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

I thank the members for Perth, Adelaide, Werriwa, Cunningham and Gorton for their contributions to this debate on the Independent Contractors Bill 2006. I will briefly respond to a number of the matters raised. Firstly, the matter of stand-downs was raised by a number of the members opposite. At common law, employers do not have the right to stand down an employee even where work is unavailable due to factors outside the employer’s control. Hence, any stand-down right must come from a workplace agreement, employment contract, industrial instrument or legislation. The problem is that in the absence of a stand-down right an employer will usually have to choose between continuing to pay an employee despite lack of work or dismissing the employee, and that is why many agreements provide stand-down provisions. This provision in the bill is designed to provide a default situation which reflects what is generally provided in many agreements within the industrial relations system.

Secondly, the member for Werriwa raised a query about owner-drivers. I say to him and the House that the situation in relation to owner-drivers in New South Wales is not one which the government would have created had it been starting from scratch. The difficulty is that assertions and counter-assertions have been made by the various parties. The member for Werriwa mentioned the TWU and the Road Transport Association. The reality is that, having spent much time over the last year looking at these assertions, it is difficult to get to the bottom of what are the empirical facts. For that reason the government has said that it would leave in place what is in New South Wales and some provisions in Victoria and next year have an inquiry to try to get to the bottom of which assertions are actually correct, to test the various positions that are put by the parties and to provide some empirical evidence upon which a further decision might be able to be made.

Thirdly, the member for Adelaide mentioned the Radio Rentals situation in Adelaide, which can best be characterised as an old-fashioned industrial dispute. It arose because there were some 17 employees—electrical technicians—of Radio Rentals who did not accept their own union’s recommendation for a collective agreement and wanted something separate from what was being proposed. Redundancy has always been a matter of an agreement and it remains so under this legislation, except for this further protection. Because of the way in which an agreement can now be terminated by a notice period from the employer, there is a risk that some employees could find themselves, if an employer wanted to act inappropriately, without their redundancy entitlements; hence the 12-month protection of that redundancy entitlement.

The member for Cunningham mentioned the advising of employees about redundancy entitlements. That is an obligation on the employer under the legislation and it can be enforced by the employee or, indeed, by the Office of Workplace Services, which could prosecute for a failure on the part of the employer to give that particular notice to the employee.

The final point—and I will not go into the argument because I know that for the convenience of the House we are looking at dealing with legislation here today fairly quickly—is that there are protections against sham arrangements. The member for Gorton mentioned that somebody could be an employee on Friday and a contractor on Monday. There are protections built into this legislation in relation to that situation.

The changes to the Work Choices legislation, which are covered by this bill and the amendments in the next bill, are as a result of the monitoring of the legislation over the last six to eight months. We have monitored and we have listened to various parties. Some of these proposals have been put by unions and employees, not just by employers. We will continue to monitor the legislation, but I believe that these amendments deal with the major matters that have been raised in relation to the working of the legislation over the last six to eight months and I commend them to the House.

Question put:

That the amendments be agreed to.

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