Don Farrell (SA, Australian Labor Party, Minister for Trade and Tourism) Share this | Hansard source

I thank Senator Roberts for his contribution. I would make the observation that if Senator Roberts is serious about trying to improve industrial relations in this country and has some genuine comments and contribution to make, maybe the best way to start is sitting down with that terrific minister, the industrial relations minister, Minister Burke, and start working with him about how we might improve industrial relations in this country, and in particular how we might start the ball rolling on lifting wages so that workers have a chance to compete with rising prices that they see everywhere. Of course we know that it was a design feature of the former government, the former government which Senator Roberts supported over and over and over again, with all of their crazy policies that have led to the extremely difficult economic circumstances which Australian workers find themselves in. Maybe if Senator Roberts hadn't supported the former government as often and consistently and regularly as he did, Australian workers might actually be in a slightly better position.

Of course they're going to be in a lot better position when the new bill passes in the next couple of days, which is going to lift the standard of living of Australia workers and give them a chance to catch up with those rising prices. I see Senator Barbara Pocock in the room. When I first started working with the shop assistants' union in 1976 we still had different rates of pay for men and women. There would be one rate of pay for a man, which would appear on one side of the wage regulated documents. On one side of the page there would be a rate for the men, and on the other side of the page there would be a rate for a woman, for exactly the same job. In this country we had different rates of pay. It's hard to believe, and you have to go back a very long time to see that, but in wage determinations in this country there were differences between men and women.

Of course, we have quite a different concept of equal pay for equal work these days. We're not talking about the overt discrimination that existed in wage determinations in this country for most of the last century. We're talking about quite a different proposition, of course, and that proposition is that there are industries where women predominate and which, if they were fairly valued, would have a higher rate of pay. The reason that the rate of pay isn't higher is that they are predominantly female industries. That's the issue that the Labor Party is seeking to address and will address in the course of this parliament.

I will first talk about what the Labor Party is proposing to do to fix the problems that Senator Roberts claims that he's fixing in this bill—and again I make the offer to Senator Roberts: if you're fair dinkum about trying to lift the living standards of workers in this country, maybe the best way is to cooperate with a government that is also interested in doing that, sitting down and telling us how you think we might be able to advance the interests of working people in this country. I haven't seen any evidence in the whole of the time that you've been in this place, Senator Roberts, that you've been remotely interested in that issue. Every single decision that you took over the previous parliaments to back in the policies of this mob when they were in government did damage to the people you now say—