Penny Wong (SA, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Corporate Governance and Responsibility) Share this | Hansard source

Would you like me to explain it simply, Senator Abetz? What you are saying is: ‘It is fine; we don’t have to ensure that people are actually told why an agreement is fair. We don’t have to give those reasons or the rationale.’ In fact, it is quite possible the decision could be based on information or a calculation that is incorrect or on ascribing more weight than is warranted to the personal circumstances of an employee and the employee may never know. These are all issues that are beyond what is given to the industrial parties—to the employer and employee.

You scoffed—which seems to happen regularly—when I suggested that, regarding section 346P(3), advice as to how the agreement could be varied to pass the fairness test was not the same thing as giving reasons for why the agreement was found to be unfair. I make two points about that: first, they are in fact different sets of information. It is possible, I would think, to glean from what has to be varied why it was unfair, but they are not the same sets of information. The second point was that, if you assert it is the same set of information—it is in effect giving reasons for unfairness—then the question arises: what is wrong therefore with requiring the rationale for a determination of fairness to be provided? What is so difficult or inappropriate or improper in actually telling workers and employers why an agreement is fair and why it is unfair? Why are you so afraid of that?