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

I think this evening we have got the great juxtaposition in Australian politics. We on the coalition side actually believe that consultation means that you talk through the issues with people before you announce the decision. We have now heard from the minister that, for the Labor Party, consultation includes the possibility of making the decision, going to the share market and announcing it, and then talking to the workers. Silly me! I thought consultation actually meant talking to people about the issues before you made the final decision! What the minister has now put up in lights—I think, very effectively—is the different approaches of the coalition and the Labor Party in relation to the issue of consultation. If it is as the minister asserts, and I see no legal precedent for this, he has basically admitted that the corporations power may require the employer not to consult beforehand with the employees—that point was basically accepted—and he said common sense would need to prevail. I happen to agree with that. But if there is a conflict, as there will be, which one is to prevail? I was foolish enough to think consultation meant you actually had to talk through the issues with people before you made the decision. If consultation does not mean that, that is reassuring, but I think that is the Labor interpretation of the term, as opposed to the legal interpretation of the term. It is, in fact, the legal interpretation of the term that we have to concentrate on and deal with this evening. Given what the minister has said, I think it has, in fact, strengthened very substantially the case for the opposition to oppose amendment (3).