Anne Urquhart (Tasmania, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

It just shows how out of touch the Liberals are on workplace relations. They are a policy-free zone with Senator Abetz holding watch and only pushing stunts like this bill without seeking to make a positive contribution on how we in this place can make the lives of working Australians better. Australians know in their hearts of hearts that those opposite want to bring back the worst of their Work Choices industrial relations system. There is no greater threat to workers in Australia than a Liberal government. We know this from past history. The Liberals will take away unfair dismissal protections for millions of Australian workers, ensure that key terms and conditions such as penalty rates, public holiday pay and overtime are removed, not protected or otherwise undermined leading to increased job and income insecurity, and allow for 'take it or leave it' individual contracts with no negotiation and no real protections leading to increased job and income insecurity.

Australians will not be fooled. Australians know that those opposite have put Work Choices on ice. They refuse to seriously engage in workplace relations, hoping to sneak into government and a little way down the track start clawing back the rights of working Australians to collectively bargain. Those opposite have put Work Choices on ice but Australians will not be fooled. Australians can see right through Senator Abetz's plea of a few weeks back when he said Work Choices went too far. Senator Abetz, the millions of Australians whose livelihoods were thrown up in the air by Work Choices know you went too far and they are rightly worried. They are worried that there are many in the coalition who share the same view of unions as the organisation who owns the Sanitarium company, and that is the Seventh-day Adventists.

The Sanitarium factory in regional New South Wales sources most of its labour locally from within the church if possible. But not all the workers came from within the church. Due to the poor wages and conditions at the factory, these workers wanted to join the union. They wanted to discuss a fairer deal for their day's work. The company would not negotiate. When the union brought the matter to arbitration, Sanitarium's HR representative refused to talk to the union and would only speak through their lawyer. Why? you might ask. A story that ran in the local newspaper tells that story. The owners of the Sanitarium company said to the local newspaper that unions were the tools of Satan. They believe that Satan is controlling workers when they come together to discuss and bargain for decent conditions at work. The workers just wanted a fair go.

Australians know that bills like this are just stunts and mirages to hide the lack of detailed workplace relations policy available from those opposite. They know that all the negativity, all the hyperbole and all the lack of policy detail from Senator Abetz is just a cover until the election. We do not hear the shadow minister for employment providing ideas and policies on how to lift employment in Australia, how to prepare Australians for work or how to care for them if they are injured at work. For a party that goes to any lengths and takes every opportunity to criticise the government's workplace relations policy, either the opposition are all talk and no action or they are deceiving the Australian public about their policy intentions in this space. Either way, it is a dishonest and dishonourable approach.

Contrast that against the positive policies and the positive outcomes we have seen in workplaces across Australia as a result of this Labor government. We have more Australians in work than ever before in our nation's history. Over 11½ million Australians are in work today. Nine hundred thousand jobs have been created since Labor came to office. Productivity is up and industrial disputes are down. This is in contrast to the rest of the world, where many developed economies have shed jobs and unemployment remains in double digits.

Those opposite love talking people down for highlighting Australia's place in the world. We do not do it to gloat. We do it because it is a fact and all Australians should be proud of it. Together we are putting in place the right policy mix to grow jobs and support families—the right policy mix to support creating and protecting jobs for Australians. It is a policy mix that also values quality wages and conditions at work and respects workers.

What we on this side of the chamber believe in is clear. We know that there are pockets of the Australian economy, of our communities, where there are challenges and jobs growth is not what we would like. That is why we are investing $1 billion in a plan for Australian jobs. It is why we are building the National Broadband Network and delivering on a plan for school improvement. It is why there are trade training centres and the National Workforce Development Fund across the entire country: to give our young people the skill set they need to enter the workforce and to give older Australians the opportunity to retrain and start a new job. It is why we are taking up the challenge to lift the superannuation guarantee from nine to 12 per cent. It is why we have introduced the low-income superannuation contribution: to effectively refund the tax paid by low-income earners on their superannuation by up to $500 per annum. It is a policy which, at its core, delivers on the value of fairness. It is a policy which assists 30 per cent of the workforce, 3½ million Australians—over two million of them women—to save for their retirement. It is a policy which those opposite have committed to the rubbish bin. It is why we passed the Fair Work Act, why we ridded this nation of Australian workplace agreements and why we started the journey of returning fairness to Australian workplaces for our workers.

The vast majority of Australians regard a strong and stable safety net, flexibility and fairness, unfair dismissal protections and conditions like penalty rates as standards in the workplace. Many people that I speak to in Tasmania are very worried about the prospect of a Liberal government and Senator Abetz as minister for employment and workplace relations. They know that those opposite are in the minority who, while they are not vocalising their support for it today, are champing at the bit to get back into office and make changes to Australia's industrial relations system. They want to make changes like wiping the low-income super contribution, like limiting access to unfair dismissal and like limiting access of trade unions to worksites. These are changes that defy logic because they are changes to a system that is delivering solid productivity improvements, decent conditions at work and historically low industrial disputes. They are changes that do not increase opportunities, do not create safer workplaces and do not lift the living standards of working Australians. In contrast, the challenge Labor seizes is: how do we build upon this system to deliver more opportunities for work and how do we deliver greater fairness and equity.

That is why we are progressing further reforms to improve the jobs and security of Australian workers: better protecting pregnant workers; providing more flexibility for workers who need it by expanding the right to request flexible work arrangements; dealing with bullying at work by restoring productive working relationships; requiring employers to consider the impact on their employees' families when they do things like change working hours and rosters; introducing a right to request part-time work when a parent returns to work after taking unpaid parental leave; and ensuring penalty rates are protected through the modern award system so that people who have to work undesirable hours are compensated for missing valuable time with their friends and family.

On this side, we want to talk about fairness in employment and industrial relations. We want to spend time promoting positive reforms, not tarring over two million Australians and their families with a brush because they want to collectively organise and negotiate for decent conditions at work. Workers like those used to work at the fish factory in George Town, in the north of Tasmania. It was a small fishery and processing facility. I, as an organiser, was approached by some of the staff to come along and speak to the whole team. When we in the old Food Preservers Union approached the management to come along they were helpful. They invited us in, got the workers together in the lunch room and made us feel welcome. The workers at the processing facility were predominantly women, all of them employed on a casual basis; the few men around were all permanent. With permanency came security but also a sense of superiority. We spoke to the staff about joining the union and people seemed positive. We left them some information and told them we would come back the next week to talk again to those who wanted to join the union. We thought we had had a good hearing and that we would be able to offer these people support.

Unfortunately—and many people listening will know where this story is going—when we left, the boss got everyone together in the lunchroom and said that if they joined the union they would lose their job. Plain and simple: they would lose their job. Two women who were silent members of the union called and told us what had happened. They were worried for their jobs. A week later, we went back to the factory and talked to the people again. This time, no one was interested—publicly. However, the silent members called again and arranged for us to meet with a group of the workers.

We met with the women at one of their homes. They told us of the shenanigans that went on in their workplace; one-way shenanigans towards the female workers by the men, and some stuff that some people might not think of it as wrong but as larrikinism. But there were a lot of acts that any reasonable person would frame as assault and dangerous. The workers would be hosing down at the end of the day. One day one of the men was cleaning down in his underwear. He repeatedly turned the hose on the women, who were just going about their job, spraying them with a high-powered hose. The lunch room at the factory had a large window overlooking the rest of the site. The workers would have lunch at staggered intervals. The men would be having their lunch, no doubt having a banter as well, and they would often bare their backsides, or their fronts, directly at the women who were still working in the factory.

At the factory, there were only shared toilets; that is, a number of cubicles in a room. One more than one occasion, some of the men would force themselves into the bathroom cubicle while one of the women was in there. It was a sick and twisted game to intimidate the female workers. One day, it got out of hand: one of the men forced his way into the cubicle and the woman was able to fight him off but was injured, with visible bruising on her arms. She told me that she spoke to her husband when she got home that night. His first reaction was: 'Who is this bloke? I'm going to rip his head off.' This was a desperate reaction from someone without the means to resolve disputes through negotiation. The second reaction was: 'But you have to go to work tomorrow because we need the money.' This woman, this family and all of these workers had no choice but to put up with this behaviour.

We asked them, 'Why didn't you raise these matters with the supervisor?' Their simple replies were, 'We couldn't, he was one of the men involved.' They had no recourse on their own, but they wanted to join the union. They wanted to join the union so that together they could make a change at their workplace. So we set up a picket outside the factory. We went to the Industrial Relations Commission, where we were able to run an argument for these women and to lay down the facts. The commissioner found that there was clear evidence that the workers wanted to join a union, that they had been discriminated against and that they should be protected. The commissioner enforced a code of conduct for the factory management and gave the female workers in particular comfort that there were avenues for recourse if they needed to go down that path in the future.

Clearly, power structures exist across a range of situations, across a range of work sites and across a range of organisations. It was untrue in this situation in George Town that there was a mentality or a value set whereby anyone could walk into their boss' office, raise issues of concern and they would be treated fairly. And it is untrue for many millions of Australians today. Unions are the staff, they are the workers joining together to give themselves some bargaining power, to give themselves some cover. If there had been a union at this factory providing a mechanism for the workers to raise issues and to be listened to fairly, some of the incidents may not have happened the second, third or 10th time; in fact, they may not have happened at all.

What will this bill do for these people? It will do nothing. It is not designed to help them. It is designed to demonise working Australians. I do not condone officers of registered organisations or anyone in a position of trust acting inappropriately, misusing trust or funds or taking benefits which they are not entitled to. But there are already significant penalties available through the Fair Work (Registered Organisations) Act 2009 and provisions that allow for further criminal prosecution. Australians want positive ideas and solutions from their government on how to grow jobs and create safer workplaces. Labor understands this. That is why we are committed to ongoing positive reforms to improve the jobs and security of Australian workers.