Brendan O'Connor (Gorton, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Employment and Workplace Relations) Share this | Hansard source

In light of my observations about the failure of the minister, I do appreciate the fact that he was courteous enough to allow for the tabling of that exposure draft bill.

That draft bill has gone out to affected parties for consultation—something we do on our side of politics; we actually consult. We do not see too much consultation occurring from the government in relation to these matters. We will continue to have that conversation. We will introduce that bill in the Senate sometime in the near future—I think it might be 14 or 15 March—in order to have a debate about these significant matters because we cannot wait any longer for the government to act. There have been too many examples of exploitation that have fallen on deaf ears. The government chose not to act and we will fill that void. It is important that we do, because it is a race to the bottom when you allow a situation to continue in a systemic way that drives down wages through unlawful behaviour. We hope that the government will join us in the pursuit of that exploitation.

With respect to some of the recent comments from the Minister for Employment in the Senate, the minister has made much of some alleged insulting and offensive comments to officers of a Commonwealth agency. If those comments were made then Labor condemn those comments from the building industry. I also want to bring to the attention of this House that, when we are having a conversation about the building industry, we must not forget some of the other challenges that confront agencies in dealing with what can be a very dangerous and difficult industry. I want to remind the government that this is a difficult industry.

On occasions, there are unsafe workplaces and I want to refer to just one site: the Royal Adelaide Hospital construction site. Jorge Castillo-Riffo, 54, was in a scissor lift and was crushed against concrete and sustained fatal head and neck injuries on 27 November 2014. I met his widow two weeks ago and there is still no resolution to that inquiry. On the same site, as recently as 20 February this year, Steve Wyatt, 63, died after being crushed between a scissor lift and the head of a low doorway while supervising the fitout inside the CBD site on Saturday afternoon. He was a highly respected electrical engineer who had 42 years' experience across the building industry. They are two deaths that happened on the same site—at the Royal Adelaide Hospital construction site.

I want the government to use the powers and the agencies of the Commonwealth to do better in preventing deaths in the building industry but also to examine why they happen. I understand the government has its agenda about other matters, but I would just say that we spend millions of dollars resourcing Commonwealth agencies that oversee the building industry and I am concerned that so little of those resources are put into preventing these tragic deaths. I would ask the minister and the government to consider deploying the resources of the agency to prevent these deaths and, if they do occur, examine how we can ensure that they do not happen again.

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