Nick Champion (Wakefield, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

I am sure that we will have bipartisanship support for RSLs. The member for Grey and I share a common border and probably some of the same veterans. So I would certainly like to add to that sentiment.

Today, in rising to speak on Appropriation Bill (No. 3) 2015-2016 and related bill, I want to talk a bit about jobs. I want to talk about the importance of them and the importance of consistency in public policymaking on jobs. Labor is the only party in this parliament or outside of it that gives consistent policymaking on jobs and wages. Mr Turnbull's government, the coalition government, has had two Prime Ministers; two Treasurers; I do not know how many industry ministers—probably just two—three defence ministers; and 14 other ministerial changes. It is a government that is divided from top to bottom. It is a government that is driven by its backbench.

I was reminiscing the other day about some of the rhetoric we hear. Nowadays we hear rhetoric about the tech sector, about the ideas boom and about the Prime Minister's wonderful new economy. We used to hear about Tony's tradies. That was the slogan of the previous Prime Minister—he was out there 'backing in the tradies'. You never hear about the tradies anymore from those opposite. You do not hear about working men, carpenters or electricians. You do not hear about them nearly as much as you once did. That is because this government is both inconsistent and incoherent in its policymaking.

You can see that in the tax debate. First of all we had the inconsistency on capital gains tax, with the Prime Minister ruling out any changes and then we found that they were considering changes on capital gains tax on superannuation. Then we saw Phil Coorey writing in the Australian Financial Review a day ago, 'Cabinet digs in as PM backflips on CGT'. What is the business community and the tradies and subcontractors out there in the community supposed to make of that? Then we saw the strange attack on Labor's negative gearing policy. We have a tax policy, unlike the government, which does not have a tax policy. It is an extraordinary position for a government to be in after a couple of years. They do not have a tax policy at all. On the one hand, the Prime Minister was in here saying that prices were going to go down and then the member for Higgins, who is a minister of some sort—I cannot remember her title, because they change so often—was on Sunrise saying that prices were going to go up. So you had two completely contradictory scare campaigns. You can have one side of the argument but you cannot have both sides of the argument, and if you try to have both sides of the argument—guess what?—it absolutely destroys your credibility. The government are incoherent, divided and inconsistent. What does that do for jobs and wages? It does not do them any good at all.

Labor has been providing leadership on these issues. It is Labor who has been providing leadership. One of the things that we have not been talking about in this parliament is how our negative gearing policy will back in those tradies in the expanding suburbs—the people who build new homes, who rely on construction for their living. That is where this investment will be channelled—into new homes. People will still be able to negatively gear. Those who are already in negative gearing will be able to retain that tax deduction and those who want to grow their wealth through negative gearing will still be able to do so, but they will do so by adding to the housing stock, by building new houses, which will back in the people who we do not hear about from this government anymore—Tony's tradies. That is because we do not hear much about Tony, the member for Warringah, anymore. He is hidden away, though he does his best to make it into the headlines on defence matters—and I might go into that at another time.

We have seen this inconsistency and incoherency most of all in my own home state of South Australia. We saw it in the automotive sector. It was not so long ago that we had a Liberal Treasurer in this House—who is now the Ambassador to the United States, and I am sure he is doing a good job in the national interest—about whom there was an article in the Australian Financial Review of 11 December 2013 under the headline 'Hockey dares GM to leave'. With that sensational attack on the car industry, this government waved goodbye to a billion dollars in investment in the automotive area and waved goodbye to 10,000 jobs in South Australia, 30,000 in Victoria and thousands more elsewhere. What does that do for economic confidence? I can tell you that it absolutely smashes it. People who have a blue collar or who wear a fluoro vest to work in South Australia are looking down the barrel at a very difficult labour market.

Talking about consistency, I noticed on Chris Pyne's website the other day 'Statement—Meeting with Holden'. It is a press release of 24 February, talking about how the industry minister met with Holden on 24 February and how he 'reiterated' his 'strong support for the Punch proposal and urged General Motors to carefully consider it as a viable option for continuing the auto industry in South Australia once the company leaves next year.' We are all supporters of the Punch proposal in South Australia. But, if you were an alien who had jetted down into South Australia or into Australia, you would question the consistency of this government's decision making, because on the one hand we have the former Treasurer, Mr Hockey, callously and in a cavalier way waving goodbye to GM and then you have the industry minister, the member for Sturt, now backing in this new proposal. So you can understand how people might be confused and how confusing that inconsistency around jobs in the automotive industry might be.

It is interesting to note that the Liberals are not the only ones who are confused about investment in the automotive industry; we also have the Nick Xenophon Team. We know that Mr Xenophon is very supportive of automotive manufacturing in South Australia, and I welcome his support, but his running mate, Stirling Griff, was quoted in an InDaily article in the Adelaide media, under the heading 'Xenophon sidekick says he wouldn't support Holden handouts', as saying:

I would not be supporting giving automotive companies further subsidies.

I do not find that the ideal way to go (but) I think Nick has a different view on that.

So there is an inconsistency. In fairness, I might say, they are now, apparently, in furious agreement about it, but there is an inconsistency in public policy toward the automotive industry. And that costs jobs; it costs jobs whether it is the Liberal Party or Nick Xenophon's Team party.

We need consistency, and Labor is the only party out there providing consistency on jobs. It does not matter whether it is the automotive industry, the submarine and shipbuilding industry or the steel industry, Labor is the consistent voice for working Australians and for those who want an economy that is diversified, makes things and employs people. We have a steel policy out there. We have a comprehensive policy about building submarines in this country in our national interest and for our national defence which has a comprehensive and sensible way of procuring those submarines into the future and making sure that our shipbuilding has a continuous build.

For all of this government's rhetoric, and I know that its defence white paper is coming out, one of the things that has not been put into a press release is that, for the two supply ships which have been sent off to Korea with, apparently, a Spanish company building them—I would not want to be writing the instruction manuals for that build; Spanish into Korean—we still have not had that announced by this government. One wonders if it is leaving it until after the next election. So Labor is the only party with consistent policies and consistent leadership, led by Bill Shorten, on jobs.

That brings us to the other important thing: if you have a job, it is important for it to be well paid, it is important for you to have some respect and it is important for you to be renumerated for the work you do and when you do it. It is so important for working Australians in retail and hospitality, in factories, in transport and in emergency services to have their penalty rates. I cannot tell you how important it is. We know what the Liberal Party's attitude is on penalty rates. It has been the same for 100 years. But, just to remind people: this was the headline in The Australian on 30 September 2015: 'Penalty rates outdated, deter weekend work: Michaelia Cash'. Also, there was this in InDailyin the Adelaide media—on 7 October 2015: 'Briggs'—that is, the member for Mayo—'steps up Turnbull attack on penalty rates'. Working Australians should be in no doubt about what the plan for penalty rates is of those opposite. It is to remove them. It is the same policy they have had for 100 years. At least on this they have been consistent. They have never had an original idea in workplace reform in the Liberal Party. It has always been 'feed the donkey less and whip them harder', for want of a better word.

When you look at other parties, it is disappointing that Family First and Bob Day want to cut penalty rates. He wants to get rid of the minimum wage for young workers. With the Nick Xenophon Team party, I noticed that at a Senate doors press conference yesterday Senator Xenophon said: 'I made a mistake about calling for a change in penalty rates in the way I did. My motivations were all about the level of youth unemployment. I think a much more sensible approach would be if we were to have a system of penalty rates where the independent umpire, the Fair Work Commission, determines what penalty rates are. But I also think there is a case for small businesses employing less than 20 full-income employees.'

This is not the first time that Senator Xenophon has said that he made a mistake. He said it on 27 January 2016 in a reply to a question that I posed to him about penalty rates and the bill he had presented to the Senate. He said, 'I made a mistake.' Just to remind people what he said when he introduced his bill:

I think that there is a special case, only for small businesses with 20 full-time equivalent employees or fewer and only in the hospitality and retail sectors, to look at a more flexible working arrangement where you do not have penalty rates of 175 or 200 per cent, which has been a job killer.

When voters in South Australia hear Nick Xenophon, the leader of the Nick Xenophon Team party—or maybe he is the convener; I am not sure what role he really plays in that party, but it seems to bear his name—it would seem that there is some inconsistency there. On one level, he says that he has made a mistake, or that he wants to clarify his position. But, then, in substance, his position has not changed. When he says to voters, 'Don't worry, the Fair Work Commission will be deciding your penalty rates,' that should be no reassurance at all. His lead Senate candidate, Mr Stirling Griff, formerly of the Australian Retailers Association, in 2003 went down to the South Australian Industrial Relations Commission to vary the retail industry award to reduce the penalty rates payable on Sundays. He was successful in reducing penalty rates on that occasion through an application to the Industrial Relations Commission.

What we have here is a false assurance about penalty rates given by the Nick Xenophon Team. On one hand, it is a seemingly sensible policy to refer it to the Industrial Relations Commission as some sort of guarantee for workers; but, in reality, there is an unrelenting drive to cut penalty rates for retail and hospitality workers—thousands of people in my electorate. Those people need their penalty rates and they do not deserve to have confusion. They want clarity. The clarity should be: only Labor has a consistent policy on wages and conditions and on jobs and industry. That is the position we will be taking to the election.

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