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

I thank the member for Parramatta for her question, and I know that she cares about fairness and decency at work. On 1 July the government’s Fair Work Act came into operation. This is, of course, the act that will make sure Work Choices is buried in a coffin, and the government wants to nail the lid of that coffin shut forever. The Fair Work Act ensures—I quote here one of its objects—that we have a ‘guaranteed safety net’ that:

… can no longer be undermined by the making of statutory individual employment agreements of any kind.

I am asked about reactions to this. Of course, there have been a variety of reactions, but immediately following the promulgation and coming into effect of the Fair Work Act I would have to say the battlelines on fairness and decency at work were well and truly drawn. That is because this book I am holding was published by the member for Warringah—obviously not in the chamber now. But he is a man of uncommon frankness.

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