australians will look at this move and see it as anything other than a politically motivated attack against the ABCC? The truth is plain for everybody to see, and it has been put very eloquently by my colleagues in contributing to this debate this evening. Clearly the Labor Party's allegiance is not to the Australian construction industry and not to the over 1.1 million Australian workers in that industry, who just want to go to work and do their job and come home, free from intimidation. No; their allegiance is to the CFMMEU and the donations they receive.

I think we do need to consider here tonight what will happen to the construction industry in the absence of the ABCC. We've talked a lot about some of the behaviour they've cracked down on. If we don't have this body, what is going to happen on Australian worksites? When there is no watchdog, industrial laws and penalties in this industry are seen as no more serious than a parking ticket: you speed, you pay the fine and the offending conduct is repeated again and again. But of course, in this example, we're not talking about speeding; we're talking about workplace intimidation, harassment of workers, particularly harassment of women, as I just described.

The federal government—any federal government, of any political persuasion—has a responsibility to ensure that our laws are strong enough to deter people from breaking the law and that there is an effective regulator in place to prosecute wrongdoers when they act unlawfully. When laws are repeatedly flouted and are not acting as a deterrent, it is clear that those laws must be strengthened. When there is an effective regulator who enforces laws with meaningful penalties, people will think twice before breaking the law. As soon as Labor abolished the ABCC in 2012, the improvements in respect for the law were lost almost immediately. After that abolition, the rate of disputes in the construction industry rose to approximately four times the all-industries average. In the first quarter, after the abolition of the ABCC, the rate of industrial disputes had increased fivefold. And here we are, yet again, in 2022, with a newly elected Labor government, and one of their first priorities is to trash this body that was created to protect Australian workers from the coercive controls of the militant union movement.

So, after all that and after numerous speakers—in this place tonight and previously on this motion when it was before the Senate back in August—have raised deep concerns about the government's move to abolish the ABCC, about how this will adversely affect workers and how this will embolden militant unionism on construction sites around Australia, I certainly hope the government will be prepared to do the brave thing and perhaps think twice about supporting the CFMMEU and their union mates ahead of hardworking Australians. My hopes aren't high, but I certainly do have them, because if they don't, if they side against the ABCC and with the CFMMEU, the Labor Party are condoning that union's abysmal record in the treatment of workers and particularly the treatment of women. And that is an absolute outrage. They are prepared to defend and side with law-breakers and thugs over Australian construction workers and businesses because it is in their financial and political interests to do so. It is plain for all to see.

This is a party and this is a government that talked a lot about integrity over the last few months during the election campaign and talked a lot about transparency. I'm not entirely sure how those opposite on the government benches can talk about integrity on the one hand and, in exactly the same breath almost, in their first few weeks of government in this country, instead be talking about siding with their union mates and abolishing the very body that has sought to make those unions better and to make Australian worksites safer. It is just a disgrace.