Don Randall (Canning, Liberal Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Local Government) Share this | Hansard source

I am very pleased speak on this matter of public importance about the uncertainty created by this Gillard government on handling the Roy Hill enterprise migration agreement. It is interesting that I should follow such a garbled response by the member for Hunter. I will endeavour to make it far clearer to the people who might be listening to this exercise out there.

As a proud Western Australian, the resource rich state that my electorate of Canning lies in, I spend a lot of time flying back and forth across the Nullarbor. Sadly, it is one of the downsides of the job. But a curious thing happened on the plane going back to Perth last Thursday night. I was sitting on the plane amongst my colleagues and others, as I often do, and there was the Minister for Resources and Energy, the Hon. Martin Ferguson, sitting just behind me to the right, busily engrossed in paperwork. I thought this was a bit strange. Why would we have the member for Batman coming to Western Australia, seemingly unannounced, deep in the study of his paperwork, particularly when there was a reasonable movie on about whales trying to break through the ice at the North Pole, which was what most other people were watching? The member for Batman, the Minister for Resources and Energy, was sitting there with the member for Brand. Of course, there were other ministers in this government on that plane.

It did not dawn on me until I read the paper and saw the news the following day why the minister for resources was in Western Australia. It was all very secretive to us, of course. The information eventually was revealed. There was one of the anti-Gillard supporters, a Rudd supporter, over in Western Australia on behalf of the Minister for Immigration and Citizenship, Mr Bowen, colluding to make an announcement which would embarrass the Prime Minister. The member for Brand, Gary Gray, who I think is a very honourable fellow and liked by both sides of this House, was also there as part of the announcement. And why would the member for Brand not be there, Mr Deputy Speaker? He is on the record, as reported in the West Australian yesterday in an article headed 'Labor urged to stand by worker scheme', as saying:

Mr Gray, the Special Minister of State, conceded yesterday that failure to communicate the arrangement to Ms Gillard had undermined the selling of the policy.

The article went on:

Mr Gray said EMAs were needed because there were not enough skilled workers.

Those were his own words.

Why is the member for Brand so behind this budget? We know he was behind this before it was announced in the 2011 budget. In fact, he was part of the organisation of these EMAs from 2010 on. But why is he so interested in seeing these EMAs working in the Pilbara? Let us have a look. There are two reasons. Firstly, unlike most of those people on that side of the parliament, he has actually had a working life in business. He was a consultant to Woodside before he came into this place, so he understands the resources sector and the constrictions and the foot on the throat that is put on the ability to get some of these projects up. He is somebody who understands very well. And, secondly, the member for Brand has the highest number of fly-in fly-out workers in a metropolitan electorate in Western Australia. How do I know that? Because I have the second highest number of fly-in fly-out workers in a metropolitan electorate in Western Australia. It is very important to us that we look after our constituents, and that is exactly what the member for Brand is doing.

Why are EMAs important? As the member for Brand has said, we cannot get enough skilled workers. One reason we cannot get enough skilled workers is the Rudd government in 2007 and pressure from the unions. The details are all there. This government in 2007 said to the union movement, 'We know you don't like 457 visas, so we will allow you to inject yourself into the approval of 457 visas and the whole policy behind 457 visas so that you can take some control of it.' Why would they do that? Because the 457 visas are not unionised. They do not belong to the unions that they would like to have in the North-West, so the unions did all they could to knock them off and stop them coming into this country. The unions are essentially the gateway: they had to pass the unions before they were given permission to sign on.

The problem is Western Australia is desperately short of workers. To give you an idea, in my electorate at the Newmont Boddington goldmine—which is going to be the largest goldmine in Australia, even bigger than the open cut in Kalgoorlie where they produce 850,000 ounces of gold a year—the mine manager, Tony Esplin, the other day said to me that on any week they are short 200 skilled workers to fill vacancies in their mine. They are not fly-in fly-outs, they are drive-in drive-outs from around my electorate and other parts of Perth. So there is a huge shortage of skilled workers in this country. Have a look in the North-West. Why are there fly-in fly-out people?

I will give you an example. Today I was informed that every couple of years around Karratha they have a land lottery. Anybody who builds a house up there has to build the most basic of houses because of the shortage of land and the cost of building houses, which is well over $1 million, and you can get $5,000 a week for a four by two in Karratha. It is just prohibitively costly to house people up there.

I am a person who began his working life in a mining town called Wickham. I was a school teacher in the mining town of Wickham, which has the Cliffs Robe River port and ore refinery. In those days, people came from all over Australia and many people came from the rest of the world, but they did not have to go through this restrictive practice of getting through the union gateway. At the moment, there are many projects up there where they are not only short of workers but the cost is becoming prohibitive. The other day we heard Jac Nasser from BHP say that Australia is becoming one of the dearest places to do business for a whole range of reasons, and one of them was not only the industrial laws but the supply of skilled workers. This was backed up by Labor's own consultant in Rod Eddington, who said exactly the same thing. He thought that the Labor Party's policy on providing skilled workers and the industrial relations laws were stopping development in this country.

In the last few minutes I have available to me, I will look at how the Labor Party has bungled this. We see this as a great scheme. We have so many other projects throughout the north-west that desperately need these sorts of workers. These projects qualify for the program: the $43 billion Gorgon project, the $14 billion Pluto project, the $18 billion Wheatstone project, the $5.4 billion Sino ore project, the $5.2 billion Oakajee port and rail infrastructure project, the $2½ billion Extension Hill magnetite project and the $2.3 billion Worsley refinery growth project in my own electorate. These, and more, would all qualify under this scheme.

We are talking about this today not because we disagree with EMAs but because of the bungled way that this Prime Minister has handled the issue. First of all, she denied it. Michelle Grattan said in her article yesterday:

In Parliament, Ms Gillard did not deny she had told union officials on Friday she did not support the agreement for 1700 foreign workers for the Roy Hill development and that she had not been informed about it.

Depending on which day you get to the Prime Minister, you get a different story. The board that is now going to be created through cabinet is policy on the run. This is symptomatic of a dysfunctional government. Everybody, including those on the other side, is questioning the judgment of this Prime Minister to tell the truth, to get it right and to reflect the policies and the will not only of her party but of the Australian people.

Why am I getting phone calls from a whole range of people saying: when can we get something done about removing this dysfunctional Prime Minister from the parliament? We know that the member for Hunter, the immigration minister and the resources minister are all part of a cabal who want to see this Prime Minister off. This was just a tricky little ploy to undermine the Prime Minister. They have been caught out and she has been snookered by the whole affair. (Time expired)

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