Allegra Spender (Wentworth, Independent) Share this | Hansard source

by leave—I move amendments (1) to (3) to the Senate amendments, as circulated in my name, together:

(1) Senate amendment (1), subparagraph (b)(vi), omit the subparagraph, substitute:

(vi) Part 7 (workplace delegates' rights);

(2) Senate amendment (3) (proposed new table item 8 in subclause 2(1) of the Bill), omit the table item.

(3) Senate amendment (9) (proposed new Division 4 of Part 15 of the Fair Work Act 2009), omit the Division.

Firstly, I'd like to talk to the government amendments that have come down from the Senate. I'd like to acknowledge that, finally, the government has decided to split the bill. This has been the desire of many of the crossbench for a period of time because we have recognised that there are many important parts of the bill that support people who need it right now, including to support for those suffering domestic violence and those suffering silicosis, to ensure that people get the correct redundancy payments and also to ensure that people do not have their wages stolen from them. This is absolutely important. I don't fully support, however, the split as it is, and one of the amendments is about that split.

I also wish to urge the government, as it considers what it does next with the rest of the bill, to take some positive steps to make it easier to employ people in this country. The government could take some positive steps for business that would also make a huge difference to workers. These are things such as making it easier to have increasing part-time flexibility for part-time workers. The minister and I have spoken time and time again about award simplification because I would still like my niece, when she asks me if she is being paid the right amount, to look that up herself rather than have me spend half an hour on the Fair Work website, trying to work it out for her. There is significant work to be done that would benefit workers and would benefit business, and I urge the government to seek that common ground much further.

The specific amendments I am making are pretty simple. The Senate amendments have the effect of shifting most parts of the Fair Work bill into a separate bill which will be considered next year. In addition to the parts being shifted out, I would like to add division 1 of part 7. This division deals with workplace delegates, providing them with additional protections and rights, and imposes a requirement on businesses to provide delegates with paid time off for training. The bill provides a carve-out for small businesses—defined as those with fewer than 15 employees—but otherwise provides no guardrails on the number of delegates or how much paid time off they can receive.

The minister has told this House that this would be policed by Fair Work, but many businesses would like to see clear, legislated guardrails such as reasonableness tests given the size of the business. As somebody who has run two different businesses, the idea that someone in my workplace may have an unlimited amount of time off that I am obligated to pay for with absolutely no control or guardrails is concerning. It's nice that Fair Work might police this, but, honestly, when you're trying to run a business, you just want to know pretty simply what you're allowed to do and what you're not allowed to do. I'm afraid that the legislation as drafted does not do that enough for business. We need to make it easy for businesses to do the right thing, because most Australian businesses want to do the right thing but do not want to have to go back to Fair Work and work out what they're meant to be doing. I continue to urge the government to look for simplification so that businesses can know what they are doing.

I appreciate that, at the moment, it's not appropriate to move an amendment to impose this test in the House; however, I'm simply asking that the government shift this division into another bill, which means it can be considered as part of the Senate inquiry and appropriate guardrails can be considered and adopted. It is a sensible measure which will provide clarity, support small and medium-size business and not be contrary to the government's policy intentions, so I encourage the government to support it.

I also encourage the opposition to support it. I have to say that I sat through the original debate on this bill earlier—I think it was the other week—and I watched the opposition vote time and time again against sensible amendments from the crossbench, including amendments that would remove union powers for delegates and remove the right for unions to go into workplaces without notice. I do not understand the opposition's reasoning on this, when these are the challenges that you as the opposition say that you're trying to preserve for businesses. It is time to work constructively with the whole House to make bills better.

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