Mr Tony Burke (Watson, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Finance) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

My question is to the Prime Minister. We all know what the Prime Minister meant when he said he supports the decision. What government policy was the Prime Minister referring to this morning when he said: 'Well, there's the, there's no question for you if you, um, well, the evidence seems to be very strong that if you have, er, lower penalty rates, lower rates on a Sunday or a public holiday, then there is less then there is more incentive, if you like, it's more affordable for businesses to employ people. That's common sense. But that's one consideration.' Prime Minister, don't Australian workers deserve better than that?

Malcolm Turnbull (Wentworth, Liberal Party, Prime Minister) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I thank the honourable member for his comic interlude and recall on the subject of penalty rates his time as an organiser for the SDA, the shop, distributive and allied employees' trade union. In those times the SDA negotiated one trade-away of penalty rates after another to the point that a shop assistant working in an independent small business clothing shop, dress shop or menswear shop on a Sunday is being paid substantially more than a shop assistant in Target. So how does small business compete?

Nick Champion (Wakefield, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Why don't you tell Target to renegotiate their agreement?

Tony Smith (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The member for Wakefield is warned!

Malcolm Turnbull (Wentworth, Liberal Party, Prime Minister) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The honourable member has the answer: what small business should do is knuckle down to the unions! That is what they want.

Tony Smith (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The member for Wakefield has just shown his guilty conscience. I have only warned him. He does not need to walk. This is not a cricket match. I suspect he should remain packed up though!

Malcolm Turnbull (Wentworth, Liberal Party, Prime Minister) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

In cricket, I think, when the batsman starts his walk he cannot change his mind and come back to the crease; he should have kept going!

The truth is—and the member for Watson knows this as well as the Leader of the Opposition and so many of the former union officials opposite—they know that their unions have traded away penalty rates again and again. The Leader of the Opposition, of course, is distinguished for trading them away in return for undisclosed cash payments to the union. That was the subject of condemnation in the royal commission report. But, right across the board, penalty rates have been compromised by those opposite.

What the Labor Party used to say for only about 120 years—from its foundation, in fact—was that the independent umpire in matters of fixing wages and fixing penalty rates should be respected.

Ms Plibersek interjecting—

Tony Smith (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The member for Sydney!

Malcolm Turnbull (Wentworth, Liberal Party, Prime Minister) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The Leader of the Opposition said that again and again until January, when he did a complete backflip. We respect the independent umpire. They have done a very thorough job. They are now looking at the transition of the changes. They have considered all the evidence from hundreds of witnesses in thousands of pages. That is their job. They have done a good and thorough job. Honourable members opposite, as Jennie George said, should be careful what they wish for if they want to walk away from supporting the independent umpire and pick up the industrial policy of the Greens. I say to the member for Melbourne—

Ms Butler interjecting—

Tony Smith (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The member for Griffith is warned.

Malcolm Turnbull (Wentworth, Liberal Party, Prime Minister) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

that if plagiarism is the sincerest form of flattery then he should be sincerely flattered, because the Labor Party have picked up his climate policy, his border protection policy and now his industrial relations policy.

Ms Plibersek interjecting—

Tony Smith (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I have asked the member for Sydney to stop interjecting. I think we are about to replay the previous sitting week the way we are going. It is Thursday again.