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

I welcome Senator Paterson's remarks and his contribution on the Fair Work (Registered Organisations) Amendment Bill 2014. He felt that the debate should be heading towards the specifics of the legislation that is before the Senate. I do intend to speak about the specifics of the bill itself, but I think it is near impossible to divorce the specifics of this bill from the broader issue, which is nothing other than a concerted assault by this government on elements of the trade union movement and the trade union movement as a whole. The idea that you can look at a piece of legislation like this in isolation without the context of the approach that is being taken by this government on the broader issues of workers' rights, trade union participation and the movement more generally I think would be false and a mistake.

I will talk a little bit about the specifics of what this bill proposes to do. I would not mind trying in an impartial way to outline the bill as I understand it and then outline my opposition to it. The bill itself establishes the Registered Organisations Commission, which will be headed by the Registered Organisations Commissioner, who will be hand-picked by the government and will have greater investigative powers than those currently available under the Fair Work Commission. It increases disclosure requirements for officers and registered organisations. It introduces higher penalties for civil contraventions and introduces criminal offences in respect of officers' duties which are modelled on those found in the Corporations Act 2001. I think it is worth noting that this bill was defeated—I know Senator Rhiannon said on two separate occasions—I recall on three separate occasions, but I may be mistaken—