Sam Dastyari (NSW, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

I rise to acknowledge the incredible contribution of a close friend and mentor of mine who recently announced his retirement from being head of Unions New South Wales, the peak union body in my home state. Mark Lennon has been a leader and advocate and an incredibly strong secretary of that organisation for almost eight years. Since taking on the role, I have had the opportunity to work closely with Mark to facilitate, to help and to participate in the work he has done and in the campaigns he ran on the issues he raised, but my relationship with Mark goes beyond that. He is a mentor and a friend. Frankly, I would not have had the opportunities in this place and as party secretary before that were it not for the incredible loyalty and friendship Mark provided me with. People like me have had incredible opportunities and have had the ability to do things we believe in and are passionate about. As all members in this chamber know, all of us are here because there have been people in our careers who have given us our starts and have given us support. Certainly, there is no doubt that I would not be here today were it not for the friendship, loyalty and support shown by Mark Lennon to me as a young whipper snapper in the Labor Party very early on.

Mark is a man of integrity, of decency and of honesty, traits he was clearly able to pass on to me over the years! He is a person of incredible intellect. Mark has reformed the model of what it means to be a modern trade union leader in New South Wales. He has a collaborative approach built around working with people not against people. It is a vision of where the movement is and where it needs to continue to head to, and we have been very lucky as a trade union movement in New South Wales to have had him at our helm. Mark has been at the Labor Council since 1988 and has held numerous different positions in that organisation—as a training officer, industrial officer, executive officer, long-term assistant secretary and now a long-term secretary—and he is leaving Unions New South Wales in better shape than he found it in. He is also leaving quite young. I think Mark is at pains to tell people that he is not retiring from everything, but he is certainly retiring from this role, having made the decision that it is time to pursue new challenges after almost eight years at the helm.

Mark is an incredible man who deserves all the accolades that I am sure he will be getting in the following few months. I will share one quick anecdote about him: after much pestering, in 2004 he finally convinced me that I needed to get a driver's licence. I got a P-plate and was given my first motor vehicle. Mark came to see me and handed me the keys to the car, and in 48 hours I handed the keys back to him. Unfortunately at that point there was no longer a car, as it had been completely written off. His words to me then were: 'I don't think this has turned out well for either of us.' As I told him at the time—and it remains true—it was the start of a very beautiful friendship. Mark, your contribution, the role you have played, your friendship and your loyalty have been incredible. Again, I cannot thank you enough for your incredible contribution and the support that you have shown me.

I also want to touch on an issue regarding the Transport Workers Union and a matter that has certainly been raised by the media and by others. The Safe Rates campaign that the Transport Workers Union has been running for many years now is an incredibly important campaign. The TWU has been fighting for the past 20 years for truckies to have safe rates. It is a campaign to hold the effective employers in the industry—the clients with the real economic power at the top of the supply chain—responsible for the rights, rates and conditions of the transport workers who move their freight. There is more than 20 years of evidence from coroners, academics and parliamentary inquiries linking rates of pay and truck crashes. Drivers under pressure due to low rates or impossible deadlines are more likely to skip breaks, speed, drive for longer and to drive rigs that have not been properly maintained. Truckies in this country are 15 times more likely to be killed at work than is the average Australian. Each year, around 300 people are killed in truck crashes on Australian roads and thousands more are injured.

A number of companies have been working with the Transport Workers Union—companies that recognise that having that kind of pressure placed on drivers is not in their economic interest, their social interest, their corporate interest or the interests of society as a whole—to establish good and safe union conditions. However, not all companies have come to the table, and there have been some large retailers—in particular Coles—that have been intent on forcing transport companies to undercut each other, moving contracts from safe union companies to cheap, dodgy operators where drivers are forced to drive for too long, too fast or while too fatigued in order to meet Coles's unrealistic demands. Analysis of records in just three transport operations at one Coles distribution centre in Western Sydney uncovered a shocking 126 breaches of national fatigue laws. That is 126 cases where truckies have not been allowed their proper rest breaks and have gone out on the same roads we all share. Truck driver John Waltis said that pressure from big clients at the top end of the supply chain was putting the squeeze on truckies, with tragic results. He said: 'I've been to the funerals for 52 of my mates killed in truck crashes. I don't want to go to any more. When truck drivers are not paid enough to put food on their family table and keep the rig running safely, you are putting them in an impossible position. Coles are notorious for the pressure it puts on truck drivers; their never-ending demands just keep putting truckers' lives at risk.'

As part of their Safe Rates campaign, 100 members of the Transport Workers Union—a union I am a proud member of—and their supporters held a rally at Coles Parramatta on 12 November. The protest lasted for over two hours, with 10 members being arrested for staging a sit-in in the frozen foods section. The concern I have is about the real overreach here, which is that this was a situation where a group of drivers and supporters wanted to highlight what they saw as a major issue: the pressure that drivers were being put under. They decided they were going to engage in a peaceful protest and, as a result of that, 10 of them ended up being arrested. Frankly, I think there was a better way for the police to handle this and there was a better way for Coles to handle this. It is disappointing that it takes these kinds of measures and these kinds of events.

Coles has a lot to answer for in how it treats its truck drivers and what it does at the top of the supply chain. The Coles argument has always been: 'We bear no responsibility for what happens below the supply chain', yet all the evidence shows that there is a direct link between the pressure that is put on at the top of the chain and what actually happens down the line with subcontractors and with driving companies. They have done nothing to respond to the evidence the TWU has presented to them linking their operation to accident after fatal accident, and they have done nothing to make sure that the truck drivers they use are getting paid fairly and are not being pressured to take risks. I want to acknowledge the incredible work in this campaign that has been led for many, many years by Tony Sheldon, the National Secretary of the Transport Workers Union, and also the New South Wales Secretary, Michael Aird, who has taken over in the past year and has really been driving this campaign. It is the TWU that, no pun intended, has been driving this campaign, particularly in Sydney but also across New South Wales and the ACT as a whole. There is evidence that demonstrates and shows there is a direct link between workers' conditions and the pressure that workers get placed under and the impact of what actually happens with drivers. The Transport Workers Union should rightly be proud of the campaign they have run. Their members should be proud of the campaign. Their organisers and officials should be proud of the campaign. Frankly, I think there are some elements of corporate Australia that need to do a lot better. Simply arresting people who are trying to highlight safety concerns is not the way to achieve that.