Julia Gillard (Lalor, Australian Labor Party, Deputy Leader of the Opposition) Share this | Hansard source

Absolutely—I do realise that. The relevant point is: where is the minister? Moving on from that point, now I have seen everything. The government, desperate for a defence for its workplace propaganda sheets is now saying, ‘We’ve pinched something out of Labor’s policy.’ Did you think that you would ever see that in industrial relations—a minister of the Howard government saying, ‘Don’t blame me; I got it out of Labor’s policy’? If you are so bereft of ideas, so stupid, so silly that you cannot think up things yourself and have to take them out of Labor’s policy then get to the dispatch box and say that.

The government has pulled a stunt here to stop Labor voting against its propaganda sheets. Let me explain to the minister why we object to these propaganda sheets when our policy includes the provision of information to people. These are propaganda sheets. If they were not propaganda sheets then the format of them would have been supplied with the legislation. But of course the government has not done that; the government has made sure that it can draft these sheets afterwards. No doubt Mark Textor will have a very big hand in that; no doubt it will all be about the polling. Why does an employer have to get these sheets into the hands of employees within three months? Why not six months? Why not 12 months? Why not two years? Why aren’t these sheets for newly starting employees? Why aren’t these sheets for employees who may be being asked to sign an Australian workplace agreement? The reason for the three-month timetable—and let us be honest; the Australian people are not mugs—is that you want these propaganda fact sheets in the hands of Australian workers before the election. That is why you picked three months; there is no other rationale for picking three months.

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