Malcolm Roberts (Queensland, Pauline Hanson's One Nation Party) Share this | Hansard source

Australia has enormous potential. Listening to Australians right across the country—from Cape York through to Melbourne through to Perth, South Australia, parts of New South Wales and the regions of Queensland—this is abundantly clear. The secret of our success, until recent times, has been, No. 1, our great people—competent, caring and highly creative, reflecting the human spirit. We also had cheap energy until recent times, and we used to have stable government. These are the hallmarks of human progress. We had a level playing field, a fair go, entrepreneurialism, innovation and wages growth that spurred the economy, based on productivity increases.

I am fiercely pro-human, and I am fiercely pro-Australian. My allegiance is only to Australia, and, in listening to people around our country, we can see serious blights that are undermining our future. People are now under increased control from remote bureaucrats, remote not in terms of geography but in terms of their connection with the rest of Australia and their high salaries. Energy prices are skyrocketing. On taxation, why would we tax payroll? We know that when we tax something we decrease its use, so why tax payroll? We don't want to decrease payroll; we want to increase employment.

We are threatened by corrupt union bosses. Notice I said 'union bosses' and not 'unions'. Union bosses have stopped protecting workers and have started to fleece members instead. We are under threat from big companies that are working in a cabal with union bosses, destroying wages and taking away things like weekend penalty rates in secret, cosy deals that have caused union bosses to abandon hundreds of thousands of people, costing them hundreds of millions of dollars in lost wages. They were taken away by people who were in the union movement and who are now in this parliament, in the Labor Party. The engine of employment and innovation is being destroyed by some union bosses.

The Fair Work Amendment (Corrupting Benefits) Bill 2017 has been designed to protect workers from the corruption that is associated with big businesses paying off union bosses to avoid union action or activity. In essence, it aims to stop that cosy relationship where big business buys a union official and undermines rates, including penalty rates.

This bill does three things. Firstly, it outlaws payments to corrupt an official. Secondly, it outlaws all payments from employers to a union, except for a few that Senator Bernardi has discussed. Thirdly, it forces disclosure of financial benefits in enterprise agreement bargaining. These flowed from the Dyson Heydon royal commission, and surely no-one was asleep while that was underway. This bill exists to curtail corrupt activity uncovered in that trade union royal commission. It bans bribes, notably paid to union officials by companies, employers, to influence the outcome of bargaining agreements. Giving, receiving or soliciting such a payment would be punishable by up to 10 years imprisonment or a $1 million fine or both. That is reasonable, because union bosses and some large multinational companies, and Australian companies, have cost honest workers hundreds of millions of dollars in lost wages. This bill also requires disclosure, on the part of negotiating officials, of any personal interests that may be affected by the outcome of an agreement.

Let's pause and go back to the purposes of unions. When they were formed, there were five main purposes: to protect wages; to protect health and safety; to protect working conditions; to ensure security of employment; and to ensure a healthy, long retirement. They were noble organisations, the early unions, and they fought hard for workers' rights over centuries. But now look: what they fought for is now enshrined in legislation. So what is a union to do? Either they can improve the services they offer and earn the right to members' dues, or they can do what some of the larger unions have done and play mischief or be a vehicle for union bosses' power or personal finances and political alliances.

The CFMEU is tied up. It is taking its coalminers' dues and funding people like GetUp! and the Greens to destroy coalminers' jobs. That is what is happening; in cahoots with people like George Soros, the international financier. Who, pray tell, was on the foundation GetUp! board of directors? It was none other than the current Leader of the Opposition, Mr Bill Shorten. Sadly among unions, the union membership is plummeting outside the public service, because people can sense that not only are they not getting value for their money but better alternatives are springing up in the form of modern unions. Even Martin Ferguson can now see the need for an IR reform push. According to the Financial Review today, former ACTU boss Martin Ferguson has called on the Turnbull government to enact a new round of workplace relations reform, backing a resource industry push for new employee rights to opt out of collective agreements and move to individual agreements, restrictions on legal strikes and a higher bar to prove unlawful employer actions—Mr Martin Ferguson, a former leader of the union movement.

Labor and the Greens are locked in a race for cash, corrupting cash, often procured corruptly. Coalminers are paying dues to kill their jobs. This, sadly, is the reality of Australia today. Let me give you some examples, Deputy President. Toll Group paid $100,000 to the Transport Education Audit Compliance Health Organisation, TEACHO, an entity controlled by the TWU to secure approval of an enterprise agreement being negotiated by the TWU, and agreed to two additional payments of $25,000 if the TWU used its rights of entry to report to Toll on the practice of its competitors, and if the TWU got Toll's competitors to contribute, the same amount to TEACHO.

Saipem paid $1 million at the request of the Maritime Union of Australia at the same time it was negotiating the use of foreign-crewed tug boats on the Blacktip gas field project in Darwin. The payment was paid to the MUA's relevant entity, Maritime Employees Training Ltd—sounds nice, doesn't it. SapuraKencana paid more $350,000, a third of a million dollars, at the request of the MUA at the same time it was planning to use foreign-crewed tugs. Dredging International paid almost $1 million, at the request of the MUA, apparently as part of a deal to finalise an enterprise agreement.

Van Ord paid over $1 million at the request of the MUA to avoid industrial disruption. Thiess paid $100,000 to the Building Trades Group Drug and Alcohol Program., an entity controlled by the CFMEU, while it was constructing the Epping to Chatswood rail link in Sydney—apparently to secure industrial peace. The payment was falsely invoiced as being for drug and alcohol safety training, but was siphoned into the CFMEU's general account. Underworld figure George Alex made regular cash payments of $2,500 to an official of the CFMEU NSW to ensure favourable treatment of Mr Alex's companies, even though they were repeatedly phoenixed, leaving workers without jobs and with unpaid wages and entitlements.

Senior Mirvac executives provided around $150,000 worth of free building goods and work on then CFMEU Queensland president Dave Hanna's house in Cornubia, Queensland, in order to secure industrial peace and otherwise favourable treatment by the CFMEU. Mirvac disguised the work by inflating invoices by subcontractors on their existing Orion shopping centre project. A system of NSW construction companies owned by Jianqiu Zhang paid the CFMEU NSW more than $118,000 to avoid entering into an enterprise agreement with the union. The payments were disguised as donations for various charitable causes, including safety industry dinners, picnic day sponsorship, mates in construction and a Friends of Sinn Fein speaking tour. A number of Canberra construction companies paid a CFMEU ACT organiser $210,000 to win construction work in Canberra. The CFMEU did not report these allegations to any authority when they came to light and paid the organiser a generous redundancy payment when he quietly resigned from the union.

There are many, many ways this is going on. Thiess Contractors paid the AWU—which is connected to Mr Shorten—apparently in return for good relations with the union. The payments were invoiced by the AWU as payments to a special education trust. But it was never paid into a trust and was instead paid directly into the AWU's general account and used for general union costs.

Potters Industries made regular payments to the AWU Victoria—there's the AWU again—apparently in return for good relations with the union. The payments were invoiced by the AWU as payments for paid education leave. Can you believe that? But the payments were made directly into the AWU's general account and used for general union costs—money making and a laundering machine.

Huntsman chemicals paid tens of thousands to AWU Victoria—there it is again, AWU—as part of an agreement to have the company pay for the AWU to employ a former union shop steward for work he never did, apparently in return for good relations with the union. The Greens and the ALP would support this to continue.

Thiess John Holland paid AWU—there it is again—Victoria $300,000 plus GST to ensure minimal industrial disruption while they built the east link freeway extension in Melbourne's eastern suburbs. The AWU issued false invoices to disguise the payments as training, back strain research, AWU magazine advertisements, forum tickets and conference sponsorships. But none of these benefits were actually provided. The payments were never disclosed to AWU members or employees—they were hiding it from their own members.

ACI Operations paid AWU—there it is again—Victoria around $500,000 to secure industrial peace while they laid off workers at their Spotswood glass manufacturing factory. The AWU invoiced the payments as paid education leave, but the payments were predominantly used to offset a loan to renovate the union's Victorian office and for other general costs.

Cleanevent, as others have known, paid AWU—there it is again—Victoria $75,000 to maintain an enterprise agreement that paid cleaning workers well below award rates and stripped them of penalty rates, overtime and shift loadings. How is that, hey? The payments were detailed in a secret letter between the AWU and Cleanevent and never disclosed to the cleaning workers, who were amongst the lowest paid in Australia. Level 1 casuals working at events were entitled to 176 per cent more per hour under the award than under the agreement sealed by these payments.

Unibuilt paid Mr Bill Shorten $32,000 to fund his 2007 election campaign manager while the company was negotiating an enterprise agreement for the AWU, for which Mr Shorten was then national secretary. In return Unibuilt received favourable treatment from the AWU and were able to promote themselves to potential customers as friendly with the union.

Chiquita Mushrooms paid AWU Victoria $24,000 to avoid industrial unrest while it was transitioning its mushroom picking workforce to labour hire. The AWU falsely invoiced the payments as paid education leave and never disclosed the payments to Chiquita employees.

Winslow Constructors paid AWU Victoria around $200,000 and provided the union with lists of employee names that were used to secretly sign up employees to the union. In return, the AWU provided Winslow with advance notice of terms of a competitor's enterprise agreement, giving them a competitive advantage. AWU hid the payments behind false invoices for OH&S training, workplace inspections and similar.

On and on and on it goes. But actually it started way back. In 1982, the then royal commission found a building company secretly provided materials and free labour worth over $150,000 to the secretary of the Builders Labourers Federation and other BLF officials, which was used to construct various beach houses. These payments were apparently made to secure industrial peace—isn't that blackmail?—and good relations with the unions. And there are many, many others.

What we have seen is the fact that the union bosses and some of their large unions are an unaccountable, untaxed, regulated monopoly that prevents other unions entering the market. They seek control for union bosses who manipulate people and provide power over the governments that created the very regulations that protect the union bosses. It gave them power and control over their own members, to the detriment of their own members.

I am going to foreshadow two amendments, because some union bosses are clever and will find ways to circumvent the law so they can continue to shaft workers. Subsequently, I foreshadow two slight tweakings of the bill via amendments that will capture this sneaky behaviour. The amendments I propose seek to close a loophole where a union may charge executives of a business, for example, unreasonably large union membership fees in lieu of no longer being able to obtain cash through other nefarious means as prevented by this bill and, secondly, to ensure benefit funds that are established for union members—perhaps, for example, widows—go directly to those the money was proposed for, not siphoned off somewhere else. We all know that some union bosses are so audacious in their attempts to steal money, they establish fake funds for victims and never give the victims one cent from that fund. My second amendment, seeks to target that specific behaviour and ensure that these funds are only exempted if they directly benefit those the money was intended for.

One Nation supporters have a moral compass and a very strong work ethic. One Nation supporters and the people we appeal to, and speak for, have a strong work ethic and a moral compass. They have a need to get back to identifying with the real Australia and real Australians—a need to appeal to and restore Australian values, which include fairness and being forthright and open. I have been forthright because this bill appeals to both aspects—the moral compass and the strong work ethic.

A workplace free of arbitrary control from union bosses and accomplices at the senior levels of companies doing deals with union bosses will be more productive. That will lead to better wages, better security and always to a safer workplace. We need to restore the secrets of our country's past success—a creative and competent workforce that is unleashed and a caring workforce that is unleashed. We need to get back to cheap energy prices, to restoring property rights; we need to get back to fair taxation and to minimised central government control. While we are going down that path to bring back this country, we must remove the controls that are arbitrary, unelected and we need to restore the secrets that made our country a success. We need to unleash Australians. As a servant to the people of Queensland and Australia, I recommend this bill for support, and we will be moving amendments.