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

I return to the Building and Construction Industry (Improving Productivity) Amendment Bill 2017. Labor will oppose this bill for the reasons I have outlined and also for some other reasons, and I will go to some of those. I will recap. As I have said, this bill will bring forward a code to apply to the building industry and will have a number of implications, not least of all employers, their workforce and unions will be unable to bargain in exactly the same manner as every other employer, workforce and union in every other sector of our economy. In particular, the code, if implemented, will restrict the capacity for those parties to enterprise agreements to bargain on a range of things, including the ratio of apprentices. That is currently allowable under the Fair Work Act but would be disallowed by the code for this industry. For example, it would not allow an employer, workforce and union to strike a deal to have a ratio of apprentices for a number of workers. We think this will limit or diminish the efforts by some in the industry to improve the ratio of apprentices and give young people an opportunity to work. That is why we are so surprised that Senator Xenophon, who likes to say he supports workers, Senator Hinch, One Nation senators and others are supporting this bill.

It also will deny employers, unions and workers the ability to regulate the forms of employment in any way. Therefore, it will not allow some restrictions about temporary worker use. We know temporary workers are often exploited in many industries in this country. We have seen recently some awful examples of exploitation, but so too some employers may seek to employ them over and above and instead of local workers. There are provisions currently in enterprise agreements, for example, in Queensland and Victoria that restrict that use or at least ensure that there is some preference for local workers. If it is the case that temporary workers are used to supplement areas of demand in the workforce, it is understandable, for example, that parties to an agreement might want to ensure that, if there are to be redundancies, local workers who have been there longer are not made redundant before temporary workers are laid off. There are provisions in agreements currently that in fact do favour local workers over overseas temporary workers. That will not be allowed to be inserted into enterprise agreements after the code takes effect.

We hear a lot from One Nation senators, Senator Hinch, Senator Xenophon and others about supporting local workers and, indeed, regulating the use of temporary workers. Government members have to understand that in supporting the code they are supporting restrictions on protecting local workers to keep their work and even denying the right of employers, unions and workers to say that, if there are to be redundancies, it should be temporary workers first. I think that is a regressive step and it shows the lengths that this government will go to to introduce this code even though it is against the interests of Australian workers.

Further to this matter, Senator Xenophon likes to make great deal of his interest in asbestos and safety generally. Indeed, he is a co-patron of an asbestos safety organisation in South Australia. He certainly is on the record arguing in favour of improvements to prevent the use and importation of asbestos. He also talks about workers' safety, yet his support for this code will deny provisions in agreements that currently exist—they will have to be struck out if they are to be code compliant—that enable five days training on asbestos safety in Queensland, South Australia, Victoria and other states. How can a senator so unequivocally support the need to educate workers and provide opportunities for them to be better informed in order to protect their health and the health of their colleagues while at the same time support a code that will not allow for such provisions to be inserted into future enterprise agreements if they are to be code compliant?

He joins the government in supporting the code. Further to that of course he supports the government in bringing forward the code, as this bill would do if enacted. Labor do oppose the code, but we said that, if the code were to apply, it should apply only once agreements have nominally expired. That would only be fair. Why should parties have regard to a code that was not passed by the parliament? What the parties did instead was enter into agreements pursuant to the Fair Work Act and, subsequently—after many rejections, I might add—the parliament then introduced a code to take effect on 29 November next year.

The Prime Minister no less was the one who wrote the compromise of 29 November 2018, as we heard from Senator Hinch in the inquiry yesterday on this bill. He wrote the compromise and passed it across the table to Senator Hinch to say he was happy to have a two-year period of grace before the code was to take effect, which would mean that companies that have agreements that are lawful and yet contrary to the code would be able to tender and win Commonwealth funded contracts. So the Prime Minister—no-one else—suggested 29 November 2018 as the date when the code would take effect and today we are debating a bill that completely contradicts the commitments made by the Prime Minister in the last sitting week of last year. This shows how dishonest this government is. It is willing to tell lies about matters that come before the parliament and of course is willing to prosecute an argument that will indeed attack the interests of working people in the building industry with no genuine benefit, just a terrible effect on workers.

So we say to the government: this code is unfair. It treats building workers and building employers differently from workers in every other sector of our economy. It limits the ability to negotiate on things like Australian made content for protective clothing, asbestos safety training, apprenticeship ratios, forms of employment and hours of duty in ways that no other sector has to endure. It is intrinsically anti worker, this legislation, and the fact that the crossbench senators are contemplating bringing forward the code by supporting this bill is quite frankly unconscionable. Those crossbench senators said that they told the industry in December they had reached an accommodation. The Prime Minister stood at the dispatch box last December and said this was a good deal, and now he is seeking to renege on that deal. It is for these reasons that I have outlined that Labor opposes this bill and will always, always, oppose the code that it contains.

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