Jamie Briggs (Mayo, Liberal Party, Chairman of the Scrutiny of Government Waste Committee) Share this | Hansard source

A part of this motion I do agree with and that is that the Fair Work Act is operating as the Labor Party intended it to operate. On the weekend we saw no greater proof of its operation than the thousands and thousands of Australians stranded at airports because of an ongoing dispute—a dispute which has reached this point purely because the Labor Party changed the law. This is why we are in the position we are in. We are in this dispute because the Labor Party changed the law and allowed matters to be bargained which were outside of the employment relationship. That is what this is all about.

The member for Chifley, and the mover of the motion the member for Wakefield—the member for the SDA union and the member for the communications union—said this has been extremist action by Qantas, that Qantas has taken on these poor union officials who are just operating in good faith. They did not want any of this; they did not want any of this industrial disharmony; they cannot believe it is happening—except that earlier this year Wayne Forno, who is the New South Wales TWU secretary, said:

Meanwhile our members at Qantas are in for their biggest fight ever for their EA ... Our members have the power to make Qantas grind to a halt ...

He said that on 14 July, three months before. What they have engaged in since that time is strike after strike. They call a strike, make the airline withdraw services and at the end say, 'Oh, we will call off the strike'—like Qantas can just automatically put the planes back in the air. This is an action where unions have forced Qantas to this point. Steve Purvinas, the Federal Secretary of the ALAEA, the engineers union, said just two weeks ago he would not book with Qantas between now and Christmas. Is that acting in good faith, Mr Deputy Speaker Slipper? I ask you: is it acting in good faith to say to consumers, 'Go and screw the company'?

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