Stephen Smith (Perth, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Industry, Infrastructure and Industrial Relations) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

My question is to the Prime Minister. Prime Minister, is it the case, as reported today, that your office has contacted major employer groups and demanded that they provide ‘good news stories’ about the government’s industrial relations changes? Prime Minister, was the Australian Chamber of Commerce and Industry, ACCI, one of those groups? Isn’t it the case that, had ACCI’s submissions on the minimum wage been accepted over the past 10 years, the minimum wage would be $95 a week, or $4,940 a year, less? Prime Minister, is $4,940 a year less for the nearly two million Australian employees who are dependent on the minimum wage the kind of ‘good news story’ you had in mind?

John Howard (Bennelong, Liberal Party, Prime Minister) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

It would hardly come as a surprise to this House for me to acknowledge that my office does have regular contact with employer organisations. It is very regular and I make no apologies for that. I like to know the views of many people in the community, and we of course all know that the shadow minister has never had any contact with Greg Combet on this subject. So that must be our starting point on this issue.

There is one thing I can say: I may have contact with employer organisations but I think I can confidently assert that no staff employed by any of my ministers has rung me on talkback radio with a dorothy dix question. We knew of ‘Chris’—from Waramanga, wasn’t he? We now have a modern version, which has come to us courtesy of Media Watch. ‘I see a good amendment of life in thee.’ Media Watch has given us Corinne, from HQ. It turns out that ‘Corinne’ is an employee of the member for Brisbane, who is a shadow minister. She apparently rang the Leader of the Opposition on ABC Radio 612 and said:

Kim I’m just wanting to, as a young person I think this AWB thing’s pretty scary and I just don’t understand why it’s not being highlighted as much. You know this is really scary-Australian dollars paying for weapons that we sent our troops off to fight in a war about.

Kim Beazley said:

Well you’re taking a very good moral stand Corinne and I’m glad to hear what you’ve got to say.

The interviewer said, ‘But, Mr Beazley, this isn’t biting out there.’ Do you know how Mr Beazley replied? He said:

The fact that Corinne’s ringing me means that it is biting out there.

‘Corinne’ happens to be the President of Queensland Young Labor. We are deeply indebted to the news hounds and sleuths of the Courier-Mail. They have a photograph of Peter Beattie after ‘10 years at the Labor helm’. You have Gough and Peter, and you have Corinne.

I have to say that I looked at Corinne before I did Gough and Peter. I know I will get into trouble for saying that in this politically correct age, but I am too advanced in that view to change. The simple fact of the matter is that this is a shameful cook-up of a dorothy dixer, and I will not take any lectures from the opposition about whom I should talk to.

Michael Keenan (Stirling, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

My question is addressed to the Minister for Employment and Workplace Relations. Is the minister aware of false claims about the impact of the government’s Work Choices legislation? Would the minister inform the House of what is really happening in our workplaces to improve the pay and job prospects of Australian workers?

Kevin Andrews (Menzies, Liberal Party, Minister Assisting the Prime Minister for the Public Service) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I thank the member for Stirling for his question, which is an important one because, once again this morning and today, we have heard more hysterical and misleading claims from the ACTU and the Labor Party about Work Choices. In fact, on radio this morning, Mr Greg Combet, the Secretary to the ACTU, claimed that a Melbourne company—and this was repeated in question time by the opposition—had sacked workers because of their union activities. Mr Combet went on to say that the company had restructured itself such that it had fewer than 100 employees. If this is what Mr Combet believes, and if this is the evidence that Mr Combet has before him, he would know as the Secretary to the ACTU that it is unlawful to sack someone for being a member of a union. Indeed, it is unlawful to sack someone for engagement in trade union activities. Not only that, Mr Combet would know that there are penalties in the Work Choices legislation for companies that seek to restructure themselves in the way in which Mr Combet claimed this morning. This shows that, by making these claims on radio, Mr Combet is once again engaging in irresponsible fearmongering on behalf of the union movement.

It is a bit like the member for Perth coming out and saying that four million Australian employees are at risk of being sacked. The reality is that Australians are sacked every day and have been since Federation. They were sacked last year; they will be in 20 years time. But also the reality is that, under the changes that this government has put in place, we have seen a substantial increase in employment in Australia—30-year lows of unemployment, real wages increasing by 16.8 per cent—and these changes are about growing employment opportunities for real Australians.

Indeed, this morning there was a report in the media from the Hudson recruiting group, which says that, according to a survey that it has carried out, 38 per cent of employers—that is almost four in 10 employers—are planning to increase their staffing levels in the months to June. But do we hear anything of this from the ACTU and the union movement? Nothing whatsoever. And, to give the lie to the campaign that the ACTU is running, on ABC radio this morning we heard from Zana Bytheway, the Executive Director of Job Watch, who was asked by the ABC presenter in Melbourne, Jon Faine, how many calls Job Watch had received regarding unfair dismissal over the past two days. The answer was half a dozen—half a dozen calls in two days. As Zana Bytheway said: ‘There has been no change in the actual rate of calls.’ And she said: ‘I can’t categorically say to you, “Look, suddenly we’ve been inundated.”’ So here is somebody who is the executive director of an agency, Job Watch, who receives this sort of call and says there has been no increase—

Simon Crean (Hotham, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Regional Development) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Mr Crean interjecting

Kevin Andrews (Menzies, Liberal Party, Minister Assisting the Prime Minister for the Public Service) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

It is always great to hear the member for Hotham in here. It is always great to see that he has survived. There has been no increase according to Job Watch in the number of calls. And what this does is to expose once again that this campaign by the ACTU and the Labor Party is pure hysteria. If you want to have a more realistic view of what the impact of these changes is, just take one from the Northern Daily Leader in Tamworth today, in the member for New England’s electorate. We had a Mr Max Cathcart, the Manager of the Tamworth and District Chamber of Commerce and Industry, who said this about Work Choices:

There will be many, many benefits to employees and employers over the next four to five years.

That is what he said. A good employer will look after their employee because it is so hard to find good employees in rural areas. And we know that right around Australia. Mr Cathcart went on to say:

The unfair dismissal law has been a deterrent to employing people.

As Hudson said this morning, four in 10 businesses are looking to take on additional employees over the next three or four months to the end of June. This shows that, rather than the hysterical fear campaign we are getting from the Leader of the Opposition and the union movement, Work Choices provides Australian employers and businesses and their employees with the flexibility needed to get on and create more jobs. The Leader of the Opposition and his puppet-master, Mr Combet, ought to take a cold shower.