Stephen Smith (Perth, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Industry, Infrastructure and Industrial Relations) Share this | Hansard source

My question is to the Minister for Employment and Workplace Relations. Minister, is it not the case that the Office of the Employment Advocate has officially advised employees of Aboriginal Hostels Ltd, in a letter dated 6 October:

Employees wanted to know whether or not they could negotiate a new collective agreement with Aboriginal Hostels Limited instead of AWAs. The short answer is no. The employer decides what type of agreement they will use. The employer chooses what agreements they will offer and what they will negotiate.

Can the minister point out to the hundreds of thousands of Australians who marched against the government’s extreme and unfair industrial relations laws today where the choice is in that?

See this speech in context