Natasha Griggs (Solomon, Country Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

My question is to the Minister for Small Business and the Assistant Treasurer. I remind the minister that small business is the lifeblood of the local economy in my electorate, but there are a number of small trucking businesses in my community that are concerned about their futures. Will the minister please outline what action the government is taking to protect the livelihoods of small business people and their communities?

Kelly O'Dwyer (Higgins, Liberal Party, Minister for Small Business) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I would very much like to thank the dedicated and hardworking member for Solomon, who is a very strong advocate for the more than 8,000 small businesses in her community.

Like her, I have been hearing from small business and family enterprises who are in the trucking industry and who tell of their despair at Labor's attacks on them through the Road Safety Remuneration Tribunal. Like them, the message is very clear: they want to see this tribunal abolished. Why do they want to see it abolished? Because in 2012 the Labor government at the time, at the behest of the union movement and under the guise of improving safety in the transport sector, established a tribunal to damage these small owner-operators who are part of the nonunionised small business and independent contractors in the trucking industry.

Everyone in Australia agrees that there should be fewer injuries and fewer fatalities on our roads. We all want to see safer roads. But if that were the real purpose behind Labor's change—if that were really their intention—they could have instead strengthened the powers of the actual regulator on safety, the National Heavy Vehicle Regulator. What is very notable is that in this recent payment order by the tribunal, set up by the now opposition leader, is that it only applies to independent contractors. It only applies to owner-drivers. It does not apply to other parts of the industry that just so happen to be heavily unionised.

On 7 April I met with a group of owner-drivers from right around Australia. One owner-driver told me of his despair. He wants to support his daughter to go to university, and his business is severely under threat. He has already been told by his regular clients that they will no longer require his services as a result of this payment order—as a result of the mandated changes in this payment order. I spoke to another about the impact on his local community and he said that if he went under that his broader community would suffer, with tyre fitters and mechanics losing out, threatening the jobs in his local community. Another operator told me that it would impede his ability to grow his business.

Neither the Labor Party nor the Transport Workers Union can point to any direct improvements in safety as a result of the order. In fact, there have been two independent reports by PricewaterhouseCoopers and by Jaguar that both said there is no relationship to safety. They have recommended the abolition of the Road Safety Remuneration Tribunal. That is what this government will do. We have introduced legislation in the House, to get rid of this tribunal which will damage small businesses. We are sticking up for family businesses, we are sticking up for owner-drivers and we are sticking up for enterprise in this country.