Andrew Southcott (Boothby, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

My question is addressed to the Prime Minister. Is the Prime Minister aware of plans to further regulate the Australian economy? Would the Prime Minister outline to the House how Australian workers will be affected?

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

I am aware of some further plans. I was not aware of them until I read my copy of the West Australian newspaper, which I did with great interest this morning, but I am aware of some further plans by courtesy of Unions Western Australia secretary, Dave Robinson. Dave very helpfully had something revealing to say about his plans to further regulate the Australian economy. Let me set the scene for Dave. We are all aware of the proposal of the Leader of the Opposition to abolish Australian workplace agreements. We are all aware of course that in the Sydney Morning Herald at the weekend a Labor Party frontbencher ‘described it as a gutless rollover to appease a mob of gangsters in Sydney’. And we are all aware of the fact that Australians do better under AWAs than they do under collective agreements and awards—far better; according to the ABS, by about 13 per cent compared to collective agreements.

We are also told by the Leader of the Opposition—I think we were told this by him at the ALP conference—that what would happen if he became Prime Minister would be that he would not allow any new AWAs; he would allow the existing ones to run their course. In less than a week, the friendly Dave from Western Australia has belled the cat on that one. What Dave has really told us is that:

Under a Labor government, only employers who had genuine agreements with staff would be able to maintain their agreement until the AWA’s expiry date.

In other words, according to the unions who run Labor policy on this issue, not only will there be no new AWAs but, even in relation to the existing AWAs, if Mr Beazley becomes the Prime Minister, according to Dave what will happen is that the unions will run a ruler over the existing AWAs, and those they do not like they will tell the newly elected Labor government to knock out. So I look forward to reading my copy of the West Australian tomorrow to get the latest instalment on Dave Robinson’s plan to reregulate the Australian labour market.