Ms Julie Bishop (Curtin, Liberal Party, Deputy Leader of the Opposition) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Notwithstanding the ideological rhetoric of the Deputy Prime Minister and the Prime Minister, I must bring to the attention of the House that this piece of legislation, the Workplace Relations Amendment (Transition to Forward with Fairness) Bill 2008, does not deliver what the government said this bill would deliver. It is in fact a flawed piece of drafting. Given that the Labor Party has had almost 12 months since it announced its policy platform on industrial relations, it is almost inconceivable that this bill is so flawed as to not come near reflecting what the government has said it will achieve. The coalition referred this bill to a Senate inquiry, against the strenuous opposition of the government, and then the time frame for the inquiry was severely truncated by the government. Nevertheless, the evidence before the inquiry has revealed that this bill is fundamentally flawed, both from a drafting and a policy perspective.

There are extensive concerns with respect to the bill’s complexity and drafting. I refer to comments from Professor Andrew Stewart, of Flinders University, who has stated that many of the provisions remain ‘unduly complicated and difficult to understand’. On a close analysis, it is apparent that Professor Stewart is correct: the proposed legislation is complicated unnecessarily and in many areas is very difficult to understand. This confusion and complexity will impact on businesses and workers. To prevent widespread confusion and ensure transitional arrangements for workplaces across the country are adequate, the bill should be redrafted to address the numerous technical and policy concerns that have been raised in the evidence given before the Senate inquiry.

Let me give you a number of examples. Whilst the bill seeks to replace existing Australian workplace agreements with another, similar form of individual statutory agreement called an ITEA—an interim AWA introduced by Labor—and in fact allows existing individual agreements to continue up to and beyond 2010, the legislation before the House is unable to accommodate particular types of employment arrangements presently able to be entered into under Australian workplace agreements.

Evidence before the inquiry shows that, moving forward, this will present significant challenges for industries who are dealing with the introduction of Labor’s interim AWAs, otherwise known as individual transitional employment agreements. A specific example of this is the construction sector, where, due to the transient nature of the workforce and the project nature of the work, there will be some employees that will be able to access Labor’s interim AWAs and others that will not. Somebody put it in these terms: ‘There will be workers who will fall into an abyss.’ This will result in workplaces having one set of workers on Labor’s interim AWAs and another set of workers, carrying out the same work, who are going to be forced back onto awards.

Within the construction and mining sector, industrial coverage, and thus protection from industrial action and drawn-out completion dates, is also a commercial consideration for many principal contractors. This bill places workplaces and contractors at risk from industrial action and puts employers and employees in a position where they have different groups of workers doing the same work employed on different industrial instruments. This is a significant problem, not just for employers but also for workers, and it is one that must be rectified by the government.

There are also inconsistencies within the bill with respect to the application of the no disadvantage test and the relevant standard against which these interim AWAs and collective agreements will be tested. In certain workplaces, interim AWAs will be measured against existing collective agreements instead of the new National Employment Standards. This could result in the ratcheting up of wages and conditions where this might not ordinarily occur, leading to wage inflation. This is a great concern. (Time expired)

Julia Gillard (Lalor, Australian Labor Party, Deputy Prime Minister) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I will answer the points that have been raised so far in consideration in detail. I anticipate that the Deputy Leader of the Opposition will have some more. I hope that this is not a tactic to delay the passage of the bill through the House. Can I say, in relation to the Senate inquiry, the representations made by the Deputy Leader of the Opposition were completely wrong. We were always happy to have a Senate inquiry. The only thing we ever asked of the opposition was that they do it on the same time frame as the last Senate inquiry was done into their last workplace relations changes—that is, we asked the opposition to apply the same standards to itself as it sought to apply to others in government. I know consistency is a hard ask for this opposition, but to represent in this parliament that we opposed having a Senate inquiry on a proper time frame is not true.

Secondly, I am bemused, I would have to say, by the reference to Andrew Stewart. He is exactly the sort of person that Howard government ministers used to get up in question time and vilify because he had criticised Work Choices—remarkable indeed. I suggest to the Deputy Leader of the Opposition that if she wants to ring up Andrew Stewart and ask him the simple question, ‘What did you think of Work Choices and do you think this is better?’ then she had better hold the phone away from her ear as he very loudly proclaims, ‘This is better for Australian working people’—because it so clearly is.

On the question of different agreements being in a workplace: now I have heard everything! This is a Liberal Party that changed workplace relations laws so that it is possible in one workplace for some workers to be on an award, for some to be on a collective agreement, for some to be on a pre-reform AWA, for some to be on a pre-fairness test AWA and for some to be on a post-fairness test AWA. Apparently the criticism of the Deputy Leader of the Opposition is that we are introducing another employment instrument. Can I reassure the Deputy Leader of the Opposition that when Labor’s system is in full operation—unlike the mess that Work Choices has created—we will have the National Employment Standards and awards creating a modern, simple safety net. We will have people able to collectively bargain to get above that safety net or people able to enter into individual common-law contracts of employment—that is, our system will be a simpler one than the scrambled mess that has been created by Work Choices.

It is with some amusement that I note that one of the great debates of the last election—one of the key questions of ideology, one of the things that has defined what it is to be a Liberal in this country—now apparently comes down to a question of drafting. The opposition no longer want to be in government. They want to run the Office of Parliamentary Counsel. That is apparently their highest aspiration in life. They would prefer to be there drafting legislation. Drafting legislation might be the highest aspiration of the opposition, but at some point they are going to have to answer the question: what do they stand for? Do they still stand for Australian workplace agreements? Will they go to the next election reintroducing Australian workplace agreements? Is that what the opposition stand for, as they wander around saying: ‘We don’t support and we don’t oppose. Now we think we could have drafted it better, but we don’t support and we don’t oppose. We did have an amendment. Now we don’t have an amendment. We don’t know whether we will have amendments. Really, we don’t really know anything.’ Against that backdrop, I would seriously suggest to the opposition that, instead of pretending that they are parliamentary draftspeople, they actually say something about what they believe in and, if they are not able to do that, then they get out of the way of a government that knows what it believes it.

Ms Julie Bishop (Curtin, Liberal Party, Deputy Leader of the Opposition) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Legislation has the potential to impact on the everyday lives of Australians. I am amazed that the Deputy Prime Minister seeks to ridicule the evidence given before a Senate inquiry. She seeks to ridicule the evidence given before a Senate inquiry as to the complexity and the flawed nature of the Workplace Relations Amendment (Transition to Forward with Fairness) Bill 2008 and she seeks to ridicule Professor Andrew Stewart, whose evidence was:

... the ... provisions remain unduly complicated and difficult to understand ...

I would suggest that Professor Stewart’s concerns be treated with respect. The premise upon which this bill is based—that is, the abolition of Australian workplace agreements—is in fact false. That is not what this bill does. The Labor Party have led the public to believe that individual statutory agreements will no longer exist in workplaces in Australia—certainly not beyond 2010. We all remember the statements in their document of April 2007—that is, the document of the now Deputy Prime Minister before the now Prime Minister had to come in and pull her into line. This document said on page 3:

AWAs and statutory individual contracts will not be a part of Labor’s fair and balanced workplace laws.

That is, in fact, not the case. Time after time, the Prime Minister, the then Leader of the Opposition, and the Deputy Prime Minister, the then shadow minister for workplace relations, said, for example:

Australian Workplace Agreements are no part of Labor’s industrial future for this country.

Julia Gillard (Lalor, Australian Labor Party, Deputy Prime Minister) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Hear, hear! Exactly right.

Ms Julie Bishop (Curtin, Liberal Party, Deputy Leader of the Opposition) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

That is not correct. They went on to say:

Our laws will abolish AWAs ...

The now Deputy Prime Minister said on 2 May 2007:

We will be getting rid of Australian workplace agreements.

The Prime Minister, when he was the Leader of the Opposition, said statutory AWAs were, for Labor, ‘simply unacceptable’. He later went on to say:

We see no need whatsoever for individual statutory agreements.

The Australian public would be able to draw from that that there will be no individual agreements in workplaces across Australia beyond 2010 or, as the Policy implementation plan said, that 31 December 2012 would be the ‘last possible expiry date for all Work Choices AWAs’. The public thought that that meant that Labor’s policy was there would be no individual statutory agreements beyond 2010 or, most certainly, beyond 2012. But, in fact, evidence provided to the Senate inquiry has revealed that individual statutory agreements can continue indefinitely where the employer or the employee chooses not to terminate the agreement. These arrangements can continue indefinitely for AWAs and for Labor’s interim AWAs, the ITEAs. The Prime Minister and the Deputy Prime Minister were at it again today in the House, refusing to acknowledge that, at the nominal expiry date of an individual statutory agreement—whether it is an AWA or one of Labor’s new interim AWAs—that agreement can continue. If the employee and the employer do not seek to terminate or to renegotiate it, it continues indefinitely—beyond 2010, beyond 2012 and into the future. The evidence that we got from an Acting Associate Secretary, Mr Pratt, of the Department of Education, Employment and Workplace Relations, should be highlighted to this House. Mr Pratt said:

In relation to the government’s intended new system, which will apply from January 2010, there will be no individual statutory agreements. There will be transitional agreements which still continue, but they are not agreements under the government’s new system.

The question was put to him:

Senator FISHER—If your definition of ‘new system’ is January 2010, you have indicated—unless you tell me that I have misunderstood—that it will be possible for parties to continue to work under legal AWAs and legal ITEAs beyond January 2010.

Mr Pratt—Certainly, but they will be remnants of the previous system.

Senator FISHER—Is there an end point? Let us go to that. Does the bill bring about a definitive end point for those agreements in date terms?

Mr Pratt—No, it does not.

(Time expired)

Julia Gillard (Lalor, Australian Labor Party, Deputy Prime Minister) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Clearly, there is now a strategy by the opposition to extend Work Choices. It is what they believe in and it is what they are trying to do. This is clearly a content-less filibuster in order to extend Work Choices. They do not want the Australian public, immediately after Easter, to have the reassurance that they can walk into workplaces knowing that no-one can ask them to sign an Australian workplace agreement that rips away award conditions. That is what Work Choices guaranteed. That is what it is guaranteeing even today. We are trying to get rid of it, and here we have a content-less filibuster to try and keep Work Choices going as long as possible.

We know that it was the position of the Deputy Leader of the Opposition and many in her party room to keep Work Choices. But, as has been so well documented in the media, that was not the position of the balance of her party room, who actually wanted this legislation to go through. The opposition say they do not support, they do not oppose, they do not know and they really cannot think about it. The best thing they could do would be to let this legislation through into the Senate so that we can deliver to the Australian people on a reasonable timetable what they voted for. We know that the concept to actually do what the Australian people voted for in workplace relations strikes the Liberal Party as grandly odd because it is not a concept that has ever exercised the minds of the Liberal Party. They did not go to the 2004 election asking people what they wanted to vote for. They cooked up Work Choices in secret and then imposed it on the Australian people.

Can I say to the Deputy Leader of the Opposition that it does strike me as passing strange that, having introduced Work Choices in this country and having fought the last election in favour of Work Choices, her criticism of the government now is apparently that we are not getting rid of it quickly enough! I mean, really! Mr Deputy Speaker, you would probably recall that industrial relations was one of the single biggest things talked about in the lead-up to the last election. It was not a side issue; it was at the centre of the election campaign. Anybody who had looked at Labor’s policy in the period before the last election—and millions of voting Australians did—would have found that it described absolutely that we would pass a transition bill to end the making of new Australian workplace agreements and that we would have a two-year transition period in which awards would be modernised. We said that people would have access to an individual transition employment agreement during that period but it would be strictly limited in terms of which employers could use it and for what categories of employees, and it would have to pass a full no disadvantage test against the underlying industrial instrument—that is, we would end the rip-offs. We said that we would then move to a substantive bill that delivered on the rest of Labor’s commitments.

We always clearly said in that policy, as part of promising a sensible and measured transition to the Australian people, that Australian workplace agreements that were in operation at the time of the passage of the transition bill would stay in operation for the balance of their term and then, in accordance with normal industrial relations law and practice, when they hit the nominal expiry date, people could make decisions about what to do next. One of the decisions they might make is that they would like to enter into a collective agreement. One of the decisions they might make is that they would like to enter into an individual common-law contract that respects the safety net. Of course, agreements in accordance with industrial law, whether they are collective agreements or individual agreements, continue to the nominal expiry date and beyond until people make that election about what they are going to do next.

What is the reason for that? The reason is to give people certainty. This is not a political point; this is ‘Labour Law 101’. There would be university lecture halls around this country that are having a more sophisticated dialogue than the opposition is capable of today. We promised this bill to the Australian people and the opposition apparently does not oppose it. So stop filibustering because, if you hold this bill up, any Australian who loses a condition will have you to hold responsible. (Time expired)

Ms Julie Bishop (Curtin, Liberal Party, Deputy Leader of the Opposition) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Indeed, one of the decisions that employees and employers can make upon the expiration of the nominal expiry date is that the Australian workplace agreement or the interim AWA can continue indefinitely. I believe the Australian public will be very interested to know that Labor’s own bill does not abolish individual statutory agreements and that, in workplaces across Australia, employees and employers are entitled to continue working under individual statutory agreements. Once again, this is all Labor’s spin and when you go to the detail the truth is revealed.

There has also been much concern raised in the Senate inquiry by stakeholders and both sides of politics about the workability of the award modernisation scheme. The coalition is particularly concerned about comments made to the Senate inquiry by Professor Andrew Stewart, who submitted that:

It is simply not possible to standardise conditions in any award-reliant industry or occupation without disadvantaging someone.

One of the minister’s own Labor colleagues, Senator Marshall, suggested last week that the ALP plan for award modernisation without disadvantaging workers or increasing employers’ costs was ‘contradictory and an impossible ask’. I ask the minister to respond to Senator Marshall’s concerns about this contradiction. Of all the areas within the bill, this is the most flawed and of greatest concern. On the one hand the ALP want to oversee the eventual demise, they say, of individual statutory agreements, yet on the other hand they are not prepared to extend the life of ITEAs until such time as there is an adequate set of modern award conditions in place. Senator Marshall’s concerns about the contradictory nature of this ought to be taken into account.

To top it off, the Senate inquiry revealed that the government had neither undertaken nor commissioned any economic modelling or economic analysis of the impact of its transition bill or indeed its industrial relations agenda more broadly. Given that unemployment is at its lowest level in 34 years and long-term unemployment has decreased significantly during the decade of workplace reform under the Howard government, we are amazed that the Labor Party are so dismissive of the impact this bill will have on jobs. They have done nothing about getting any economic modelling or analysis on its impact on jobs.

There is nothing fair about unemployment. I am at a loss to understand why Labor has not published any analysis—positive or negative—on the impact on jobs. We are aware that the minister has a report from Econtech that analysed the impact of Labor’s broader industrial relations agenda and conservatively estimated that it will result in a 2.4 per cent increase in unemployment and a potential loss of 268,000 jobs. The minister has refused to release this report publicly. What does she have to hide?

It is the responsibility of the government of the day to draft legislation that can be implemented without confusion, without complexity and without subsequent damage to the economy. The government is obliged to consider the evidence given to the Senate inquiry and respond with the necessary amendments to ensure that the legislation reflects the promises that Labor made to business, industry and workers before the election.

My initial proposal alluded to in my speech in the second reading debate, to amend the bill to extend the life of Labor’s interim statutory agreements, is no longer necessary in the light of the evidence before the inquiry. I remind the House again of the evidence of Finn Pratt, an assistant secretary in DEEWR. Existing AWAs and the new individual statutory agreements introduced by Labor can continue indefinitely—and that is what I was seeking to do with the amendment—into the future, provided neither party seeks to terminate or renegotiate the agreement. It is a well-known fact that there are thousands of agreements that have continued for many decades on the same terms and conditions. The coalition does not support this legislation but we will not oppose its passage to the Senate.

Government Members:

Government members interjecting—

Ms Julie Bishop (Curtin, Liberal Party, Deputy Leader of the Opposition) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Labor seeks to ridicule that position in the same high-handed, arrogant and dismissive manner that is becoming a hallmark of this leadership. It is a position that Labor adopted on numerous occasions in opposition. (Time expired)

Julia Gillard (Lalor, Australian Labor Party, Deputy Prime Minister) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I am advised by the Deputy Leader of the Opposition that she has nearly finished her remarks. If that is the case we will hear again from the Deputy Leader of the Opposition and then do what the Australian people want us to do, which is to pass the bill which they voted for. In relation to the last representations and silly statements by the Deputy Leader of the Opposition—no doubt she will stand at the dispatch box and make another series of silly statements which I will leave unanswered—the Howard government never produced any economic modelling of Work Choices. I will not stand here as a member of the Rudd Labor government and be lectured by the current opposition on the question of the production of economic modelling. Indeed, her request for it is the height of hypocrisy. For the Deputy Leader of the Opposition to describe her proposal in her speech on the second reading as something that has been satisfied through the Senate inquiry process is a cover-up of the fact that she has clearly been rolled by her party room again. She tried to achieve yet another extension of Australian workplace agreements, because she believes in Work Choices—she believes in AWAs that can rip people off. She put that position to the party room, she got rolled and she clearly got rolled again on the amendment.

I will give the Deputy Leader of the Opposition this: at least she knows what she believes in and she is prepared to stand up for it. I have to give the Deputy Leader of the Opposition that. I can understand her high state of anger with her colleagues whom she described in the media as having ‘gone to water’. I can understand that. She at least knows what she believes in. She believes in Work Choices and she always will. But this government was elected to deliver something different. It is this bill. We are seeking passage of it through the House of Representatives today. We will receive the Senate inquiry report. We always supported there being a Senate inquiry with a proper time frame. We will consider what the Senate inquiry report says. But having had that consideration I can see no reason why this bill cannot pass the parliament this week so we can end forever the spectre that Australians walk into their workplaces to be confronted by an Australian workplace agreement that takes away an award condition from them without any, or any proper, compensation.

The Deputy Leader of the Opposition can carry on about nominal expiry dates and time periods for agreements, but what she and the Liberal Party know is this: the only thing that ensured the end of Australian workplace agreements that can rip conditions away was the election of the Rudd Labor government. We would never have got to this point had the Howard government been re-elected. She will dismiss it—she will carry on about nominal expiry dates—but the Deputy Leader of the Opposition must concede that next week when this bill is proclaimed there will never again be an Australian worker who walks into their workplace fearful that that is the day when an Australian workplace agreement gets shoved into their hands that takes away an award condition for no proper compensation or perhaps no compensation at all. I think that is a truly historic step. The Rudd Labor government believes it to be a truly historic step. It is what the Australian people voted for when they repudiated Work Choices and the party of Work Choices—the Liberal Party.

Ms Julie Bishop (Curtin, Liberal Party, Deputy Leader of the Opposition) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The coalition urges the minister to review the existing bill in the light of the Senate inquiry. We also understand that the Senate committee will deliver its report on the inquiry sometime this afternoon. The coalition understands that the Labor government is keen to put its election promises into action, but it should heed the warnings that this bill will not achieve what Labor said it would achieve. The minister should put aside her ideological rhetoric and admit that the bill is so poorly drafted and deficient that it should be withdrawn and redrafted. She should listen to the evidence that has already been given that shows what impact the inconsistencies and the complexities will have on business, particularly the construction and mining sector, which has done so much to underpin the economic strength that we are currently experiencing. I urge the minister to do so.

Bill agreed to.