Murray Watt (Queensland, Australian Labor Party, Minister for Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry) Share this | Hansard source

The fact that we are putting forward amendments to this legislation indicates that the Albanese Labor government does think that the Fair Work Act needs improvement. Yes, the Fair Work Act was introduced by the Rudd-Gillard governments. As time goes on it needs improvement, just like every piece of legislation. The point I'm making is that over the course of this debate, both last night and today, you have suggested that there are things in the amendments that we're putting forward that are wrong or immoral or will do this or that, when in many cases they are picking up concepts that were contained in the legislation that existed when you were the minister. You did attempt to make amendments to the Act while were you the minister, many of which would have actually made workers' position worse off. I am very proud of the fact that we resisted those. Now that we're in government we're about trying to improve this act from where it began under the Rudd-Gillard governments, from where it was under your government, to where it needs to be to make sure that workers in this country get a decent pay rise and we can lift productivity in businesses as well.