Graham Perrett (Moreton, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

I note the contribution from the member for Parkes on the Social Security Legislation Amendment (Green Army Programme) Bill 2014. I share some of his optimism about this program but would like to detail some concerns. I was in the Parkes electorate over Easter, on the Macintyre west of Yetman—a beautiful part of the world. I had a lovely time there. I have a soft spot for the Macintyre, which I assume is the northern border of his part of New South Wales. My mum was a Goondiwindi girl. We scattered my mum's ashes on the Macintyre three years ago. It is three years ago tomorrow, in fact, that she passed away. So I have always had a soft spot for that part of the world. It is beautiful.

Obviously, when young people go to particularly remote parts anywhere—even if they are from Toomelah, Parkes or any other part of his electorate—I have concerns about who these young people will be supervised by because of the cultures that can sometimes develop in work camps, in any work camp. My grandfather came from Goondiwindi and he told me many stories about how tough some of the work camps can be in really remote areas. I will go to some of these concerns in my speech.

This legislation is of particular concern because three Green Army projects were promised in the electorate of Moreton prior to the 2013 federal election. I am assuming—rather naively on budget day, I guess—that the Prime Minister will carry out the promise made by the LNP candidate for Moreton to roll out these three Green Army projects. Interestingly, the LNP candidate promised that there would be a jobs symposium within 100 days of the election. I have written to Minister Abetz and Minister Pyne, and still that jobs forum has not taken place.

But I still live in hope that the three Green Army projects that were promised for the Oxley Creek Common, the Archerfield Wetlands and the Granard Wetlands will take place. They are all in the middle of my electorate. Even though mine is an inner-city electorate, these areas—basically, around what I call the Oxley Creek Common area—are a twitcher's paradise. If you go there at any time, you will find a lot of birdwatchers. You can easily see about 70 different species in one hour, even though my electorate is only 10 or 15 minutes from the middle of Brisbane. If you go along there, you can even see jabirus. I have not seen them there, but you can see a jabiru—almost in the middle of Brisbane. Striped honeyeaters, spotted harriers, juvenile little bronze cuckoos and fairy wrens are just some examples. There have been up to 195 bird species seen in this Oxley Creek Common area.

The Green Army seeks to reinstate the failed Green Corps program that was started by the Howard government. The LNP government claims that Green Corps was undermined by the former Rudd-Gillard government; however, it was a Labor government that first introduced the Landcare and Environment Action Program, which aimed to provide work with opportunities for young people while achieving positive environmental outcomes. This grassroots environmental action is extremely important to any community, whether it be the remote communities mentioned by the member for Parkes or inner-city suburbs that have challenges, like those in the electorate of Moreton.

I support action to address these local issues. However, I am concerned that, with only a few months until the program is due to start, no-one is quite clear about the specific details as to how the Green Army will work. I had a look at the application from and there is still a lot of uncertainty about how it will run. I am particularly concerned about its exemptions from workplace health and safety laws, compensation laws, industrial relations laws and even bullying and harassment laws, because those who will be involved are young and because, generally—as you would find if you have had any dealings with such people in your electorate—many have not been academic successes or have had challenges at home and challenges in their family life, so they are often our most vulnerable. Taking away those protections, particularly health and safety laws and those preventing bullying, will make it a particular challenge.

I believe, and Labor believe, that we need to do everything we can to get people into work. We are the Labor Party. It is in our title; it is in our DNA. Every individual who can work should be given the chance to work, but we know that that can only happen if there is appropriate support and protection. We do not want work at any cost. That is the strategy of the economic 'let 'er rip' society. That is not what Australia is about, not since the Harvester Judgement and even before that, you could argue.

Environmental work and training programs are an effective way—I agree with the member for Parkes—of getting people employment, as well as providing environmental benefits that help the nation. Workplace training programs have the potential, if they are well designed and well implemented, to achieve these twin goals. But there still outstanding questions.

Firstly, I am concerned about wages. We acknowledge that Green Army participants will be paid the equivalent of a training wage, which, while not overly generous, will be more than the income support payments many of them would likely be on. These payments will also be similar to the training wages received by thousands of other young Australians who are in vocational training or education. Certainly, that is the case now—before 7.30 tonight. But, unlike trainees or apprentices, participants in the Green Army are under the supervision of the Commonwealth. Denying them the status of Commonwealth employees leaves them in a no-man's-land in terms of the employer-employee relationship, which affords a range of workplace rights—an area of law I am quite familiar with. They are not considered workers and therefore they would not have the same workplace rights. The ACTU president, Ged Kearney, said:

This is about taking away well-paid, well-protected jobs from people and replacing them with low-paid, unsafe jobs.

Yet, every second day, we have someone from the government talking about the rollout of the insulation program and the concerns that came with that.

Youth unemployment is a significant issue within my electorate, and I do not want the coalition government to think that, if they see unemployment rates for youth improving, it is as a result of these projects, because the Green Army program's wages are not sufficient for our youth to survive on. Our youth need real jobs with real wages, real workplace safety measures in place and a career path.

Those recruited will do manual labour, including clearing local creeks and waterways, fencing and tree planting. I have seen similar programs in my electorate already. Yet this government has ensured that Green Army members will be exempt from Commonwealth workplace laws, including the Work Health and Safety Act, the Fair Work Act and the Safety, Rehabilitation and Compensation Act. One thing that concerns me about the amendments to this bill is that they mean it does not provide adequate protections—namely, in the areas of occupational health and safety, workers compensation and rehabilitation. Every Australian has the right to work in a safe and comfortable environment without concerns about their physical safety or the threat of emotional abuse. This government has a duty of care to these proposed workers and, if they are not protected under the Fair Work Act, this government needs to expose its plans in more detail so I can explain to my constituents what the protections will be.

On top of this, the 15,000 young people who are intended to be employed under the coalition's Green Army have no guarantee of protection against racial, religious, sex or other forms of discrimination while working in the program, and will not be protected by workplace bullying prevention laws. As I said, people in my inner-city electorate can go home at night, but if they are working out in Woop Woop or beyond the Black Stump—particularly young and vulnerable people—they might be exposed to abuse, I would suggest. The Human Rights Commission's website states under the responsibilities of employers:

Your employer has a legal responsibility under Occupational Health and Safety and anti-discrimination law to provide a safe workplace. Employers have a duty of care for your health and wellbeing whilst at work. An employer that allows bullying to occur in the workplace is not meeting this responsibility.

In this case, they will be employed by private service providers, and therefore they will fall under state and territory workplace health and safety regulations—regulations that are under threat in Queensland at the moment. I do not know the situation in other jurisdictions.

We now know that participants will receive, at a minimum, some training in first aid and work safety. Where appropriate, cultural awareness training will also be provided. Beyond this, there is no explicit obligation on service providers to provide further training, although we understand the assessment process will ensure that additional training will be rated more highly. We also know that some participants may require work-readiness training, including literacy and numeracy. Young people in my electorate need a guarantee that they will be protected against forms of discrimination while working in the program.

This amendment to the Social Security Act, as proposed by the government, neglects to expose details related to workers' rights, benefits and protections, and it cannot be supported blindly. The associated statement of requirements is equally limited on detail. Since this bill was first introduced, further information has been released on how the Green Army will operate, but only piece by piece. At best, it is piecemeal. Access to formally recognised training delivered by a registered training organisation under the Australian Qualifications Framework is noted in the statement of requirements as an optional component of the program, to be negotiated with each participant. This gives me no confidence that participants will actually gain access to useful training.

The federal Liberal-National government boasts about improving waterways and environmental hubs, including the three promised projects within my electorate that I mentioned earlier. However, the LNP government in Queensland is selling off community garden spaces that this bill is trying to promote. Nyanda State High School in my electorate was closed down at the end of 2013. Running through the grounds of the Nyanda State High School is the Nyanda community garden, where the community has been working to rehabilitate the Rocky Waterholes Creek. This is a very important site for the local community and for training. Not far from the site, I am reliably informed, a platypus has been seen. The local community requested that any proposed development of the school site carve out the area where the garden was. I wrote to the Queensland education minister, John-Paul Langbroek, but unfortunately he refused to shave off this bit of land—even though the LNP government owed this community big time because when they were last in government they closed down the Acacia Ridge High School, moved the students to the old Salisbury State High School and turned it into a new school, Nyanda State High School. Now that they are back in government, they have closed down this high school, at a time when we should be investing in education and when the suburb's numbers are growing. There is a boom in the number of young people coming through local state schools, yet they closed down that high school.

So, on the one hand, the Abbott government claims to be addressing the issue of youth unemployment through the Green Army Program; on the other hand, it is removing funding for the Youth Connections program, designed to stop young people who have not completed year 12 from falling between the cracks by working with them and their challenges to help them onto the path to work or education. Last year almost 75,000 young people were given the help they needed through Youth Connections, and by the end of this year it is expected to reach 100,000.

There is overwhelming evidence to show how critical the transition from school into work or study is to reducing the lifetime risk of unemployment and boosting lifetime earnings. We know how important it is to be learning or earning. BoysTown and the Smith Family, which have serviced youth in my electorate, will lose their funding under the LNP government, and so these vital services that look after the youth of Moreton will be lost.

Labor seeks a guarantee from the government that all participants in this Green Army Program who are on income support payments will be better off, regardless of their life situation. We need to ensure that participants are not worse off through any changes in income tax, childcare payments or the potential loss of low-income healthcare cards or associated concessions. I also have serious reservations about preserving existing jobs in areas that overlap with activities to be undertaken by the Green Army. The Green Army simply cannot be an excuse for putting Australians out of work in favour of using low-paid participants. The government needs to stop deceiving the Australian public that this is an environmental program. The coalition's track record on environmental policy, as seen in their disastrous Direct Action policy—a policy which they are embarrassed by and about which no environmentalist or economist can find anything good to say—is shameful, and I urge this government to stop ignoring the signs and start looking at effective climate policy and improved environmental preservation.

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