Eric Abetz (Tasmania, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Employment and Workplace Relations) Share this | Hansard source

You got it. How surprising! No matter which way this government turns, it will manufacture an excuse to put some union boss or ex union boss onto a board. There are three new board members to be appointed under this new category of employee representative. And, just in case you thought this was going to be a very careful selection process, guess who one of those three new board members is going to be? It is none other than—you see him here, you see him there, you see him everywhere—the National Secretary of the Australian Workers Union. The person who installed Ms Gillard as Prime Minister has, as part of his reward, been given a position on this board. Remember the man who was there on Lateline telling the Australian people that they were going to get new Prime Minister the next day, courtesy of the numbers that he controlled in the Labor Party caucus? He is going to be a beneficiary of this amendment bill through a position on the board.

If you thought, 'One out of three isn't too bad,' guess who else has been appointed? It is none other than Dr John Edwards, the fellow who wrote an academic treatise on Australia's greatest Prime Minister.