Adam Bandt (Melbourne, Australian Greens) Share this | Hansard source

It takes a particular kind of arrogance and incompetence to take a really good idea and turn it into something that's a potential threat to people's safety, but that's what the government has done with this bill, the Mutual Recognition Amendment Bill 2021. It's a good idea in principle to say that people in this country should have the right to move in between states and take their qualifications with them; I think you'd find most people would agree with that. But when you go below that level of principle and work out how to make it happen you can immediately see that there are some issues that have to be worked through.

If you're an electrician, the rules that apply, the standards that apply and the kinds of equipment that apply—voltages and work practices—might in fact differ from state to state—indeed, potentially even from region to region. That is why at the moment, in many respects, there are state systems of registration and understanding and state levels of training. If you're a teacher, you can very readily see that, because the state governments have so much responsibility for our schools—they set the curriculum and put in place standards to deal with the safety of students and of staff that work there—training in one state might not be automatically applicable to another state. That is why, over many years, the bodies and the people that work in this area—electricians, teachers, others—have put some thought into how you get the right balance to make sure not only that people can move between states but also that public safety and welfare are not compromised. In the electrical industry, mutual recognition—that's the technical term—arrangements already exist. But they take into account those very important issues of safety.

It's also important to understand that the registration system we're talking about here isn't just a licence to work for the worker; it is also in many respects a guarantee for the public. You presume that, if someone is a registered builder or electrician in your state, they're trained to a certain standard and that that work is going to meet a certain quality. That's why, in those industries in particular, they've said that when you move from one state to another there are certain things that have to be complied with in order to have your licence recognised from one state to the next—in part because it's about protection for the public.

You will find universal agreement on the idea that people should be able to work across the different states of Australia. What you will also find, if you bother to look—which the government clearly hasn't—is that the people who are doing the work at the moment and who understand the systems of registration and licensing have put some effort into making sure that you can do it in a way that promotes mobility but doesn't compromise other standards, including standards that protect public safety. So if you wanted to bring a bill to this place that allowed people to move across Australia but also protected standards, you could probably do it. But you'd start by sitting down and talking with the workers and the unions and the employers and the regulators who work in this industry to make sure that you are lifting everyone up to the best standard rather than allowing a race to the bottom

But the government has come along with a special kind of arrogance and complete incomprehension and taken a really good idea and turned it into something that could be a threat to peoples' safety. What they've come along and said is that this will work in a really simplistic way where, even if there are particular standards applying in your state that are about protecting the public or ensuring that work is done to a certain standard, you no longer have to comply with them. The problem with the way the government has done it is that it's going to encourage a race to the bottom. It will mean that, provided you're registered in one state, it automatically applies to another state even if that other state has got higher standards. So the state and territory governments, who've got the responsibility for looking after their people and ensuring that all electrical work or building work, for example, is done according to a certain standard, or that teaching meets certain standards, are now going to have that potentially undercut.

That's why what the government needs to do is take this bill back to the drawing board and go and talk to the people who work in the industry and who understand the system of regulations so that we can have a system of mutual recognition that works for people so that they can cross borders—because that's what we all do in this country—but that also doesn't undermine the standards that are put in place at the state and territory level to protect people. It is good that there are amendments being moved. We will support those amendments to ensure that areas like the electrical industry and construction industry, where so many issues of safety are at play, are exempt from this. But we should go further because the bill can't be supported in its current form.

The teachers union made a very important point in their submission on the draft exposure bill—that this will have a negative impact on children's right to quality and safe education. Their submission, that it's an ill-conceived, unsolicited, redundant and untargeted regulatory intervention, is absolutely right. And it's of a piece with the government's response to the COVID crisis. The government see a crisis and, in that, an opportunity to pursue their trickle-down deregulatory agenda. We've seen that with their removal of the protections consumers have against bad behaviour by big corporations and director and executives. That's exactly what they've tried to do on that front. We have seen it with their approach to handing out billions of dollars in corporate welfare in the hope that somehow it will trickle down to jobs. But it isn't and it won't. Instead public money is being used to help billionaires buy private jets. And we're seeing it here as well. The last speaker said, 'Wouldn't it be great if, coming out of the COVID crisis, there's a silver lining from that dark cloud—and this bill is it.' No, it's not. This bill is using the COVID crisis as an excuse to do something that could potentially undermine standards, public safety and peoples' right to a good education across the country—and that's what the people who are involved in the sector say.

This bill can't be supported in its current form. The government needs to go away and redraft it, in consultation with the people who are going to be affected, and then come back. I come back to this point: I suspect that you would find universal agreement across this place on the idea that, with qualification, people should be able to move across borders. But you do that by either lifting everyone up to the best standard or by encouraging a race to the bottom. This bill is encouraging a race to the bottom. It's got big problems. It has been rushed here and it should not be rushed through this place. If the government insists on putting it through in its current form—it can't be supported as it is.

The Greens will be supporting the amendments that will be moved, but we need to go further because we have an opportunity here to deliver something really good for the community, something that will maintain standards, maintain public safety and also allow people to move across states with their qualifications, but this bill ain't it. The government seems to have an allergy to talking to workers, talking to representatives of workers and talking to regulators who might actually know more about this than the government itself does. If we withdraw this bill, go back to the drawing board, come back with something that isn't about a race to the bottom but is rather about lifting standards to the top, then I suspect it will be supported and it will probably sail through this place. But, as it is, we can't support something that potentially poses a threat to peoples' welfare and peoples' safety and also threatens to undermine standards in this country.

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