Darren Cheeseman (Corangamite, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

I would like to make a short statement in support of the workforce at the Visy Pulp and Paper factory in Tarneit. I believe the efforts of these workers should be brought to the attention of our national parliament. These workers have shown great guts and heart. They have shown great support for each other. For years Visy have tried to force them into signing individual contracts. Visy have been totally unscrupulous. They have used the ugliest tactics available to them under the totally un-Australian previous Work Choices regime.

The company has denied these workers representation, breaking internationally recognised ILO conventions. They have threatened to terminate workers—the ultimate blackmail. They have threatened to deport sponsored workers. How unscrupulous can you get—to threaten a person’s job, then put their lives at risk by deporting them.

There is more. The company management also directly and overtly discriminated against workers who would not sign AWAs. They punished them financially and tried to ostracise them. They tried every disgusting trick in the book to break these people but for more than three years a small number of workers have staunchly held out. Visy are now attempting to force workers to sign a non-union collective agreement, and the fight still goes on.

I do not like to use unparliamentary language but the management in this branch of the company just suck. They are bullies, they are cowards and, of course, they are greedy. Every week the management representatives come out from behind their desks to check their big fat salaries as workers hang by a thread. I believe the members of the CFMEU’s pulp and paper division are some of the many great unsung Australian heroes. They are people who have made our country what it is today. They have fought for and protected the core Australian characteristic of a ‘fair go’. They have stuck by their mates and I say to them: Well done! You have done a great thing. You have stood up for your principles and you have stood up for all Australians. The Australian parliament now recognises you.

See this speech in context