Peter Dutton (Dickson, Liberal Party, Leader of the Opposition) Share this | Hansard source

That's obviously not a point of order. As we know if we go to Victoria, where the CFMEU has its claws in deep to the Allan government, a union official on major Victorian government construction sites and senior Bandidos bike enforcer is currently charged with serious assault. The union official is currently on trial for a violent home invasion where a woman was attacked. The Fair Work Commission deemed this individual a fit and proper person on 23 June and granted him a right-of-entry permit despite it being aware of his criminal history. A union official who was a convicted drug dealer was able to obtain a right-of-entry permit, only to have it revoked when he was penalised by the court for failing to comply with that said permit. Yet still this parliament, this government, has refused to pass a law that seeks to remove these individuals from our worksites and protect people in small business when unions threaten, coerce and bully them. It has to change. There needs to be a restoration of the rule of law.

Why the government would abolish the Australian Building and Construction Commission when it had a decent record, as we've just referred to, is because of the influence. It's because of the political influence. When we look at this government's motivations, they are motivated by only a few things. One is preferment on the unions because the unions pay millions of dollars of donations to the Labor Party. They are obsessed—particularly this Prime Minister—with an inner-city Sydney view about how he can stop the bleeding of votes to the Greens, so the motivation is what can benefit the unions.

A lot of people across the country now are rightly asking themselves what on earth is the Albanese government about? No. 1 is how can we help out the unions—not the Australian people, not people who are struggling in the suburbs at the moment with paying their bills. How can we help the unions? No. 2 is how do we stop haemorrhaging votes to the Greens? Therefore, we're driven further and further to the left on issues, including in relation to matters that are in the press at the moment in relation to migration matters et cetera. That's why they're selling out part of the community here in Australia and it's why they've made Australia less safe than what it has been in the past.

So the Albanese government is about unions, it's about stopping votes going to the Greens, it's about making sure that they can take care of friends otherwise—and I think we'll have more to say in due course about some of the people who have been donating to the Labor Party in recent times. They're not concerned about the Australian public, who are really at odds with the government's perspective on home ownership because this government doesn't believe in making it easy for young people to buy a home. Their model is build to rent—that is built to rent for life because you're more likely to be a Labor voter if you're building to rent and you're a renter for life than you are if you are a homeowner, because you're worried about interest rates and economic management et cetera.

As we're seeing in the polling now, people really understand that despite this Prime Minister's best attempts, he has no clue when it comes to economic management.

Labor always, always run up debt. They always have higher interest rates. They always mismanage the economy and, ultimately, unemployment goes up; inflation is sticky as it is at the moment. Interest rates are going down in New Zealand and Canada and in the United kingdom but not here, and it's because of the Labor government's mishandling of the economy.

So they're not worried about homeownership. It's at the core of who we are, because we believe in choice. We believe in making sure that the economy works for people, not that people are working for the economy. We want to make sure that people who save and work hard keep more of their own money. That's what our coalition partners are about. That's part of our vision for our country. We want to make sure that Australians can realise the great dream of homeownership. We want to make sure that there is more prospect, but there is less prospect of homeownership when the CFMEU is running riot across building sites, whether they're industrial or commercial or, indeed, residential in this country.

This Prime Minister and the weakness that he has displayed every day over the course of the last two years have resulted in the CFMEU holding this government to ransom. That's what's happened here. But the average Australian is paying the price. Taxpayers are being ripped off. Nick McKenzie, to his great credit—the work that he and others have done in the Nine Network in exposing some of this. It's just scratching the surface. There are builders and subcontractors who, when you speak to them in private, their stories are horrific: their dog at home being baited, their family being threatened. The way in which the CFMEU uses bikies, who are the biggest distributors of drugs in our country: they're enforcers. That criminal conduct that takes place is not conducive to a good building sector and one that is affordable for Australians.

This is the biggest rip-off of Australian taxpayers in our country 's history, and this Prime Minister continues to turn a blind eye. That's why I would encourage the House to consider this bill and to support it in due course.

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