Bill Shorten (Maribyrnong, Australian Labor Party, Leader of the Opposition) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

My question is to the Prime Minister. Andrew lives in Gawler in South Australia. He is here in the gallery today. Andrew works at Spotlight on a Sunday to pay his way through university. Andrew says that he will lose around $1,000 per year because of the cuts to penalty rates, cuts which the Prime Minister has supported. Can the Prime Minister tell Andrew why he has to take a pay cut?

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

I thank the honourable member for his question. Of course, if Andrew had been working at Kentucky Fried Chicken, KFC, he would be earning $21.19 an hour instead, and he would be earning that amount because of a union agreement. The reality is that the AWU and the unions the honourable members opposite represent have again and again traded away penalty rates in one EBA after another.

Ms Chesters interjecting—

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

The member for Bendigo.

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

Not only have they traded them away, they traded them away in circumstances where they have received money from the employers concerned.

Ms Chesters interjecting—

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

The member for Bendigo is warned!

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

We might well ask: what about the great achievement of the Australian Workers' Union with Clean Event? Only today the member for Isaacs, the shadow Attorney-General, said that the Labor Party were proud of every deal the Leader of the Opposition had negotiated. They are bursting with pride.

Bill Shorten (Maribyrnong, Australian Labor Party, Leader of the Opposition) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

A point of order, on relevance. Andrew has travelled from Adelaide; he is here in the gallery—

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

The Leader of the Opposition will resume his seat.

Mr Shorten interjecting—

The Leader of the Opposition will resume his seat.

Mr Shorten interjecting—

The Leader of the Opposition will resume his seat.

Mr Pyne interjecting—

The Leader of the House will cease interjecting. I am not going to revisit everything I said last week about points of order. I asked the Leader of the Opposition to resume his seat three times. We are getting into unprecedented territory. The Prime Minister has the call.

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

When it comes to penalty rates, imagine if Andrew had been working for Clean Event. Imagine if he had been getting, thanks to the great advocacy of the Leader of the Opposition—this champion of the working class, this hero of the people—$18 an hour instead of $50 under the award. But there was something else: payments to the union, not disclosed. The member for Isaacs says that they are all proud of the Leader of the Opposition's track record as a union—

Mark Dreyfus (Isaacs, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Attorney General) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

You bet we are.

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

'You bet we are', he says. If they are so proud, why did they not share those deals with the members? Why were the payments kept secret? If it was such a great deal, why not tell everybody? Why did it have to be kept secret? One deal after another, one payment after another, and one thing in common: it took a royal commission and two years to find out about them, just like the donation to his election campaign, again, from Unibilt, a company that his union had been engaged in negotiations with—no connection there, I am sure; just a coincidence! The Leader of the Opposition has been selling workers down the river for years, trading away penalty rates for years, taking backhanders for years, and we are going to stop it.

Honourable members interjecting—

Warren Snowdon (Lingiari, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for External Territories) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

You are a grub!

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

The member for Lingiari! Members on both sides will cease interjecting.

Chris Bowen (McMahon, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Treasurer) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

A point of order: the Prime Minister just engaged in a grossly improper reflection on a member, and he must withdraw.

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

I heard what the Prime Minister was saying towards the end of his answer. Reflecting on that, there have been many occasions, and I refer members to Practiceand I am happy to spend a lot of time on this, if they want to—where the characterisation is not of a specific nature in the way the member for McMahon is talking. If we want to have a robust question time, which I think the opposition wants to more often than the government, I think this really does pass into the territory of question time, I have to say. I will hear from the Manager of Opposition Business on the point of order.

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

I did not jump up at the time, but I have just had it explained to me exactly what was said. Standing order 90 states:

… all personal reflections on other Members shall be considered highly disorderly.

I do not see how that particular claim falls short of that.

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

The Manager of Opposition Business will resume his seat. I will deal with this matter, and members on both sides may not like it. There were some contributions in the 90-second statements where I could have very easily sat the member for Moreton down at the end of his speech. If we are going to take a literal approach, I will be taking a literal approach. I do not believe the Prime Minister suggested that the Leader of the Opposition was literally taking a 'backhander', which I think is the term you are objecting to. I do not think the Prime Minister was saying that the Leader of the Opposition personally benefited—I don't. I believe it was a—

Honourable members interjecting—

Members will not interject—the member for Lingiari has already been mentioned! It was a political characterisation. If you want me to go to the aspects of Practice, I can give you many examples where that has been allowed. If members want a literal interpretation of the standing orders I will be ruling questions out of order left, right and centre. I am watching the language very carefully. I am not going to intervene at this point and I am going to call the next question.

David Coleman (Banks, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

My question is to the Prime Minister. I refer the Prime Minister to his announcement today that the government will move to ban and criminalise corrupting benefits to unions, in line with the Heydon royal commission. How will these measures increase transparency and protect workers, including in my electorate of Banks?

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

For years, as the Heydon royal commission demonstrated, Australia's big unions have been selling their members out by trading away members' entitlements in industrial agreements, and, at the same time, taking money from employers, which they did not disclose to their members and which had no bona fide basis whatsoever. The evidence is extensive. We have heard about the Clean Event payment, which I spoke about a moment ago, where penalty rates for some of Australia's lowest-paid workers were traded away in return for cash payments to the union, and the royal commission's conclusion was that the only beneficiaries of that deal were the AWU and Clean Event. Who lost out? The members. We are standing up for the members, so what we are doing is introducing on legislation on Wednesday that will criminalise secret payments between employers and unions that could have a corrupting influence. In addition, what we also will do is criminalise payments between employers and unions that do not have a legitimate basis, like so many of the payments exposed in the Heydon royal commission.

What about the payment by ACI Operations to the AWU in Victoria? They paid them around $500,000 while workers were laid off at the Spotswood glass manufacturing plant. The AWU invoiced the payments as 'paid education leave'. But what were the payments used for? To offset a loan to renovate the union's Victorian office, and four other general costs. That is the finding of the royal commission. There are so many others like that. If the member for Isaacs and indeed the Leader of the Opposition himself are proud of their record in representing workers, why weren't the workers told? Why were so many of these payments hidden? Why were they concealed from the members whom they claim to represent?

The third part of the bill that will be introduced on Wednesday will require both employers and the union to make public, to disclose, any payments that flow from the employer to the union at the time of an enterprise agreement. In the Heydon royal commission we have seen only the tip of the iceberg. There is a culture of deceit, a culture of selling out the workers, a culture of trading away workers' rights in return for membership lists and in return for cash, and we are going to put a stop to it with the legislation we are introducing in the House this week.

Tanya Plibersek (Sydney, Australian Labor Party, Deputy Leader of the Opposition) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

My question is to the Prime Minister. Kerry works as a pharmacy assistant in South Australia, and she is here in the gallery today. Kerry says that the decision to cut penalty rates will cost her around $1½ thousand a year from an annual wage of just $34,000. The Prime Minister's support for cutting penalty rates will mean that Kerry will struggle to pay her bills. Why does the Prime Minister think that Kerry deserves a pay cut?

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

Kerry would know, I am sure, that the member for Sydney and all of her colleagues on the Labor benches have for years said that they will support the Fair Work Commission and its decisions—again and again. You could fill a library with the quotations from Labor figures endorsing the Fair Work Commission.

Ms Owens interjecting—

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

The member for Parramatta!

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

In February last year the member for Gorton, who was very vocal at the door this morning I see, dripping with sanctimony, drowning in hypocrisy, said, 'Labor believes the Fair Work Commission is the appropriate to consider these matters and it should be left alone by the Liberals to do just that—conduct its business as the independent umpire.' Labor used to stand by the independent umpire. Labor used to defend their decisions. The Fair Work Commission is standing up for small business. Labor should do so too. Labor knew exactly what that inquiry was about. The Leader of the Opposition set it up, he wrote the terms of reference and he said again and again he would support its decision. He knew exactly what it was about and so did the member for Gorton. Every member of that commission was hand-picked by the Labor Party and now they want to cast it aside. The inconsistency and the hypocrisy of the Labor Party is what they should be explaining to Kerry and thousands of other Australians.

Honourable members interjecting—

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

The member for McEwen! The member for Gilmore has the call.