Kevin Andrews (Menzies, Liberal Party, Minister Assisting the Prime Minister for the Public Service) Share this | Hansard source

I thank the member for Maranoa for his question. Indeed, I am aware of proposals by the Leader of the Opposition to introduce compulsory union bargaining in Australia. These plans, which are being pushed by the Leader of the Opposition and the union movement, both here in Australia and internationally, are basically a threat to the Australian economy.

The employers of Australia, who have created over 175,000 jobs in the last five months in Australia, are now staring down the barrel of a handover of control of their businesses to militant unions because of this proposal by the Leader of the Opposition. The reaction today in Western Australia, the home state of the Leader of the Opposition and member for Brand, could not be clearer. The Australian Industry Group said that this was one of the most extreme industrial steps ever taken by the Labor Party. The Western Australian Chamber of Commerce and Industry said that some Western Australian businesses—members from Western Australia should particularly note this—would struggle to survive under these proposals. This was all summed up in an editorial in the West Australian today headed ‘Beazley’s IR plan to hand back control to the unions’. The editorial writer said, inter alia:

It is evident from Mr Beazley’s pronouncements that he intends to hand back control of IR to the unions—a huge leap back into an inglorious past of union agitated industrial disputation.

That is the summary of the West Australian and other business groups in that state of the consequence of this decision by the Leader of the Opposition to introduce compulsory union bargaining if he was elected to government.

This attack on the Australian economy is not just being carried out here in Australia; it is being carried out overseas as well. Indeed, the President of the Australian Council of Trade Unions, Sharan Burrow, has been using an international forum, the International Labour Organisation, to talk down the government’s reforms, business leaders and—

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