Andrew Laming (Bowman, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

This morning was an opportunity to hear Labor's point of view on this bill which significantly reduces economic burden in the area safety, rehabilitation and compensation. We listened to someone who is arguably the nicest guy in the union movement still give a fairly opaque elaboration of exactly what his opposition is to this bill. We cannot make it any simpler: we are making it easier for corporations around the country that currently have to deal with up to eight different workplace health and safety arrangements such that they will now only have to deal with one. That is such an improvement in the system. It really is incumbent on the other side of this chamber to clearly articulate their concern with that change.

Many of us suspect it is just about how many more union free rides they can get in the state based schemes. That is the suspicion. We are really asking those on the other side of the chamber to crawl out from under the union log and tell us exactly what their concern is with what is an incredibly streamlined and common-sense approach. Within days of the Labor Party being elected to government in 2007, they instantly froze any possibility that a corporation that currently straddles multiple states and territories could apply for a streamlined federal system. The minute we came back into power, we unlocked that because we know it is complete common sense. We owe it to those in the gallery who have travelled from all around the country and are listening to this debate and those listening to the broadcast to tell them exactly why this is not a great idea.

The previous speaker spent half of his contribution to this debate on asbestos and mesothelioma. Of course everyone on both sides of the chamber would hate to see any system where an individual is placed at risk of such a horrible disease. Every injury and death in the workplace is one too many. But, with respect, that is not what this is all about. There may well be 44 people working in Comcare who are responsible for making sure corporations and current members of the system are compliant. But, by definition, the more that join Comcare the more offices they will have. There will be an appropriate number of officers to do the job. By definition, those payers—those people who purchase a licence and self-insure under the Comcare scheme—become part of a larger pool, and therefore you have more people enforcing it. That really is a straw man argument.

But the bigger one really is—and it was just alluded to by the previous speaker—the desire of the union movement to be picking and crawling all over corporations in the guise of being cops on the beat. Now hang on a moment. We have law enforcement agencies all around the country. Last time I checked, it was not the union movement that we have commissioned with the role of crawling all over corporations and calling themselves cops on the beat. No, that is not what they are there for; they are there to look after the interests of a worker. When it comes to corporations who are licence holders under an act like this, there are federal entities responsible for that job. With the greatest respect, it is not up to the union movement to be coming into workplaces without an invitation, kicking tyres and making a nuisance of themselves. I know they got used to it over the last six years, but they are not cops on the beat; they are unions, and that is a very, very different entity. They need to be reminded of that after six years of pretty much doing their own thing without any control at all from a federal government.

We are trying to reduce this regulatory burden. It is absolutely common sense that relatively small corporations that currently have to compete with Comcare in many cases should not face that competitive issue; there should be competitive neutrality. If an entity is currently competing with that Commonwealth provider then under this act they should have the right to be able to apply for a licence.

So, currently, under the SRC Act you can either be a premium payer, which is all of your Commonwealth and ACT entities, or a small number of ADF personnel who are injured in nonoperational service prior to 2004. But, for those that are corporations, we have crawled over this issue a number of times, and even while we had Labor in government we had inquiries recommending that it be open to corporations. So hang on, these are not paid up members of the Liberal Party; these are the highest level thinkers in this space, and I am not just talking about 2011 or 2012. This is going back to 1994, 1995. In the absolute ascendancy of the then Hawke-Keating Labor government was a finding we needed more harmonisation between state arrangements. With credit due to the previous Labor government, there were workplace health and safety model laws that were enacted in 2011, and that was absolutely fine. Unfortunately Victoria, Western Australia and now Queensland are touching on possibly changing these laws, which will mean that entrance to the scheme under licence will have to still retain some form of compliance in their own states.

But this ultimately, for the 43 per cent of entities that are licence holders, needs to be made easier for them to be part of this scheme. Labor's argument that they cannot possibly all be enforced is a spurious one because, as any arrangement builds, so too will the number of enforcement agencies. What we are talking about on labour site access to common law is really just an excuse for the trojan horse of being able to have unions still be able to pick over these corporations and their great fear that once they come out of state based schemes they cannot agitate and they cannot be a constant annoyance to corporations who are fundamentally doing the right thing. If unions have a concern that they are not, there are entities to which these corporations should be reported. That is how it works; that is how the real world works. It does not work with union people trying to find their way into lunch break tearooms, sort of hanging around the coffee table and trying and drum up membership. Financial issues aside, that is not making the workplace a safer place whatsoever.

As early as the mid 1990s, this sort of legislation should have been in evolution and was recommended. We had a 2004 inquiry by the Productivity Commission; we had a Comcare review performed in 2008, including the Taylor-Fry actuarial report; and very briefly and most recently, as I said, there was a review of the SRC Act, performed in 2012-13 and undertaken by Peter Hanks and Allan Hawke, reviewing both the compensation benefit structures and the scheme's performance and in particular governance and financial frameworks. They have consulted those two individuals extensively. You do not have to take one side of parliament's word on this; they have worked with the participants of Comcare scheme and developed these recommendations which clearly say to both sides of this chamber that what we need is a system that allows these new entrants who are choosing to self insure, who are carrying both the risks and benefits and are saying, 'We want to work to reduce within our workplaces the call on workers compensation by having world standards and, in turn, we want our premium to reflect that.'

The great challenge of staying in some of the state based schemes unable to have this say is you are, effectively, paying premiums that cover the transgressions of other corporations and entities. A self-insurer simply says: 'I may be big, I may be small, but I am going to take that risk. I am going to take the actuarial risk, cover my workers and have world-class safety arrangements in place, and we will reap the benefits ultimately by being self-insured and paying lower premiums.' But it is not about lower premiums; it is about lower calls on the SRC system. It is about fewer people requiring workers compensation, because we have world-class safety in our workplaces.

This is a common-sense piece of legislation. It is extraordinary that the other side not only opposes it but really cannot tell you any good reason why they oppose it except, as we suggest, they all just want a few more free lunches for union members. I know that drives them and it drives their preselection, but ultimately this is about corporations and entities that cross state borders being able to pick up the risks and the costs of self-insurance to do that, to remove the need for a minister to be able to determine if you are eligible, to simply be able to apply to the SRCC. This is common-sense, red tape removing legislation and something that not just this side but both sides of the chamber should be supporting.

Ordered that the resumption of the debate be made an order of the day for a later hour.

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