Andrew Wallace (Fisher, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I move:

That this House:

(1) notes that trade union malfeasance has cost taxpayers around 30 per cent, and possibly more, of their investment in recent infrastructure projects, and has led to widespread harm among Australian workers;

(2) welcomes the Government's decisive and comprehensive program of measures to investigate, stamp out and punish union malfeasance, including;

(a) the Fair Work (Registered Organisations) Act 2016;

(b) the Building and Construction Industry (Improving Productivity) Act 2016, which included the restored Australian Building and Construction Commission (ABCC), and the Building Code 2016; and

(c) the Fair Work Amendment (Corrupting Benefits) Act 2017;

(3) congratulates the Government on dealing with the scourge of union misbehaviour on Australian construction sites; and

(4) encourages the Government to continue to explore ways of eliminating unethical trade union practices and to provide all necessary legal and financial support to the ABCC in its work to investigate and punish illegality in the construction industry.

In the years before the ABCC was established, the industrial dispute rate in the construction sector was five times the all-industry average. When the ABCC operated from 2005 to 2012, that rate dropped to only twice the average—not a good rate, but still it dropped to twice the average. For the first quarter after the ABCC was abolished, in September 2012, the rate increased fivefold.

As someone who's worked in the building and construction industry all of my adult life, 30 years, I can say without a shadow of a doubt that the extent of union corruption in the building industry is absolutely rife. Since 2007, the CFMEU has accrued fines for illegal activities of more than $12 million. That's a new record. On 13 September they received $2.4 million in fines for illegal behaviour at the Barangaroo site alone. If it hadn't been for the Leader of the Opposition's abolition of the ABCC, these fines would have been up to $4.8 million higher, as the proceedings commenced under the old penalty regime, which he himself had introduced, rather than the coalition government's restored ABCC.

Since 2007, the CFMEU has donated $8.1 million to the Labor Party. The CFMEU's fines have included activities on projects like the Queensland Children's Hospital, the Commonwealth Games venue in Queensland, the Queensland Institute of Medical Research and the Ronald McDonald Charity House, which accommodates the families of sick children. The CFMEU knows no bounds. It doesn't care what the subject site is. And it's not just happening in Queensland; it's also happening in Western Australia where they also disrupted the children's hospital site.

As at September 2014, there were 90 CFMEU representatives before the courts for more than 1,300 suspected contraventions. This is no surprise, as even the ACTU secretary, Sally McManus, said in March on national television that she believes that it is acceptable for unions to break laws that they disagree with. The Leader of the Opposition's response was to suggest that he would change the laws that the unions want to break.

This is not just me talking about the malfeasance of the CFMEU. Justice Jessup in a decision in July 2016 said this:

The CFMEU's record of non-compliance with legislation of this kind has now become notorious … That record ought to be an embarrassment to the trade union movement.

Judge Jarrett, in the same month, said:

The CFMEU has as egregious record of repeated and wilful contraventions of all manner of industrial laws.

Justice White in April 2016 said that the CFMEU's compliance with industrial legislation has generally been poor—perhaps the understatement of the century. He said:

The union's prior history bespeaks an attitude by the CFMEU of ignoring, if not defying the law, and a willingness to contravene it as and when it chooses.

Judge Vasta in March 2016 said:

It would be apt to describe the behaviour of—

namely, the CFMEU–

as sheer thuggery. Such thuggery has no place in the Australian workplace. Contraventions of the Fair Work Act that involve such thuggery cannot be tolerated.

Yet those members opposite, even here today, continue to support their trade union masters.

The Leader of the Opposition's policy on union misbehaviour was revealed in letters between him and the CFMEU when he was running for the Labor leadership. In an effort to attain the CFMEU's support, the Leader of the Opposition agreed to their demands lock, stock and barrel. It is absolutely a matter of fact that the Leader of the Opposition is owned by the CFMEU, and he ought to be condemned. (Time expired)

Maria Vamvakinou (Calwell, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Is there a seconder for the motion?

Andrew Laming (Bowman, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I second the motion.

Susan Lamb (Longman, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

It's the first day back in parliament after four weeks in our electorates, and it's only taken a few short hours for the government member here to again start bashing unions and workers—just a couple of hours. Despite the cowardly issues caused by this government's lack of foresight, empathy or action that require urgent attention, this government would instead rather parrot their tired antiworker rhetoric. This government attacks anyone who stands up for workers, wherever and whenever they can. I understand that it's easier than standing up to corporate interests, but I won't accept this as an excuse. I'm a member of the Labor Party, and we fight for workers and we fight for what is fair. What's not fair are the conditions and the continuous attacks on workers, wages and conditions that are taking place in this country—attacks like the vicious cuts to penalty rates, the take-home pay of hundreds of thousands of workers, that this government has championed.

Those opposite act as if they are proud of those senseless cuts, when really they should be hanging their heads in shame. How can this government stand there, representing someone who is struggling to get by as it is, and vote to cut their take-home pay? How can you stand there and do that? How can this government so blatantly favour the interests of big business shareholders over those who struggle to feed their family?

The royal commission into trade unions that took place in 2014 and 2015 has recorded just one conviction. Despite there being over a million unionists in this country, the royal commission found one conviction. This royal commission was just another one of those LNP witch-hunts that was orchestrated to undermine Australian workers. It was another failure; let's be very clear. They spent tens of millions of dollars straight out of the taxpayers' wallet to prove that one bad egg in the union movement is, quite literally, one in a million. And yet, after all of this, the member for Fisher who was just here—he has just left the room, of course—still wants to waste time and money, and that's taxpayers' money. He wants to continue to waste time and taxpayers' money by attacking this unethical behaviour which the royal commission proved is all but non-existent—remember that one, 'all but non-existent'. It's truly a very pathetic attempt to malign Australian workers, and it just shows how weak this government actually are. They are a government who will denigrate vulnerable workers, time and time again, while they refuse to investigate big businesses or banks.

Why does this government continually stand in the way of a royal commission into the banking sector? I know my constituents want it. I know constituents all over this country want a royal commission—they tell me every day. They're tired of being ripped off. But, each and every day, the government are standing in the way of a royal commission into banks. To the member for Fisher, who has just left the room, my question is: why do you and your government refuse to take meaningful action against multinational companies who avoid paying their fair share of tax in this country? It's not fair that companies can operate in Australia but use unscrupulous accounting loopholes to circumvent our laws. It is the Australian people, the Australian workers, who become victims of this behaviour by multinationals.

The member for Fisher, just before he left the chamber, was speaking about the ABCC as a champion that stamps out union corruption. But last month's court hearing really proves the opposite is true. It is this government who are to blame for the blatant disregard of Australian laws. Senator Michaelia Cash and the whole of the Turnbull government have a lot to answer for. They hand-picked Nigel Hadgkiss as commissioner of the ABCC, despite being well aware of his intentional disregard for the law. It's quite amazing, isn't it, their hand-picking of Mr Hadgkiss as commissioner? How can this government claim to be a moral authority, when they have effectively condoned his unlawful behaviour? Does this government see it as okay to break these laws, so long as they disadvantage workers and unions in the process? Labor doesn't condone unlawful behaviour from anybody at all, we don't discriminate with legislation, and we do not attack workers. This government, on the other hand, has a lot to answer for.

Jason Falinski (Mackellar, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise to speak on the motion put by the member for Fisher. The use of deceitful and corrupt practices in the trade union movement has meant that honest Australian workers have been lied to, deceived, and represented to a standard that would flatter Dennis Denuto. While Dennis Denuto's shortcomings can be explained by general incompetence, the poor representation of unions is the product of self-interest and greed. This greed not only leads to poor outcomes for workers, it leads to poor outcomes for Australian taxpayers. The trade union royal commission laid bare a long list of inexcusable instances of union misconduct and corruption. This included bribery, extortion, and secret corrupting payments to unions in exchange for cutting workers' entitlements and rights.

One of the worst offenders when it comes to secret corrupting payments is the Leader of the Opposition. During his time as the national secretary of the AWU, he was part of the furniture in a culture of corruption and deception. His agenda entailed advancing two key interests: his own interest and that of the Labor Party—let's face it, advancing the Labor Party was also about advancing himself. In 2005, he signed up the entire membership of the Australian Netball Players' Association to a union and invoiced them $9,000 without their knowledge. This was also—since the AWU would have more votes in Labor Party preselections—nothing but self-interest. In 2007 he donated $25,000 of union workers' money to his own election campaign. The Labor Party may call this politics. The Australian people call this dishonesty—at best, theft and, at worst, dishonest. The Leader of the Opposition has been a case in point for reform of the union movement, his actions showing its deep-seated culture of lawlessness and corruption. Despite the Leader of the Opposition having left the unions, they continue where he left off.

The AWU have doctored invoices to conceal the fact that $25,000 was used to bolster memberships and the AWU's influence on the Labor Party. Recently, the AWU confirmed that the Leader of the Opposition was personally behind the $100,000 donation to the left-wing group GetUp!–members' money, meant to support them, being ploughed into rent-seeking unions and political lobby groups.

It would be difficult to forget the instance when the Leader of the Opposition rid some of Australia's low-paid workers of their paid benefits and conditions in return for secret payments made from Cleanevent. During his reign at the AWU, Mr Shorten was actively involved in negotiating lower penalty rates for big business to benefit the unions, but he is strongly against giving the same level of benefits to small Australian businesses. The Labor Party wants to ensure that small businesses pay higher penalty rates than the big businesses that they do secret deals with.

Enabling trade unions to continue their dishonesty, theft, fraud and corruption makes the life of Australia's most vulnerable workers even harder. These workers have the right to expect transparency and truth from their union. Labor's decision to continue voting against protecting Australian workers shows the true colours and moral bankruptcy of the Labor Party. They fought against the Turnbull government's ABCC to end lawlessness on building sites. They fought against making unions accountable to their members in the same way that companies are accountable to their shareholders. They fought against ending secret corrupting payments to make sure unions can't sell off workers' rights for 30 pieces of silver. Perhaps the member for Maribyrnong would be better named 'Judas'.

The Turnbull government's crusade against union corruption from the re-establishment of the ABCC to reforms to registered organisations and eliminating corrupting payments will ensure that Australian workers come first, not the Labor Party or their mates. To the union thugs out there who think it's over: it's only just begun. The Turnbull government is now turning its focus to stopping industry super funds giving $22 million a year of your retirement savings to unions, to give to the Labor Party. This government will not stop until unions do what they were made for: protecting workers, not lining their own pockets and those of the Labor Party.

Cathy O'Toole (Herbert, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I am proud to rise in support of my comrades, because it has only ever been the union movement and Labor that have looked after the working person. It will only ever be Labor and the union movement that will protect the working person from the relentless and shameful attacks of the Turnbull government. The working conditions that workers, including members of the Turnbull government, enjoy today were hard fought for and won by the union movement. Paid annual leave was first won after a campaign by the Printing Workers Union in 1936.

The Australian unions fought an intensive campaign for paid parental leave which resulted in the victorious introduction of the Paid Parental Leave scheme by the Gillard Labor government. Superannuation is another union victory. Prior to 1986, only a select group of workers were entitled to superannuation, and it became a universal entitlement after the ACTU's national wage case. Then there was the campaign for penalty rates. In 1947, penalty rates were established. Unions argued in the arbitration commission that people needed to be paid extra money to work outside of normal hours, and the union battle rages on today to keep penalty rates.

Unions have delivered redundancy pay, meal and rest breaks, sick leave, health and safety, workers compensation, shift allowance, long service leave, uniform allowance, unfair dismissal protection, collective bargaining and awards reform. If it weren't for the unions, more than 800 workers in my electorate of Herbert would be without their fair entitlement guarantee payments after the closure of Queensland Nickel—a guarantee that was created by Labor and attempted to be restricted by the Abbott-Turnbull governments.

Workers in my electorate will not forget the disregard of this government when they needed action and protection from a greedy businessman. It was the Minister for Employment, Michaelia Cash, who was dragged kicking and screaming by the Australian Manufacturing Workers' Union, the Electrical Trade Union and the Australian Workers' Union to release a fair entitlements guarantee, which was rightly owned by these workers.

Now more than ever, workers, Labor and unions are facing one of their toughest battles—the Turnbull government. It's a government that stands up for top hats, not hard hats. It's a government that puts big business first and the worker last. It's a government that puts profit before people. The Turnbull government, together with One Nation leader, Senator Pauline Hanson—who votes with the coalition 84 per cent of the time—are out to undermine and attack Labor and the union movement. They are determined to weaken the mighty union movement, whose aim is to save jobs and protect fair working conditions. Our next fight is to stamp out inequality—an issue that this government does not seem to understand and refuses to address. Inequality is at a 70-year high. More than 105,000 people are homeless, 32,000 unemployed people live in poverty, and wage growth hasn't been this low since the retention of records.

Since 1975, the Australian Bureau of Statistics has collected data on earnings inequality. Profits went up 40 per cent, wages less than two per cent—real wages growth of 72 per cent for the top 10 per cent. In 1975, the top 10 per cent of earners earned twice as much as the bottom 10 per cent, but by 2014 they were earning three times as much. If lower wage earners had enjoyed the same percentage gains as the highest-paid, they would be $16,000 a year better off. The richest one per cent of Australians own more wealth than the bottom 70 per cent combined. For every dollar that a male earns, a female earns 82 cents. Six hundred and seventy eight corporations paid no tax; 48 millionaires paid no tax. Let's just put that into perspective: the subcontractor working on the construction of the Townsville stadium, the university student working at Zarraffa's Coffee, where penalty rates have been cut, and workers like teachers, nurses and electricians have all paid more tax than multibillion-dollar companies. And what does the Turnbull government do? It gives big business a $65 billion tax cut.

Shamefully, the Turnbull government is completely out of touch with working families. Inequality and wage growth for workers will never be addressed by this government. It is only Labor and the union movement who will fight for working people. This government knows the facts about low wage growth and inequality. But instead of working with Labor and the union movement to address these issues, this motion is put forward—the complete opposite of what is actually required. But workers, Labor and the union movement will do what we do well when we're under attack. We will stand up and we will fight.

Sarah Henderson (Corangamite, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I would like to commend the member for Fisher for putting this motion for debate before the Federation Chamber. I would like to start my contribution by reflecting on the comments that the member for Herbert made. She said, 'The union battle rages on to keep penalty rates in this country,' or words to that effect. Well, what a shame that the union battle and Labor's battle to keep penalty rates doesn't extend to its own sleazy deals. What we as a coalition government have exposed across this country are hundreds of thousands of Australians working mainly in the retail sector but also in many industries, where they are working below the award or without penalty rates as a result of sleazy deals between Labor-backed unions and large employers. This evidence was put to the Senate in an inquiry on these deals.

Opposition Members:

Opposition members interjecting—

Sarah Henderson (Corangamite, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Members opposite don't like it when we talk about this. As the inquiry exposed, for many years unions have signed enterprise agreements with large enterprises that include cuts to Sunday penalty rates, and small businesses have been on an uneven playing field relative to large businesses. I reflect on a terrific column written by Grace Collier in The Australian, 'Make ALP pay for union collusion'. She is a former union worker who saw the light. She reflects on this report and cites some of the terrible examples where ordinary Australians have been ripped off by these EBAs brokered by large employers and the union movement, where workers have, in many cases, been left completely blind as to what is going on:

So pity those who work in a bed and breakfast. They get dudded by these deals. Another example was given:

That is as a result of special deals, EBAs, between KFC, McDonald's, Pizza Hut and the union movement. One of the biggest unions responsible, of course, is the shoppies union. Yet another example was given:

As Grace Collier points out, Labor's main defences of these deals—that any losses are offset by a higher base rate of pay and that they meet the better-off-overall test—have been totally demolished. They have also been demolished by the Fair Work Commission in some agreements. It found that evidence from a number of people who work for large retailers suggested they were worse off. Worse than that, they were not informed by either the company or the union that their agreement included penalty rates that were lower than those provided for in the award.

So we have seen absolute hypocrisy from the Labor Party in terms of this so-called battle against keeping penalty rates. They are not prepared to stand up for the many hundreds of thousands of workers who have lost out with these sleazy deals, which we are trying to combat through our corrupting benefits legislation. If the Labor Party and members opposite were interested in putting all workers on a level playing field and standing up for all workers, they would back our corrupting benefits bill. But they are not doing that. There is no greater deal-maker than the Leader of the Opposition. When he ran the AWU, his deal with Cleanevent denied Cleanevent workers penalty rates to the value of $4 million, which is absolutely notorious. What we have seen from the opposition is that the Leader of the Opposition is fine with lower penalty rates when his union mates do it—when they do those big sleazy deals with big business, including the likes of Woolworths, Coles, KFC, McDonald's and Pizza Hut—and he only opposes penalty rate modifications when the independent umpire, the Fair Work Commission, makes adjustments. Shame on Labor for its utter hypocrisy.

Graham Perrett (Moreton, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise to speak on the disgraceful motion put forward by the member for Fisher, who I note is absent from the chamber. This motion is like an old vinyl record with a scratch in it. The Turnbull-Abbott government goes around and around and around on continuous repeat but says nothing. It's the song those opposite keep singing when the band stopped playing long ago. It's another feature of the government's ideological obsession with unions. I could talk about how unions have improved the working conditions of Australians for more than 100 years. I could tell you how unions are the reason that Australian workers have an eight-hour day, annual lave, sick pay, workers compensation and health and safety standards, which mean there's a good chance that employees will go home and see their family. I could talk about how cost-cutting by building companies keeps putting Australian workers, and those who use the buildings they sweat to make, at risk. Companies trying to bolster their bottom line are importing cheap building products that contain asbestos, putting at risk not only the workers but the eventual inhabitants of the homes and offices that they're building. Where there is illegality, it must be called out and punished, whether it is the behaviour of the employers, the unions or the employees.

I note that employers haven't got a mention in any of the speeches preceding mine. I say that individuals are responsible for their own behaviour. When individuals behave badly or even illegally, we must be careful not to visit their transgressions on the wider organisation that they are purported to represent. If we did that, it would be difficult not to tarnish all company directors or businesspeople with the behaviour of Christopher Skase or Alan Bond, or all movie producers with the behaviour of Harvey Weinstein, or all Queensland Liberal National Party politicians with the behaviour of the convicted criminal Scott Driscoll, an LNP MP who sits in a Queensland jail cell right now. All organisations, like all sectors of industry, have some rogue individuals who will besmirch the reputations of many good, hardworking people in organisations that make great contributions to our community.

Unions are crucial. Unions are made up of many hardworking, diligent and conscientious people whose sole objective is to make the working life of Australians better. But those opposite don't want to talk about these good people—that vast majority. They don't want people to know about the good work being done by unions, day after day. So I'm going to tell you about some of these people—people like Ros McLennan, the head of the Queensland Council of Unions, who spent 23 years empowering Australian workers. Ros has a particular knowledge and appreciation of the role of unions in regional Queensland. In 1998, she worked up in Townsville, and she spent 10 years as an assistant secretary of the Queensland and Northern Territory branch of the Independent Education Union. In 2014, Ros was elected to the Queensland Council of Unions as assistant general secretary, and in 2015 she was elected general secretary. Ros is a hardworking mother of two, married to Brad, and one of my constituents, and was also my campaign director.

Andrew Ramsay, a CFMEU workplace officer, is often called to building sites in Brisbane to inspect for breaches of workplace safety, including asbestos being on site. He's also chairman of the board of the Asbestos Disease Support Society. Crucially, he understands the harmful effects of asbestos and is particularly concerned that asbestos is still being found on building sites in Australia today. It was through the diligent work of Andrew and his team that asbestos was discovered on the Executive Building building site in Brisbane. The site was immediately shut down to protect workers from this insidious substance. Andrew helped me to get elected a decade ago, as part of the Your Rights at Work campaign, and he is a great advocate for the union movement.

Craig Wood has previously worked for the Queensland Teachers' Union as a research officer, and is now a hardworking teacher and union activist. He is a very committed teacher. Craig is passionate about education and drama, but particularly about education. He has taught children from prep right through to university. He understands the demanding role of teachers, and that they require a strong union to support them. Craig is also one of my constituents, and has worked tirelessly to ensure that the south side of Brisbane has progressive representatives.

These are just three people. I could give you hundreds and thousands more of these unsung heroes in the union movement that I've met over the years, people who are just going about their jobs, standing up for Australian workers and their colleagues every day, and standing up for Australian workers who aren't members of their union but who get the benefits of union membership. Ros, Andrew and Craig don't deserve the constant attacks being levelled at them and their unions by the Turnbull government, a government that is devoid of vision and devoid of purpose. I do not support this motion from the member for Fisher at all. (Time expired)

Maria Vamvakinou (Calwell, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The time allotted for this debate has expired. The debate is adjourned and the resumption of the debate will be made an order of the day for the next sitting.