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

I will take up the invitation. I know that it became a somewhat sensitive topic talking about social welfare reform and lack of it. But my point is that the industrial relations reform is also needed. We need a virile, hungry, energetic Labor Party willing to talk about solutions, but they've really given nothing here.

I go back to where I started. This debate actually was initiated by blowing up the notion of a casual worker and telling every employer in Australia that they should both pay the casual loaded rate and then all of the additional leave entitlements. It was a patently ridiculous claim that had almost no chance of surviving in court, but of course they were going to go through with it because some employer had to find the $2 million to take on the overpaid union lawyers. That's the essence of this legislation. That's why we're all here today, right? There's that attack on casual workers from the Labor Party and then there's the obvious necessity to retain the JobKeeper flexibility in agreement making while we go through COVID.

So I apologise to one or two on the other side who were somewhat sensitive about noting just how lacking in reform zeal this Labor Party is, but I think it's all been exposed today. I must admit that debate about the platform economy just showed a luddite Labor Party that still wants to walk in front of those newly mechanised carts with a flashing light, saying: 'Warning: there's a car coming down the street.' You've got to move with the times. You've got to learn how to download an app. You've got to realise that people are going to work in the platform economy in a way that can't be regulated by unions. Yes, sadly, they won't be paying their membership dues.

At the heart of it, this nation would be far better off if we had a left-of-centre party that could engage these debates of IR reform without being driven by trade unions.

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