Daryl Melham (Banks, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise to continue the remarks I commenced on Thursday, 9 August on the Building and Construction Industry Improvement Amendment (OHS) Bill 2007. I was given leave to table the complete list of workplace accident victims honoured on the CFMEU wall of remembrance in New South Wales. Construction, by its very nature, is hazardous. However, these hazards can be reduced by effective management. The bill we are debating today takes a positive step in that direction. Of course, the best prevention of accidents is by the workers themselves. Every worker wants to return home safely at the end of the day, and their families want them to return.

Unions have a long history of ensuring that workers are trained and supervised in a safe manner. They have ensured, when no-one else cared, that there were occupational health standards in place across industry. Since 1902 the building unions have campaigned to ensure workers’ safety on site. This has included campaigns for weight-lifting limits, compulsory safety helmets and hard hats, the banning of asbestos and the banning of lead paint and organochlorines, to name a few major campaigns. Unions introduced full-time safety officers and have relentlessly promoted the need for safety committees. Unions have taken the responsibility for ensuring safety training is available to workers. Unions have led the charge to ensure there are industry standards and regulations to reduce workplace accidents.

I must now ask: given the critical nature of occupational health and safety, why single out the building and construction industry? Surely this government is concerned for the health and safety of all Australian workers. Why is there a need for separate legislation for this specific industry? It is legislation that was prepared for political purposes. It is complex, conflict-driven legislation which is based on false assumptions that will not assist the industry or its consumers. This government’s agenda is clearly fixated on crushing the union movement. The approach of confrontation that was so aptly demonstrated on the waterfront was extended to the building industry and then to other industries through the so-called Work Choices legislation.

In the building and construction industry the government introduced the Australian Building and Construction Commission. Let us consider the powers of that body. The ABCC can issue a notice to anyone they believe is in possession of information that can assist them with a prosecution of a building industry participant. The worker has 14 days notice of an interview. The worker cannot refuse to attend the interview. The worker cannot refuse to answer their questions. A lawyer representing the worker can be present. The worker must hand over any documents that the ABCC requests to further their investigation. This is a mandatory process and there is only one penalty for failure to cooperate: six months jail. In addition, there are penalties imposed if the worker reveals the content of the interrogation process.

The ABCC decided to prosecute 107 individual building workers for allegedly participating in unlawful industrial action on a building project in Perth. These workers face individual fines of up to $22,000 under the current building legislation. Some face an additional $6,600 fine for allegedly ignoring an Industrial Relations Commission order banning strikes. The irony of this case is that the company involved chose not to sue their own employees while they were suing the union. The company see no merit in dragging their own employees through the courts. This could be perceived as a malicious action on behalf of the ABCC. The actual merits of the case are irrelevant. This smells of retribution. This is the result of legislation singling out a specific industry. We are witnessing a concerted attack on unions and union members in this country. This attack commenced with the waterfront dispute, it continued with the Cole royal commission and it will continue while this government remains in office.

I would like to return to the words of Andreia Viegas, the widow of one of those killed on a worksite. Mrs Viegas provided a succinct description of what workers are facing today under the government’s industrial relations laws. On 26 October last year she said:

These laws attack the right of entry of trade union officials, stopping them from cracking down on safety problems in dangerous workplaces. They limit the ability of union officials to investigate and rectify safety issues. This is despite the fact that trade unions’ do more to campaign against workplace deaths and injury than any other organisation in this country.

If the government were really serious about occupational health and safety in the building and construction industry, it would abolish its unfair industrial action laws for the industry. These laws mean that, for a worker to prove that he or she is faced with a situation that they think is unsafe, they risk fines of up to $22,000 to prove to a court that there was an imminent risk to their health or safety.

There are serious issues in the building industry that we have to confront as a community. It is about time that the government stopped being consumed with crushing the union movement and the state and territory governments and started to think about a serious reform agenda. This bill is a small step in the right direction and Labor will support that move. But it leaves unanswered the many other issues which face the building and construction industry. It does not address the need for tougher penalties for corporate insolvencies involving ‘phoenix’ companies. These are companies that leave employees, revenue authorities and other creditors unpaid when they are wound up. It does not address the security of payment for employees when companies are deliberately ‘sunk’ for tax evasion purposes. It does not address non-payment of employee entitlements. It does not address the exploitation of illegal immigrant labour. Trade unions are and always have been about workers looking after each other. This government has provided a separate set of laws for one industry, purely for political purposes.

I would like to conclude by quoting from one of the submissions to the Senate Standing Committee on Employment, Workplace Relations and Education. The committee reported on the draft of the Building and Construction Industry Improvement Bill 2003. This bill enacted recommendations from the Cole royal commission. Included in its terms of reference was item 2(b), referring to the consistency of the bill with Australia’s obligations under international labour law. The preface to chapter 3 of the final report included a comment from the CEPU (Plumbers Division) taken from page 21, and I will quote it in full here. To my way of thinking, it is a precise summing up of the broad issue which underlies this government’s approach to the building and construction industry—notwithstanding Labor’s support for the bill now before us. The quote reads as follows:

Apartheid is an emotional term but does bear out the wrong done when a discrete group within a community is treated differently to the rest. Whether that different treatment is based on race, or religion, or income, or location, it is unjust. The fact that it is based on industry, as is the case in the present instance ... does not remove the vice in treating one section of a class less or more favourably than the rest ... the rule of law showers us all. Those proposing this legislation understand that, unless there is a valid justification, it is wrong to identify a particular industry for special treatment.

Stuart Henry (Hasluck, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Commissioner Cole, in his final report into the Royal Commission into the Building and Construction Industry, stated that it was universally accepted—by governments, by employers and by unions—that OH&S is of fundamental importance to the industry. Between 1998-99 and 2001-02 there were 189 fatalities in the building and construction industry. Statistics show that people working in the industry are more than twice as likely to be killed at work than the Australian all-industries average. It is interesting to reflect on that in light of the comments from the member for Banks, whose only interest a little while ago seemed to be in ensuring right of entry to union officials rather than ensuring that the safety issues on sites were addressed, particularly when you consider that statistic I quoted from the Cole royal commission. The statistical information annexed to the report clearly shows that the safety record in the industry is poor. Commissioner Cole further stated:

The likelihood of suffering a workplace related injury or fatality is greater for workers in the building and construction industry than for workers generally. The only industries where the risk of injury is higher are the maritime, agricultural, forestry and fishing, mining, and transport and storage industries. In only the transport and storage industry is there a higher risk of a fatality.

The building and construction industry workforce comprises a broad range of people, from young apprentices to fully qualified tradespeople, including plumbers, plasterers, electricians, form workers, painters, steel fixers and many others; both skilled and unskilled labourers; operators of plant such as bobcats, cranes and heavy earthmoving equipment; along with a myriad of other people all working on the same site, including foremen, supervisors and managers at all levels. Each person on site is entitled to expect the workplace to be a safe place to work. However, the very nature of construction and building sites means that there is a level of risk. Everyone associated with the industry must be prepared to accept responsibility to ensure that risk is reduced to an absolute minimum.

We expect when we attend work each day that we will return home to our families safely. Sadly, each year for approximately 50 people working in the construction industry this is not the case. On current statistics, building and construction workers are more than twice as likely to be killed at work than the all-industries Australian average. The rate of serious injury is about 50 per cent higher. These statistics demonstrate that this is not a matter that should be exploited. Occupational health and safety is a critically important issue that, if not taken responsibly, will result in serious injury and possible death. Yet the CFMEU for too many years have acted in a less than responsible way in addressing safety on building and construction sites, all too often using safety as an opportunity to pursue wage or site claims that have nothing to do with site safety and everything to do with exploitation, disruption and harassment.

For many years I worked on building and construction sites cutting and drilling concrete, so I appreciated the safety risks that existed at that time and I took every necessary precaution. I also recognise the improvements that have occurred in the industry over recent years. Unfortunately, we do not see any improvement in the exploitation of health and safety issues by the CFMEU in Western Australia on site or in their public stance. It is disappointing that they continue to misrepresent their role and intent, which seems to be all too easily demonstrated in their misleading advertisement which was recently slammed by the Australian Building Industry Commissioner, John Lloyd. He said:

It is most unfortunate that the CFMEU has chosen to exploit occupational health and safety in this manner.

Such a blatant misrepresentation of the facts only serves to undermine the efforts of many in the industry to reduce its unacceptable rates of death and injury.

The Building and Construction Industry Improvement Act establishes the powers and functions of the Federal Safety Commissioner and provides for the establishment of the Australian government’s building and construction industry occupational health and safety accreditation scheme. The scheme was developed in response to a recommendation by the Royal Commission into the Building and Construction Industry. It was designed to allow the government to use its influence as a client and as the provider of capital to improve the construction industry’s occupational health and safety performance. Currently, the scheme seeks to improve occupational health and safety standards in the building and construction industry by requiring the accreditation of persons entering into building contracts with the Commonwealth or Commonwealth authorities. The effect of the amendments would be that the Commonwealth or a Commonwealth authority is required to take appropriate steps to ensure that such persons are also accredited for the duration of the building work.

Until the government moved to ensure changes to the building and construction industry, Australia’s approach to workplace safety was ad hoc. Based on the recommendations of the Cole royal commission report, the Building and Construction Industry Improvement Act 2005 received royal assent on 12 September 2005. Section 3 of the act sets out the main objectives, but put simply it aims to provide an improved workplace relations framework for the building and construction industry to ensure that building work is carried out fairly, efficiently and productively for the benefit of industry participants and the Australian economy as a whole. It legislates the government’s response to the Cole royal commission’s report, specifically the important occupational and safety measures such as the establishment of the Office of the Australian Building and Construction Commissioner, along with the establishment of the Federal Safety Commissioner to oversee an accreditation scheme that contractors undertaking Australian government funded work will be required to comply with.

Workplace health and safety is an important issue for all Australians. Those working on construction and building sites deserve as much protection in the workplace as any other worker, which is why the promotion of work safety practices is a key aspect of this government’s initiative. It has promoted the development of the National Occupational Health and Safety Strategy and has worked diligently to encourage its adoption by all Australian governments and peak employer and employee bodies. It provides an integrated approach for workplaces to be free from work related death, injury and disease.

This government leads the way in promoting an environment in which employers and employees are encouraged to take a cooperative approach to identifying and eliminating hazards that can cause injury or death. Its approach is based in prevention rather than punishment after the incident. This fosters a workplace environment which promotes safety rather than allocating blame, which differs greatly from the occupational health and safety legislation introduced by the New South Wales Labor government. In 2005 the New South Wales government’s Occupational Health and Safety (Workplace Deaths) Act was enacted. The objects of that act were: (a) to amend the Occupational Health and Safety Act 2000 to make it an offence for a person who owes a duty of care under part 2 of that act to engage in reckless conduct that causes death at a workplace; and (b) to amend the Criminal Appeal Act 1912 to provide for a right of appeal to the Court of Criminal Appeal where a person has been convicted and sentenced to imprisonment by the Industrial Relations Commission in court session for the proposed new offence.

Employers face up to five years jail and a $165,000 fine if they are convicted of causing an employee’s death through recklessness. These laws place employers and employees in what can only be described as an adversarial workplace setting. After extensive criticism and review of that act, the New South Wales government circulated a draft bill last year aimed at relaxing those laws. Law firm Allens Arthur Robinson published an article in the May 2006 edition of their Workplace Relations Publication Focus, which states:

... the Draft Bill adopts a more realistic and practical standard that does not penalise those acting reasonably and responsibly.

Occupational Health and Safety legislation will not be effective if it is too tightly prescribed or regulated.

The Cole royal commission identified some 20 occupational health and safety regulations that the industry has to comply with, in addition to a further 34 other regulations which have some implications for the industry. Commissioner Cole best sums it up, and I quote:

The result is a fragmented, disjointed and uncoordinated system of occupational health and safety and regulation which, when applied on a national industry such as the building and construction industry, is inequitable, wasteful and inefficient.

Whilst workplace health and safety is primarily a matter within the jurisdiction of the states, it is not easy to understand why a worker in one state should be exposed to a lesser or different safety regime to a worker in another state.

The aim must be to have a regime of the highest possible standard applicable uniformly throughout Australia. The statistics show that the risk of injury is materially different in different states and territories.

In addition, there were numerous and differing codes of practice operating in each jurisdiction. Aside from the inconsistency and volume of the state based regulatory regimes, the regulations and codes that underpin the principal acts are generally prescriptive and process driven. This places a significant compliance burden on businesses of all sizes. A trend towards increasing occupational health and safety regulation is unfortunately evidence that the states have failed to reduce the regulatory burden on businesses. Reform must be undertaken on a consistent basis across all jurisdictions.

The national occupational health and safety accreditation scheme for construction work aims to protect workers from hazards associated with construction work. It provides an example of how the government is encouraging consistency in regulation. The adoption of the scheme will remove inconsistencies across Australia and mean that the same standards will apply for all construction work regardless of where it is being carried out. The government is committed to promoting greater national consistency in occupational health and safety.

It is a little over a year since the establishment of the Office of the Federal Safety Commissioner. The commissioner uses the government’s purchasing power and influence as a client to bring about better occupational health and safety outcomes on federal government funded construction projects Australia wide. The Federal Safety Commissioner has developed an occupational health and safety accreditation scheme for government construction projects, requiring all successful tenderers for federally funded building and construction work worth over $6 billion to be accredited. Some 64 builders have now received accreditation. This ensures that another recommendation of the Cole royal commission has been implemented.

This bill reflects the Australian government’s commitment to improve the occupational health and safety performance of the construction industry and to develop a culture where work is performed safely as well as on budget and on time. By making accreditation under the scheme a requirement for builders on construction projects for which the government has contributed significant funding, the government will be able to further drive the cultural change that is needed in the construction industry.

The amendments to section 35 of the Building and Construction Industry Improvement Act 2005 will provide clarification that the scheme is only intended to apply to builders who actually perform building work, and will provide that steps must be taken to ensure that those same builders remain accredited while undertaking building work for which scheme accreditation is a requirement. By simplifying the process for engaging federal safety officers, the bill will also assist the Federal Safety Commissioner in more effectively administering the scheme.

I am very concerned with the remarks of the Australian Labor Party only last month that they would abolish the Australian Building and Construction Commission. It is also interesting to note a headline in the Weekend Australian a few weeks ago, stating ‘Union boss awaits return of ALP glory days’, and I will quote from the article by Paige Taylor:

Knowing that should Labor win the next federal election, his nemesis—the only authority in 20 years to rein in his hardline and volatile union—will be destroyed. And Mr Kevin Reynolds as West Australian Secretary of the Construction Forestry Mining and Energy Union, along with his colourful deputy, Joe McDonald, will again have total control over almost every major construction site in the booming West Australian capital and right across the state. It is a daunting thought. Along with the powerful Labor candidate and ACTU leader Mr Greg Combet, Kevin Reynolds and others plan to run Australia. Indeed Mr Combet is credited with saying ‘We should return to a time when the Unions used to run this country.’

Let us look at Labor’s record in the state of Western Australia, where Mr Reynolds is one of the most influential factional players in the Labor Party. Within 24 hours of being elected, the WA Labor government neutered the WA Building Industry Task Force that had effectively addressed the excesses of union intimidation, thuggery and a culture of lawlessness, improving productivity and reducing industrial action. Now we find that police stations across the state are being closed down because they do not have enough policemen. They have abandoned the graffiti task force, which has seen a huge increase in graffiti in electorates like Hasluck. They have also closed regional and community hospitals across the state.

Can we believe Labor when they say they will retain the ABCC? No way! Clearly the building and construction industry in Western Australia and all other states needs the ABCC. Indeed, it is worth reflecting on the Econtech report, The economic impact of the ABCC. The report estimates that, as a result of the ABCC, GDP is 1.5 per cent higher than it otherwise would be, the CPI is 1.2 per cent lower than it otherwise would be, and there has been a real increase in consumption of 0.8 per cent. The report concluded that the ABCC has influenced an average fall in construction costs of 5.2 per cent and a rise in construction activity of 2.9 per cent—a great result for an organisation that Labor, at the direction of its union masters, will do away with.

The Australian Building and Construction Commission has the power to investigate contraventions of the Building and Construction Industry Improvement Act 2005, the Workplace Relations Act 1996 and the Independent Contractors Act 2006, including issues relating to workplace agreements, federal awards and orders of the Australian Industrial Relations Commission. It can also initiate legal action against those alleged to have contravened those acts. It can also refer allegations of breaches of other laws to relevant agencies or authorities, such as the Federal Safety Commissioner, the police, the Department of Employment and Workplace Relations or the ACCC.

In an article published in the Sunday Age on 22 April this year, the Master Builders Association chief executive, Wilhelm Harnisch, said:

... what we fear will simply come back is unfettered right of entry by union bosses and heavyweights and thugs.

We saw the previous speaker, the member for Banks, argue strongly to ensure that union organisers and union shop stewards have unfettered right of entry. That was more important to him than addressing the safety issues. The article also said:

We’ll get back to a ‘no ticket, no start’ situation. The biggest risk is the reintroduction of pattern bargaining and the inflexibilities that imposes on employers—one deal done for the whole town. They pick off the vulnerable contractor, and that becomes the benchmark other contractors are effectively bullied into adopting.

Under the commission’s surveillance and other changes, he said, building costs had been reduced by 20 per cent to 25 per cent and long delays to big projects almost eliminated. The AXA project in Docklands and Eastlink are ahead of schedule.

That is because the union excesses of the past have been somewhat curbed. I think a 20 or 25 per cent reduction in building costs is probably very conservative. I am sure that the costs on union building sites in Perth were over 40 per cent above those sites where non-union labour was used.

There are currently 75 building and construction matters being investigated by the ABCC, with some 130 finalised. It is no surprise that the Labor opposition intend to abolish the Building and Construction Commission because it is efficient and effective and achieves an honest outcome, having changed the culture and productivity significantly for the better. The Australian Bureau of Statistics shows the incidence of industrial disputes has fallen to a new record low. The key statistic for cracking the level of industrial disputes is ‘working days lost per thousand employees.’ The rate for the year ending September 2006, the first full year of the operation of the ABCC, was a very low 1.6 working days per thousand workers, as opposed to the corresponding quarter in 2005, prior to the ABCC, when it stood at a much larger figure of 37.4. That is a huge reduction. When you look at the figures from the September quarter of 1996, you see that a massive 263.9 working days were lost per thousand employees. Do we as a country really want to go back to pre-1996 days when the unions used to run the country?

These figures demonstrate that it is little wonder that union membership is declining, because working families in Australia would rather work than be bullied into industrial action to massage the ego of some union organiser or their Labor Party puppets. Just who are the Australian Labor Party appealing to with their plan to abolish the effective Australian Building and Construction Commission? I commend the bill to the House.

Laurie Ferguson (Reid, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Multicultural Affairs, Urban Development and Consumer Affairs) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The previous contribution was obviously wide ranging, with expertise with regard to graffiti et cetera, but I will try to keep slightly closer to the legislation. On one level, it obviously deals with some rather uncontroversial areas: ensuring that people are accredited under the scheme; the time for entering the contract of building work; extending the accreditation requirement for direct and indirect funding arrangements; clarifying that section 35(4) of the act overrides Commonwealth provisions to the extent of inconsistency et cetera. But I want to join the previous speaker with regard to his citation of the views of the President of the ACTU. Greg Combet was obviously speaking in rather broad terms when he said that he is going to return Australia to the time when the trade union movement controlled the country. Unfortunately for Greg Combet, unfortunately for the real world, we are in a very different circumstance in this country and internationally with regard to the labour market. We no longer have 1,500 people in my electorate employed in the asbestos industry at James Hardie and Wunderlich. We no longer have the same numbers of workers with that sense of solidarity and connection at Australian Gypsum down the road. We do not have plants like Bradford Insulation and we do not have a painting industry with employment of the size it once had.

We do have a casualisation of the workforce. Internationally, we are the country with the highest proportion of people in casual employment—not the highest in Oceania, the highest in the world. We have a situation where many people now work at home. As I said earlier, the workforce is essentially in small employment sectors. The trade union movement, if anything, has had to reorganise itself so that it can try to recruit people. I do not really care if Greg Combet used this very broad phraseology in his wish; the reality is that it will not happen with all the will in the world.

However, one point I make to the previous speaker, the member for Hasluck, is that Greg Combet might still stand by his words. That does not seem to be the case with the previous speaker’s great friend and associate, Mr Len Buckeridge, a person well known in conservative politics in Western Australia and a person who makes the same kinds of comments as the previous speaker with regard to industrial relations. Mr Buckeridge is becoming somewhat more reticent, somewhat less vocal, about some previous views he expressed. In May 2003 he gained some notoriety by saying that the solution to Australia’s industrial relations problems was to kill a few trade union officials. This is a person who is closely associated with the previous speaker and closely associated with the coalition and its drive to put down industrial relations conditions in this country, to smash workers’ rights, and, at the very least, if not put down their wages, to make sure that in a period of labour shortages their ability to organise and recover real wage increases will not happen.

Mr Buckeridge is very unwilling to stand by his words. I had the Parliamentary Library recently contact his office about those remarks at the HR Nicholls Society. This was the response of Mr Buckeridge’s secretary:

We do not appear to have a copy of the notes for the speech given by Mr Buckeridge at the above conference and he has asked me to let you know this.

Sincerely

P Castley for: LW Buckeridge

This guy made outrageous comments in the confines of the HR Nicholls Society and someone recorded it. That is his real view. That is what he is saying to a group that is driving industrial relations changes historically in this country: that the solution is to kill trade union officials. As I say, Mr Buckeridge is always available to make comments supportive of this government’s industrial relations policy, but perhaps he is a bit worried that that comment actually went public.

On one level this is an uncontroversial bill. The only controversy is that the government legislated in 2005 and we thought that was the end of the road—that they had got it right—but they have come back here two years later with amendments to the original legislation, which was supposedly the greatest thing since sliced bread. We see a significant number of amendments now. There is no real reason why they failed to pick up on these points earlier. Basically it is incompetence in regard to the ministry. As I say, it is uncontroversial in one sense, but the broader agenda was perhaps the question of the royal commission.

We had the previous speaker bemoaning the fact that the opposition might get rid of the ABCC in a few years time. I actually think that would be a good decision because, quite frankly, looking at this organisation, $60 million of taxpayers’ money has been spent on a series of allegations for which very few people have been charged. There is innuendo, allegation and backdooring to journalists about individuals but very few prosecutions. In the same period there has been the death of one worker every week in the building industry—an area that this commission was not very interested in. End of story. They were not interested in that matter and not interested in tax evasion. They spent $60 million of taxpayers’ money, slightly more than the current advertising campaign to defend their industrial relations system. As I say, 23 union officials recommended prosecutions against them. It did not occur in most cases. That is the genesis—the excuse—for this kind of legislation to drive down workers compensation rights in this country.

Of course, that is accompanied by gestures to push people onto Comcare. We know that in that case there is no workers compensation coverage when travelling to and from work, during ordinary recess breaks or for temporary absence from work, unless the absence is at the direction of the employer; there are tighter definitions of injury, stress and disease to deliberately restrict employee rights; there are lower death benefits for dependants—that is, widows and partners; maximum lump sums under Comcare for permanent disability are capped at $142,000 et cetera. So the background to this is the attempt to restrict the union’s ability to organise and their right of access to the employees.

I had the privilege last night of attending the launch of a video, by Joe Loh, called Constructing Fear. It deals with Australia’s secret industrial inquisition, otherwise known as the Cole royal commission, and the role of the ABCC. One of the cases shown was about a six-year-old kid who was confronted in his front yard and quizzed about his father by about a dozen or so inspectors. He was asked, ‘Did your father really go to the doctor’s today?’ and that kind of thing. People are hauled in to appear before these bodies and they are not able to tell their families what occurred. They are basically forced to give evidence and they face prosecution and jail if they do not give evidence. It really does sound like a parallel to the terrorism laws in this country—except that the reasons are not anywhere as good as the reasons for having antiterrorism provisions.

So the background to this very placid legislation, which on the surface is uncontroversial, is essentially the broader agenda that we saw coming out of the royal commission, where we had a former university law school associate of the Prime Minister, a very reliable hand, to deal with these matters—and, of course, another hand who is quite reliable from the ABCC, a person who worked for Kerin and, 100 years ago, for Peacock, the former Leader of the Opposition.

What we have here is a broad agenda to basically diminish the rights of people in this country to talk to employees on work sites, to diminish right of entry—and I heard the previous member talking about the member for Banks supposedly advocating unfettered access. Of course, he did not say that. Of course there have to be restrictions. Of course you have to be mindful of the way an industrial situation occurs. You cannot just have people walking in there every day of the week on no pretext. I will tell you something: they have actually got better things to do, quite frankly, than to go in there for no good reason.

As I said earlier with respect to Comcare, we know there has been a reduction of conditions, but it is interesting to note the safety activities of various bodies around Australia. In 2005-06, Comcare—this glorious operation that everyone should be under—had 32 inspectors, compared with 312 in New South Wales and 207 in Queensland. Its workplace visits totalled 189, compared with 3,960 in the ACT. Its safety prohibition and improvement notices totalled a massive 22, compared with 21,286 in New South Wales. That is the kind of oversight that they are supposedly going to have in order to protect people from injury. Those figures are publicly available. I want to cite the comments of Steve Mullins, the OH&S officer of the ACTU, in a speech on 16 February this year. He said:

It is worth noting at this point that the ILO estimates more than 6700 Australian workers die every year from occupational injury and disease. Access Economics puts the figure at 4500.

ABS statistics show more than 477,000 workers suffer some form of injury or illness at work each year.

I would have thought that when we know something works to reduce these appalling injury, disease and fatality statistics, the government would encourage that activity.

In contrast, the government are basically trying to minimise activity to stop this. They are basically arguing that we have to have productivity and we cannot have it hindered by union officials coming on the site, and that we cannot have effective OH&S committees because they might restrict unsafe conditions.

We need more than slogans from the Minister for Workforce Participation, who said on 29 March this year that we need cultural and behavioural change. We are not going to have cultural and behavioural change when people’s rights are restricted. The only way you are going to get effective workplace safety is if the workers on the site have some say about what is occurring, if they have the ability to police the situation, if they can actually stop jobs when they are unsafe. Now the government has placed the onus on workers to establish that a situation is unsafe; otherwise they could face legal impediments.

In conclusion, the previous member was all over the place about police numbers in Western Australia and, whether they have graffiti units et cetera. The fundamental issue here is the attempt by this government to restrict the ability of workers on the job to organise so that they can ensure safety in their job, so that they can reduce this horrendous figure of one person killed every year in the building industry, and so that they can make sure that they have minimal conditions to protect themselves.

I do note the emotionalism of the member who is scheduled to speak next in this debate. He was famed for being the most hardline person on industrial relations in the parliament. In recent years he has become somewhat jealous of the previous speaker, who has in a way outgunned him as the hardline proponent of these kinds of things in the government. But perhaps that member will not be here in the next parliament and he will again be able to ride the horse as the main advocate in this area.

Debate (on motion by Mr McArthur) adjourned.