Julia Gillard (Lalor, Australian Labor Party, Deputy Prime Minister) Share this | Hansard source

They chant out in support of Work Choices. We know that they supported Work Choices. They supported a scheme with statutory individual employment agreements that allowed protected award conditions to be ripped away from Australian workers. We know, for example, shift work loadings were excluded in 70 per cent of agreements and penalty rates were excluded in 63 per cent of agreements. That is what they believed in: the rip-off of basic conditions of Australian working families. They believed in it then, they believe in it now and, if they ever have the opportunity, Work Choices would be back. We know this because, when we gave them the opportunity to vote in this House to verify that individual statutory employment agreements would not be reintroduced under a future Liberal government, they refused to vote for that proposition. They believe in Work Choices, they believe in rip-offs and they believe in no-one having any standards, and no cant or hypocrisy from the other side can ever cover that up.

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