Jamie Briggs (Mayo, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

I rise to speak on the Fair Work Bill 2008. Before I speak to particular provisions of the bill, I think it is important to put on the record my view of the history of this matter. Industrial relations battles have defined Australia’s public policy history more than any other. Indeed, industrial relations spawned the birth of the Australian Labor Party and many on that side of the House hold it very close to their hearts. It is a battleground steeped in ideology as well as language. Words like ‘good faith’, ‘unfair’ and ‘entitlements’ can mean vastly different things depending on which side of the political fence you occupy. It is a subject that inevitably touches the lives of nearly all Australians through their employment or business arrangements and, therefore, it forms a very important pillar of the Australian economy.

It has become part of the political wisdom that the former Prime Minister made an error of judgement in 2005 by removing the no disadvantage test from agreement making. What is certain, however, is that Work Choices is dead. I believe the former government made an error in 2005 in removing the no disadvantage test. While it was designed to create more jobs, it concerned working Australians who believed the balance had been taken too far. To assist them with this perception, the union movement spent a record amount by a third party on a campaign to scare people. The campaign worked very well. It must also be said that the new Labor government also campaigned on the issue. They did so in a misleading way, but at least on this matter they put out a detailed policy, which is largely reflected in the bill before the House. So the new government has made its bed and it is a bed they will lie in. But my prediction to this place is this: the economic consequences of these changes will hang around the government’s neck like an electoral albatross. It is a bill written for those who represent only 14 per cent of the Australian workforce.

We watch the arrogant display of those on the other side as they celebrate their victory through this debate. The Australian people dislike overt arrogance, and while the introduction of this bill may seem like their finest hour, the consequences of the changes this bill makes could well be the end of any parliamentary careers on that side. And if members opposite think that yelling out ‘Work Choices’ at members on this side each time we rise to speak will prevent us from making legitimate criticisms, they are wrong. While bullying might be alive and well in certain parts of the Labor Party, it never concerns nor fazes those of us on this side who will hold their government to account. So while the former government made a mistake in removing the no disadvantage test by taking the balance too far one way, this bill swings the balance much too far the other way and this will have severe consequences for our economy.

It should be noted that much of the former government’s framework remains in this bill. For instance, the restrictions on industrial action are still contained in this bill. In particular, retaining pre-strike ballots is a provision to be welcomed. The national system of workplace relations, fought for by the former Prime Minister and the former government, remains. And can I pay credit to the Parliamentary Secretary for Defence Procurement for standing up to forces in New South Wales on his side of politics that wanted to reverse this important reform.

The post-1996 reforms to Australia’s workplace laws delivered more jobs, higher wages and fewer industrial disputes. The reforms took Australia from the economic dark ages to the stronger, prouder and more prosperous country that we handed to the Rudd government in 2007. When the Howard government came to office in March 1996 it found a completely different situation. It found the darkest of economic times. Australia was just beginning to recover from the deepest recession since the Great Depression, with an associated human cost of one million unemployed and interest rates soaring to more than double today’s levels—destroying families, businesses and lives. It found a budget in deficit and $96 billion in government debt. The Australian workplace was uncompetitive. Restrictive awards applied across industries and businesses. The workplace was dominated by heavy-handed and unwanted intervention from third parties driving industrial disputes through the roof, killing productivity.

What the Howard government did was focus on jobs. It freed the Australian workplace from unwanted intervention, and it let it get on with business. It focused its reforms on opportunities for all Australians, not just the select few. Those on the other side will continue to claim that this reform agenda was designed to attack unions. Rather, what the government did was stand for the rule of law. In this House a number of weeks ago, the Deputy Prime Minister said that no-one was above the law. This is one of the very, very rare occasions I fundamentally agree with her. So in that respect, the decision by the Howard government to free the wharves of unlawful behaviour was right. The doubling in crane rates on our wharves proves that decision correct. The decision by the Howard government to ensure that the rule of law applied in respect of the building industry was right. The new government should resist the current campaign by some left-wing unions and members of their own side against the Australian Building and Construction Commission. The ABCC is doing its job well, increasing productivity by reducing illegal industrial action.

The approach being taken by the Prime Minister and those opposite in relation to the legacy of the former government is to dismiss it, to deny it exists. But they simply cannot deny the facts. The facts being that the Howard government’s legacy of reform has been a major contributor to the Australian economic success story. More than 2.2 million new jobs, the highest amount of Australians working in history, the lowest unemployment rate in a generation, real wages being lifted by over 20 per cent and the lowest level of industrial disputations in memory: these are the benefits of hard-won reform. The Prime Minister likes to claim that these results are simply because of a lucky mining boom, but he fails to recognise the structural changes that allowed Australian companies to make the most of the good times.

In comparing this reform agenda with the new government’s approach, I come to the bill being debated in this place today. The Deputy Prime Minister makes a great play of the idea that this is delivering on Labor’s election commitments, and to some degree she is right. Labor is entitled to move the bill to ensure its commitments are met. However, this bill goes much, much further in one respect: union power. Without doubt, unions play an important role in our workplaces, but that role should not be at the expense of choice in the workplace. This bill reintroduces the privileged position that the union movement used to enjoy to the detriment of the individual and to the detriment of choice. Through the new provisions around union preference bargaining, the bill forces employers to bargain with unions even if the majority of workers do not wish the union to be involved. It rewards union recalcitrance by allowing a third party to stand by an ambit claim with no real desire to settle, forcing an arbitrated outcome. This is in proposed section 269 of the bill. It opens up right of entry powers again to allow union officials to inspect the books of non-union employees, even though the Deputy Prime Minister said this would not happen. It allows agreements to force non-union-members to pay a fee for the privilege of being represented by a union even if they did not request it. Proposed section 124 requires a government department to send out information to a new employee that they can join a union.

These provisions are mistaken. They are a payback for the multimillion dollar scare campaign that the union bosses ran over the past two years. The Labor government is putting the interests of the union movement ahead of working Australians and the Australian economy. This bill will damage job opportunities at the wrong time for our economy—and it is not just the coalition making this claim. On the weekend I came across an assessment of the new Fair Work Bill that is important to consider. It was not an assessment done by me, by John Howard or even by one of the Deputy Prime Minister’s favourite extreme employer organisations. Rather it was a newspaper article written by Paul Kelly, who is hardly known for his conservative leanings. He writes:

Kevin Rudd shouts from the rooftops each day that the global financial crisis has changed the world, but the Prime Minister does not believe his own words. A bizarre fate has befallen Australia. At the precise time it faces a global crisis, a business downturn and rising unemployment, the Rudd Government is recasting workplace relations to increase trade union powers, inhibit employment and impose new costs on employers.

Normally this would defy any test of common sense. Indeed, it would seem the essence of irresponsibility.

Paul Kelly continues:

It is as though Australia’s workplace relations system exists in some interterrestrial immunity from the rest of the economic world.

The global crisis means everything has changed … But standing immovable is Labor’s support for greater trade union power, more costly restrictions on employers—

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