Jenny Ware (Hughes, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

I rise to speak on the Fair Work Legislation Amendment (Closing Loopholes) Bill 2023, which I oppose in its entirety. At the outset, before I get into the detail of this bill, it's a further demonstration of the Labor government's commitment to unwinding the flexibility that did exist within our industrial relations system. It is also a shout-out to the union movement. I was here in the House when I heard the member for Canberra, who I have a lot of respect for, speak. I just want to point out, before I get to the union involvement in this legislation, the specific thank you that was given to the ACTU and the gratitude that has been expressed by many opposite me to the unions for this legislation.

In 2023, when we have so many challenges to our economy, now is the time for the government to be boosting productivity, encouraging businesses and not making things harder for them—because that is what this is doing. This is making things harder as well for many people in the gig economy and casual workers who choose this as a way of working. They may only do it for a short period of time in their working life, but they do it for reasons of choice and they do it because it suits their particular lifestyle. It also helps employers. It helps our businesses. It helps productivity. I'm referring particularly to the building and construction industry. In the electorate of Hughes, I have many building and construction companies. We have close to 2,000 in my electorate alone. I have nearly 7,000 constituents who work in the building and construction industry within my electorate. At many times in the building and construction industry, a company may suddenly say, 'I've just got an extra job, so now I need some extra plumbers, roofers or painters.' So it may be the case that there are people they can call upon—labour hire, casual workers—that will come in and help that business to get that job done. That is where there is real benefit with keeping casual workers within our economy. There is no reason why casual workers should not be able to retain that choice. They should not be forced to become permanent workers. The Labor Party claim to be the friend of the workers, but in this case they have this wrong.

When the responsible minister, Mr Burke, introduced this bill overall, he said this bill will 'clarify' and 'simplify' aspects of our industrial relation system. This legislation is 161 pages, with an explanatory memorandum of over 300 pages. I do not know how, by any definition, that is simplifying this system. If we look at what we have now and what the government is attempting to do with simplifying how we define 'casual employment', first of all, the permanent casual loophole has already been closed under earlier legislation, but this new definition of 'casual employment' in this bill is three pages long and includes 15 factors to determine if an employee is in fact a casual. Again, I fail to understand how this is simplifying our industrial relations system and making it easier in any way for businesses and employees to work together, which they have been able to do. In that regard, this government, as all federal governments should be doing, should be providing an environment to facilitate our industrial relations system. It should be driving productivity. That is what makes Australians stronger, not micromanaging every tiny detail of the relationship between employers and employees and between businesses and workers.

This bill is well and truly taking Australia down the wrong path. This bill is intended to be a distraction from the real issue that is facing Australians at the moment, which is the cost of living. This bill is doing nothing to address what people in my electorate are telling me are the real issues that are facing them.

This bill has three main problems: it is impossibly complex, it is going to add significant cost to businesses and to consumers and it is impossibly confusing. I have just spoken about how we are now going to define a casual worker, for example. The minister for employment, at his recent National Press Club address, said: 'This bill will, indeed, add complexity to an already unduly complex system and, in addition, consumer costs will go up.' When we are facing a cost-of-living crisis in this country, exactly what we want to hear from the employment relations minister is, 'By the way, I am now introducing legislation which I guarantee will increase the costs of a whole lot of consumer goods'!

So to say that this new workplace relations system is going to improve things for our country is completely disingenuous. This is about eroding the choice and flexibility of individuals who want to work in their own time and on their own terms, and those workers are not members of unions. We have just heard a big thankyou given out to the ACTU for its involvement in this legislation.

This legislation is going to put significant constraints on businesses and employers who want to expand, construct new products and infrastructure or simply manage their operations in their own way. Small businesses, medium businesses and large businesses should be able to do that within a flexible industrial relations system. On this aside, we are not going to support reforms which will weaken our economy and continue to make a bad situation worse for Australian small businesses, Australian farmers and Australian families.

This law and the earlier fair work legislation that has already gone through this House is a radical reordering of Australian workplace law which every business organisation in this country has pleaded with the government to not go ahead with, from very large business down to much smaller businesses. Organisations that have supported it include, of course, unions. The unions will now have unprecedented rights of entry into many businesses, and I will turn to that in a moment.

We all want Australians to have safe, high-wage, sustainable jobs and to be rewarded for their hard work and experience. Driving productivity and ensuring that Australian companies and Australian employers do well is exactly what we need to get this country moving again. But an attack on gig workers, labour hire companies, tradies and other independent contractors, which is what is at the heart of this closing loopholes bill, is what we are seeing instead.

These are simply people who want to work in their own time and on their own terms. They should be allowed to do that. What industrial relations in this country should be focusing on is making us more productive and creating more jobs. This is de-incentivising companies, particularly small businesses, to put on new employees and to employ casual worker. It's quite patronising, I think overall, to say to workers who have chosen to work in these areas or who have chosen casual work, 'Well, we're the government, and we say that what you are doing is actually not the right path.' We should be able to trust an industrial relations system where employers and employees can make their own decisions and where employers, particularly small businesses, can choose when they may need extra resources to power their businesses. I refer particularly to the words of Jennifer Westacott, Chief Executive of the Business Council of Australia. She has said this is a 'radical shakeup of the industrial relations system' in this country. She spoke about it creating confusion and extra cost for consumers, which was backed up by the minister, and it will make it harder to hire casual workers, creating uncertainty for employing anybody. She said:

Any government that's serious about cost of living would not do this.

And those words are supported.

Turning to unions, this bill will expand union powers in workplaces. It is going to enable unions to exercise right-of-entry powers without any notice whenever it relates to wage underpayment. All they have to do to gain immediate entry is to assert to the Fair Work Commission that they suspect a case of wage underpayment. No evidence is needed at that point. They will simply then be able to enter the workplace. Labor talks about closing labour-hire loopholes, but the truth is that this policy goes much further than labour hire. It can be seen as hugely disruptive. It stops businesses from being able to access the service they need to address what are often short-term problems within their production lines. This is nothing but an unjustified attack on labour-hire employers as well as the businesses and workers that depend upon this sector. This is a sector that has played an important role in our economy and should continue to play an important role in our economy.

Labor often talk about diversity and how much they like diversity, but they don't like a diverse labour market in this country. They don't like the fact that gig workers in the casual workforce undertake various forms of work and largely do not join unions. The Albanese government in this respect does not respect diversity. They do not respect diversity of the labour market. The opposition, on the other hand, 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.

I just want to turn briefly to what a couple of other stakeholders said when this legislation was sent out to them for comment. We had the Minerals Council of Australia say:

The Albanese Government's latest industrial relations legislation changes are some of the most extreme, interventionist workplace changes that have ever been proposed in Australia.

The changes will inflict immense harm to the economy, the weight of which will fall on the shoulders of the most vulnerable Australians who will pay more for groceries, housing, and energy.

Tania Constable went on to say:

For Australian mining, this excessive burden and workforce rigidity will put the industry's ability to deliver the full economic and social benefit from the emerging clean energy mining boom, under serious threat.

We hear almost every day in this place about the push to clean energy, and this is not going to help the government achieve those targets.

In closing, this is not good legislation. This is not a good way to reinvent industrial relations within this country. We have long moved away from this sort of centralised wage fixing. We have long moved towards flexibility between employers and employees. The coalition government respected that business owners—small, medium and large businesses—could make the decisions for their own workforce, and it respected the right of casuals and those in the gig economy to have the choice as to when they worked and whether they wanted to remain as casuals. This is not good legislation. For all the reasons outlined, I oppose it.

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