Eric Abetz (Tasmania, Liberal Party, Deputy Leader of the Opposition in the Senate) Share this | Hansard source

Can I briefly respond. What the minister says is right—but, when there is a dispute, the courts do have cause to look at the objects clauses to help them decide what the intent of the legislation is. The clause we are talking about says ‘achieving productivity and fairness through an emphasis on enterprise-level collective bargaining’—I repeat: ‘an emphasis on’. So somebody from Fair Work Australia or the Industrial Relations Commission, in trying to come to grips with this, will say, ‘The people in the Australian parliament, the legislators, wanted an emphasis on enterprise-level.’ What the coalition would seek is to insert the word ‘workplace’—that there be ‘emphasis on workplace’. Of course, Senator Fielding very neatly says that you can have emphasis in relation to both, and I think that more accurately reflects what we as an opposition were thinking and wanting. We do not mind an emphasis on enterprise-level bargaining, just as long as workplace-level bargaining is not therefore somehow interpreted as being a second-order issue. I think the worst the minister came up with was that it was ‘unnecessary’. If it is unnecessary, one would hope it would not do any harm—and, who knows, this could be the double dissolution trigger that Mr Rudd has been looking for, but I hardly think so. I commend Senator Fielding’s suggestion to us.