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

In case the minister at the table—who is very sensitive, having come from New South Wales Labor herself—does not understand that the legislation that we are debating does in fact to get into the area of occupational health and safety, what this legislation does is to deny private employers the chance to get out of that corrupt system that her state Labor government had in New South Wales and into the Comcare system. So I can understand the sensitivity.

Getting back to these civil libertarian organisations, I suppose one should not be surprised, because they always come out on one side of the ledger—there is no balance to their concern. If I were to really think about it, that would not surprise or concern me, but the thing that does concern me is that it took so long for a group of organisations and others to come together to back Mr Kirk all the way to the High Court. That this legislation was allowed to exist in Australia for nearly a decade is, I have to say, a disgrace and it will be seen as a blot on the Australian industrial landscape, and New South Wales Labor and their trade union movement have nothing to be proud of. I simply say to people, ‘If you think Senator Abetz and the coalition are ranting a bit about this, fine—believe that—but just read the judgment of Justice Heydon of the High Court and you will see what New South Wales Labor presided over for so long.’ I have to say I am astounded that so many business organisations did not come together for a High Court challenge immediately and I wonder why it had to wait for nearly a decade before the outrageousness of some aspects of the scheme were knocked out by the High Court, which happened only yesterday.

Labor, for whatever reason, does not want small businesses or other businesses to opt out of their state schemes into the Comcare scheme. This is, once again, ideologically driven—union driven. It does not make any sense, but we accept the reality in this chamber. Therefore, I indicate that the coalition will not be opposing the legislation.