Henry Pike (Bowman, Liberal National Party) Share this | Hansard source

I haven't been in this place for a very long time, but one thing I have learnt is that when this government describes a proposal as 'modest' we should take that with a grain of salt. We've seen them suggest that the changes to the Constitution with the Voice, which we'll vote on on 14 October, are a modest proposal, and now they're describing this bill as a modest proposal. The Albanese Labor government's Fair Work Legislation Amendment (Closing Loopholes) Bill 2023 will make life tougher for Australian businesses by increasing costs, complexity and red tape. This will likely lead to not just job losses but also restricting small and medium-sized businesses across Australia from creating jobs in the first place.

By the government's own admission, the changes will cost employers up to $9 billion in extra wages over the next decade. Industry has contested this 'modest' suggestion. In today's AFR, BHP, who were invited by the department to be part of the costings process for the bill, are now suggesting that what they provided to the department to help produce the explanatory memorandum for the bill grossly underestimates the actual costs, now that they've had an opportunity to look at the finer detail.

The Department of Employment and Workplace Relations costings tabled the day before yesterday show that the changes could cost employers up to $510 million annually, assuming just 66,446 labour hire employees would be covered by new Fair Work Commission orders. We understand from the industry response since the bill has been tabled that that is considerably underdone by their estimations.

The reality is that the changes proposed by this bill are far from 'very modest', as the employment minister describes them. This is in fact a radical reordering of Australian workplace law which every business organisation in this country has pleaded with the government not to go ahead with. You've got to understand this bill in the broader economic context that's currently facing Australia. We know that Australia's workplace laws are incredibly complex, and they come with a high level of cost for businesses—but also for consumers because, obviously, these costs are built into prices. If you add that on top of Australia's current cost-of-living crisis and on top of the crisis facing many Australian businesses with the current labour shortages, and when you consider the increasing cost of inputs, businesses out there are doing it very tough. The minister has admitted that these new laws will increase costs for consumers for everyday services they have come to rely on. He admitted this in the National Press Club speech in relation to this bill—that it'll add complexity to an already unduly complex system and that, as a consequence, consumer costs will rise.

It is in effect simply an attack on labour hire, the gig economy and casual employment, and it gives unions unprecedented rights of entry into businesses. It's about eroding the choice and flexibility of individuals who want to work in their own time and on their own terms, and of the many Australian consumers who access the services. Those services have become a considerable part of our economy and a considerable part of the lives of many Australians. The coalition will not be supporting reforms which weaken our economy and continue to make a bad situation worse for Australian small businesses and families.

Can I outline that the process around this bill is almost unprecedented. We're seeing this bill rammed through this week. It was only introduced this week. The government has rejected the coalition's common-sense proposal to delay debate on this quite significant bill. We're talking about 284 pages of legislation, and the explanatory memorandum goes out to 521 pages. They've rejected our proposal to delay consideration of this bill until October, and yesterday they rejected our suggestion that the bill be referred to a committee, as would be the normal process.

In the last few weeks in this place we've seen the government's agenda laid bare, because they haven't actually had many bits of legislation of significance before this chamber. We've seen speaking lists filled with government speakers because they're trying to drag out debate in order to make this building continue to work, despite the fact that it's largely noncontroversial bills here. Suddenly they find something worth debating to keep this place operating. Of course, we saw a similar process in place when the government introduced the secure jobs, better pay bill last year. We saw the same pattern of behaviour—trying to condense debate and even threatening to have parliament sit on Saturday in order to get it through, which would have come at great expense to taxpayers.

In the development of this bill, the Labor government secretly shared it with a small, select group of recipients, who were forced to sign legally binding nondisclosure agreements. So a lot of these employer groups who were provided with the content of this bill were unable to tell the public about it and unable to tell people within their organisation about it. They are now coming out of the woodwork in order to criticise it, and I'll touch on their comments later. But, certainly, the coalition is being forced to debate this bill, having only seen it halfway through Monday. The bill—as I mentioned, its pages run into the hundreds—makes fundamental changes to the rules governing Australian workplaces, and I just don't think that that level of closed consultation, but also ramming the bill through this place, is appropriate.

I've recently restarted, since the winter break, a process of knocking on the doors of small businesses within my electorate. The cost pressures that they are facing at the moment are quite extreme. The No. 1 complaint I have had from local businesses I've spoken to within my electorate has been labour shortages, and I don't think this bill goes anywhere towards helping resolve this issue. In fact, this legislation will make labour shortages far worse. These small businesses were also talking to me about the complexity of doing business in Australia at the moment, the amount of regulation, the amount of red tape. When you consider that the Fair Work Act is already 1,200 pages long and that this bill seeks to add an extra 200-odd pages to it, I just worry about whether businesses across Australia are going to be able to ensure that they are fully compliant with the changes. But let's dive into some of the detail of what this bill is actually proposing.

Firstly, and probably most worryingly, we are seeing an expansion of union powers in the workplace. The bill will amend the Fair Work Act to enable unions to exercise right-of-entry powers without any notice whenever an issue relates to wage underpayment. To gain immediate entry the union only needs to assert to the Fair Work Commission that it suspects a case of wage underpayment. No evidence is required to make their case. I know a lot of farmer groups and farmers across Australia are particularly concerned about this new right of entry without notice, which would allow union representatives to enter farms unannounced. Of course, there are all the biosecurity considerations when you deal with some of our primary producers. But there's also the fact that for a lot of farmers their place of business is actually their home, and the thought of having people arriving unannounced with a right of entry is obviously of deep concern. It is important to note that this element of the policy was not included in the government's 2022 election policies, although I note that many of the government speakers are trying to pitch it as something that was achieved as part of their mandate. This was also not foreshadowed in any of the public consultation papers that were released in relation to this bill in April this year.

Secondly, the bill outlines the so-called same job, same pay provisions. The government has asserted that the intent of the policy is to close a loophole and address the limited circumstances in which host employers use labour hire to deliberately undercut the bargained wages and conditions set out in enterprise agreements made with their employees. However, Labor policy actually goes much further than this and also covers any service contractors who provide services, not just labour, to another business. Any business that engages service contractors will be captured by this provision. The so-called same job, same pay changes are an unfair and unjustified attack on labour hire employees as well as the businesses and workers that depend on the sector. This sector plays an important role in our economy. Like employers, the opposition recognises that our labour market is diverse and that those who choose these forms of work represent legitimate and important aspects of Australia's labour market. The government's proposal is all about discouraging different forms of employment across Australia and, course, trying to promote those unions that contribute so much to the Labor Party when it comes to election time.

Changes to the legislation affecting gig workers and other independent contractors mean the additional costs to tech companies providing the services Australians rely on will be pushed on to consumers and the businesses that rely on their services. These proposed changes threaten the viability of Australia's vibrant platform economy, which delivers essential goods and services from our business community to consumers. We know the real agenda here because the minister let the cat out of the bag when he recently referred to the gig economy as a cancer. Customers who benefit from the innovative new services that gig platforms deliver do not think it is a cancer. They love the convenience and the range of services and choice these new elements of our economy provide. And the workers choosing to do gig work, often as a second job—I meet many constituents who are undertaking gig work as a second job—or when they want to choose their own work arrangements to suit their lifestyle arrangements, particularly students, parents and retirees, have embraced the gig economy.

It's important to mention that there are a lot of protections in place already under Australia's laws to cover gig workers.

Given the time, I won't touch on the changes for casual employees, but I will, perhaps, just outline some of the responses that we've seen come out of the employer groups. I know the government is very keen on quoting employer groups in this place, whether it's promoting the Jobs and Skills Summit or their position on different issues, but let's hear what some of the industry responses to this bill have been.

The Minerals Council of Australia chief executive, Tania Constable, said that the cost outlined in the explanatory memorandum 'barely scratches the surface' of the true impact. She went on to say:

As the legislation now makes abundantly clear, the economic impact fails to take into account the hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of service contractors and workers in related entity businesses that will be captured by the legislation.

The Council of Small Business Organisations Australia chair, Matthew Addison, described the legislation as 'onerous new obligations'. The Business Council of Australia described the labour hire arrangements as 'unworkable'. Australian Chamber of Commerce and Industry chief executive Andrew McKellar said:

The only loophole this bad legislation is looking to close is that of plummeting union membership.

I think that's a very telling line. Perhaps he's hitting, very much, on the root of where this legislation has come from. Australian Industry Group chief executive Innes Willox described it as deeply 'flawed'. He said:

The Government is proposing major changes to core aspects of our workplace relations system. They are changes that will, collectively, impact most sectors of the economy …

It is crucial that Parliament properly scrutinises the changes and isn't misguided by efforts to downplay the adverse impacts of the changes or their significance.

I'm sure this parliament would love to provide the proper scrutiny, but, unfortunately, we have been given this bill under unusual circumstances, and I'm sure we're not going to get the full scrutiny that a committee investigation into this bill would offer.

This bill amounts to a direct attack on the efficiency and flexibility of Australia's digital economy. It's important to note that none of these changes are designed to improve the productivity of Australia's economy, which is a critical thing that I know many of our economic pundits on both sides of this chamber have been discussing as a key priority that we need to be undertaking. Millions of Australians have enthusiastically embraced digital platforms due to their convenience and innovative offerings, but, unfortunately, Labor wants to turn us back to a rigid 1950s style economy because that's, of course, what the union bosses want.

This bill will result in fewer jobs, more costs to Australian businesses and a weaker economy. The laws will tie up Australian businesses in more red tape and make it more difficult for Australian businesses to hire workers. That's why the coalition will not be supporting this bill.

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