Peter Lindsay (Herbert, Liberal Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Defence) Share this | Hansard source

What a great democracy we live in. We live in a democracy where we can choose who our partner is going to be, we can choose how many children we are going to have, we can choose where we live and we can choose where we take holidays. But in this great democracy, with the Fair Work Bill 2008 before the parliament, we will not any longer be able to choose what our working conditions will be. It is absolutely extraordinary. Of course, the opposition value choice in everything that we do. Tonight, as this bill goes through the parliament, choice in how you work will disappear.

Let us look at what the government has inherited from the former government. Labor has inherited the strongest economy in Australia’s history—economic growth of 4.2 per cent for the year ending December last year. Confidence was very high, unemployment was at a 30-year low, the nation was debt free, the budget was in surplus and money had been set aside to meet future liabilities. What has happened since Labor came to office? Inflation is up and economic growth is down. More people are out of work, many more are working less than they would like to and there are many more to come out of work as well. Business and consumer confidence has slumped, industrial disputes are up and productivity growth is down. Labor has imposed $19.7 billion in increased taxes and other revenue measures it did not tell the Australian people about before the election. The budget surplus has been slashed and, very recently, we have found out that the budget in fact will go into deficit. It is a dismal picture and I use the example of all those things to indicate that the bill tonight is a dismal outcome forAustralia.

Last year Australia went to an election where workplace relations policy occupied the main battleground. Although any Australian who wanted a job could get a job and workers were enjoying better conditions and higher real wages, the unions of Australia conducted an ongoing campaign to have Work Choices changed. In November last year the former government was defeated. The Rudd-Swan Labor government is now implementing the policy it took to the last election, although I do know about matters—and I will refer to them later in my speech—which they did not take to the last election but which are in this bill tonight.

There has also noticeably been much hubris within the current government as the Fair Work Bill has been brought into the parliament, but the bill comes at a time when there are dark clouds on Australia’s economic horizon. Emerging commentary on this legislation, which I do believe to be impartial and fair, is drawing the nation’s attention to a bill that is repeating the mistakes made by the former government with its Work Choices legislation. Just as Work Choices went too far one way, this bill, according to respected commentators, is going too far the other way, and there will be an undesirable result. Unions will be far too powerful for the country’s good and workers will find themselves without a job. How could that be a good outcome?

This bill shifts workplace relations policy way back to the past. It significantly boosts the power of unions, even in workplaces where they are not wanted. Unquestionably, these reforms will weaken productivity and impact on employment. I say to those opposite who think the introduction of this bill is a great victory: reserve your judgement for 12 months or so. Be prepared to face your supporters who lose their jobs because of it. Be prepared to face the Australian nation, which will struggle with the inflation that this bill will generate. It is utterly bad policy to support the resurgence of uncontrollable union power at any time, let alone at a time of global financial crisis. Just as the Rudd government’s policy to soften Australia’s stance on border protection has been greeted with glee among the people smugglers and has opened the doors to a new wave of boat arrivals, this bill opens the doors to a new wave of union power and thuggery.

This bill could well be described as a radical overhaul of workplace laws that has gone much further than the mandate given to the government at the last election. It gives the unions the keys to the doors of all workplaces, even where there are currently no dealings with unions. More disturbingly, it appears to breach the government’s commitment to overhaul the privacy laws to protect the interests of the individual. This bill gives unions the right to inspect the wages records of employees whether they are union members or not. It is none of their business and it is an invasion of privacy. The reason that the government has caved in to the unions is to allow them to collect the personal details of non-union employees. This will likely result in intimidation of employees to join a union and intimidation of employers to have their people join a union. This unprecedented access to private information takes this country in a new and disturbing direction.

It is not surprising to anyone that a government full of ex-union officials is so delighted to be making these radical workplace relations amendments. We all remember the year-long union campaign backing Labor’s quest for election. We remember it as the most expensive campaign in history, driven by highly emotive and often untrue advertising. Superficially, the campaign was about ridding Australia of Australian workplace agreements but, substantially, it was about bringing the unions back to town.

Australian workplace agreements allowed individual employees to strike their own agreements with their employers, ones that reflected how each party wanted their work arrangements to be. The agreements suited both parties because each got a benefit they would not otherwise have had. Labor and unions are opposed to individuals having control of their own employment conditions because they want to see collective bargaining introduced in a major way in the workforce.

The deeper subplot of all this is the apparent reintroduction of pattern bargaining, which will have grave consequences for the security of workers’ jobs and the stability of the annual inflation number. Let me make it entirely clear. There is no question about whether Work Choices is dead or alive: Work Choices is dead. The debate that Australia is now having is about the return of union power to the workplace.

I read a piece in the Australian Financial Review a few weeks ago by Alan Moran. He made the point that:

Labor always unravels prosperity.

He reflected on the ‘increased influence of unions, which are the party’s major funders and foot soldiers’. He went on to observe that:

… the increased influence they obtain adversely affects productivity.

He went on to say that:

As the administration becomes more established, it also starts increasing the regulatory controls over markets.

Gradually these activities undermine the prosperity that was the legacy the government inherited.

Next year, with the passing of this legislation, Labor’s chickens are going to come home to roost.

On top of the 200,000 jobs that Labor has already admitted will be lost, this bill will see many more job opportunities lost. The return of tighter unfair dismissal provisions has spooked employers. They never say so; they just quietly choose not to employ additional people or not to replace people who are leaving so they can protect their businesses against unfair dismissal claims. Labor and the unions have never been able to understand that employers never sack an employee who is doing their job, because staff are the most important asset of any business. How do I know? I ran my own business for 25 years, with a staff of about 30 people. I certainly remember before I was a member of parliament how I felt about Labor’s unfair dismissal legislation at that time and the impact it had on my decisions to employ people. It was one of the reasons that I came to this parliament in 1996.

I remind the Labor Party that the coalition had a mandate from two separate elections to remove the draconian unfair dismissal provisions—and we did. Although we had that clear mandate, Labor refused to recognise the will of the people. Yet, now they are in government, they too claim a mandate—and rightly so. Our actions in supporting this bill, albeit with sensible amendments, are in stark contrast to Labor’s actions in the past. Question time gives the people of Australia and the press gallery an opportunity to gain an insight into all of us. When I observe both the Prime Minister and the Deputy Prime Minister, I see increasing hubris and, particularly, personal nastiness. This is not a sign of strength but rather I believe it is a sign of insecurity, where both feel that great parliamentary debates should focus on personal attacks rather than public policy. I liken this bill to a self-licking ice-cream. It will consume itself and, in the process, consume the job security of hundreds of thousands of Australians.

I delivered my maiden speech on 1 May 1996. It was a little while ago now. That year Townsville was named Australia’s community of the year. Its star was finally on the rise and an unprecedented period of economic growth and prosperity was about to begin for Townsville. At that time the construction of a major zinc refinery was only months away. It was to be the litmus test for our city in terms of bringing online a major construction and processing project. It brought in a large amount of foreign investment and gave tremendous confidence to the Korean parent company about investing in Australia. Importantly, it delivered many new jobs to North Queensland. Sadly, this plant and the jobs at the plant are now under threat from the Rudd-Swan Labor government.

Over the past decade and more, Townsville has also built a fine reputation for excellence in marine science, earth science and tropical medicine research of world significance. It also benefited from the previous government’s rock solid commitment to rebuilding the capabilities of the Australian Defence Force. In 1996 confidence was on the rise in Townsville and North Queensland. Employers were eager to create new opportunities and began hiring and training staff in record numbers. In my electorate of Herbert in March 1996 the unemployment rate was 8.4 per cent. Can you believe that? It was 8.4 per cent. By June 2007 it had been cut in half to just 4.2 per cent. Guess where it is going now under this bill that is before the parliament tonight.

During the period that I referred to, 26,000 new jobs were created in my electorate, centred around the wonderful city of Townsville. That represented average growth of 200 new jobs a month for more than a decade. Townsville’s growth story was emblematic of many cities and towns across Australia. Its success has been underpinned by business confidence and eager private entrepreneurs keen to create employment opportunities and be part of the new value-adding industries which have so benefited Australia’s terms of trade. Townsville’s pattern of jobs growth was repeated on a national scale under the previous, coalition government. All of us recognise that between March 1996 and November 2007 more than 2.2 million jobs were created in Australia. Of these jobs, over 1.2 million were full time and almost 950,000 were part time. These were all created under the Howard government. We left office with over 10.6 million Australians in work, a record high. Over 7.6 million were in full-time employment and three million were in part-time employment. The unemployment rate in Australia was 4.3 per cent in October 2007, a 33-year low, and had been below five per cent for 21 consecutive months. The male unemployment rate was 3.6 per cent and the female unemployment rate was 4.4 per cent.

Yet in December 1992, under Labor, the unemployment rate peaked at 10.9 per cent, leaving almost one million Australians unemployed. With the passage of this bill I fear for this country and I fear for the employment of those people who have a job and I fear for their families. The so-called party of the worker had watched hundreds of thousands of people being shut out of work under its union dominated, anti-individual policies in the early nineties. Much was made in the mid-1990s of the damaging effects of unemployment on Australia’s teenage population. It was certainly a serious concern in my electorate. By the start of this year, teenage unemployment stood at 3.7 per cent, an extraordinary achievement. Not one of the 77 ABS regions recorded a double-digit unemployment rate in June 2007. In March 1996, when the Howard government came to office, 24 of the 77 regions recorded double-digit unemployment rates. Long-term unemployment in August 2007 was 66,700. It was slashed by almost two-thirds under the Howard government and was 79.8 per cent lower than the peak of 329,888 set in May 1993 under Labor.

So there are the facts. Despite the ways in which the Labor Party has tried to demonise the previous government’s record on employment and industrial relations, the facts speak for themselves. People who wanted a job had a job. And, what is more, the wages growth under the Howard government was positive whereas for the previous 13 years under Labor it was negative. The coalition performs for the workers of this country. Now we have a bill that is going to perform again—it is going to put people out of work, and in 12 months time Labor will be suffering because of it.

Much has been made of the intent of the Labor Party’s new legislation. They say it is about ‘restoring fairness and striking the right balance’. But this is really just rhetoric. What this new policy will actually deliver is very concerning. Regardless of the high-minded hyperbole that has accompanied this bill around perceived fairness or justice, the elephant in the room remains the impact it will have on enterprise and employment. After all, there is nothing fair about unemployment—and that is what the Fair Work Bill will deliver: unemployment. The true and only test of an industrial relations policy is its capacity to deliver new jobs and wages growth. Time will tell whether a yesteryear policy founded on increasing union power and placing greater hiring constraints on business can be embedded into a modern, globalised economy with any success. I doubt it.

The respected journalist and commentator Paul Kelly just this past weekend asserted that the Rudd-Swan Labor administration is today ‘recasting workplace relations to increase trade union powers, inhibit employment and impose new costs on employers’ at completely the wrong moment in Australia’s economic history. As he suggests, ‘this is major institutional reform with a long fuse’. It will take time to work through the economy. As with all Labor policies, there will be winners—unions mostly—and losers: small business operators and their wannabe employees. Kelly suggests the new regime will hurt some industries more than others. He predicts it will have a ‘substantial impact on the resources, retail and services sectors, but less so in manufacturing’.

Australia’s resources sector is already facing dramatic pressures following the collapse of commodity prices and the slowdown in China. Likewise, the sectors hardest hit by the global financial downturn are predicted to be those dependent upon discretionary spending—namely, retail and services. The Labor Party’s bankrollers—the unions—must be rubbing their hands with glee today. Not only will their coffers swell from new levies; they will have unprecedented statutory power. As argued by Ken Philips in the Age last week:

Until now, industrial relations law governed relationships between employers and employees.

Now that law will also cover relationships between employers and unions:

This is very different and unanticipated.

           …         …         …

Under the legislation unions have statute authority independent from that of any union membership they may have in a workplace.

This change should be judged in the appropriate context. Demand for union representation has been in steady decline. Around 85 per cent of private sector employees today are not union members and do not want to be. Clearly this was an intolerable situation for unionists. Unions do not care about whether workers want them in the workplace—they can now be there regardless. I can indicate that the opposition will be supporting this bill, and it is just such a shame for Australia that the result in 12 months time will be disastrous.

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