Doug Cameron (NSW, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Human Services) Share this | Hansard source

Where do you start with that diatribe? This is simply about principles in law. It's about legislation—actually applying principles fairly and evenly across the nation. This government will not accept these amendments, even though they've been exposed to have so badly drafted this bill that, in the minister's own words, she has had to accept 90 per cent of the amendments. But when it comes to treating the union movement differently from corporations, she is not prepared to move—not prepared to move.

This is about ensuring that workers and their unions get treated fairly, and this is not happening. It's not a coincidence that the ACTU and the employer organisations—Ai Group, one of the biggest employer organisations in the country—raised this issue as a fundamental problem. If you're going to push onto the trade union movement certain new laws that differ from the laws that apply employer to employer, then there is something wrong. The Scrutiny of Bills Committee recognised that. The Parliamentary Joint Committee on Human Rights, which has Liberal and National Party members, actually raised concerns about this, and they are advised by eminent lawyers who deal with these issues.

What's happening here is that dishonesty underpins any breaches of the law if you're a government official. Dishonesty has to be proven if you're a member of parliament, but not if you're a union official—you don't have to prove dishonesty; you don't have to do that. This is a nonsense. This is a blatant attempt to further weaken the trade union movement from a government whose history in this place has been of attacking the trade union movement. I find it galling that this minister stands up and says she's acting in the interests of working people. This would be the first time, Minister, you ever have. It would be the first time I've ever seen you doing it.

But you know that's not the truth; this is not about a government acting in the interests of working people. This is a government who introduced Work Choices. As soon as they had the opportunity and the numbers in this place, they set about diminishing the rights of ordinary workers, who lost their penalty rates, lost their annual leave loading and had their rates of pay cut under individual contracts championed by the coalition. That is what this government's about; let's not make any bones about that. As soon as this government gets a chance to diminish collective bargaining in this country, it sets about doing it. It never acted in the benefit of workers. It never has and still has not stood up for the 700,000 workers who are going to lose penalty rates as a result of the decision of the Fair Work Commission after the commission was bullied by coalition members who were out there calling for penalty rate cuts for months, if not years, before that decision was taken. Nor has the Prime Minister. This is a Prime Minister who is so weak that he cannot effectively run his own government, a Prime Minister that is so jelly backed that he has to give in to a former Prime Minister and some of the most extreme members of the government, a Prime Minister who is a captive of Deputy Prime Minister Barnaby Joyce, a Prime Minister who has given up any semblance of standing up for his principles.

When you have a weak Prime Minister and a government that is ideologically driven, you end up with a situation like this: 90 per cent of this legislation has had to be changed when it has been subject to scrutiny and analysis by the opposition. This is bad legislation. It's designed to ensure that ordinary working people do not have access to effective trade unions. It's about ensuring that trade unions are treated differently from employers. It's about ensuring that trade unions are treated differently from members of parliament. We have to act dishonestly before we would end up going to jail, and government officials would have to act dishonestly before they end up going to jail, but not for a trade union official under this legislation. I would appeal to the crossbenchers not to fall for what's been put by the minister. Every expert that's looked at this—either scrutiny of bills, human rights or the Law Council of Australia—who put in a submission on this bill, then wrote to the Labor Party and said to shadow minister O'Connor that our amendments were consistent with the submissions that they put.

It is absolutely essential, for the fair operation of the law in this country and for everyone to be treated equally under the law in this country, that these amendments are accepted because it's creating different classes of organisations under the law. And it just so happens that it's the Liberal and National parties that are treating the trade union movement differently from everyone else in the country. If you're a corporation, you're not faced with this. If you're a corrupt public servant, you're not faced with this. If you're a corrupt member of parliament, you're not faced with this. What it means is that people operating within the law can end up going to jail for two years. This is, despite all that the minister has said, treating people differently under the law, depending on what organisation they're in. If you're the Commonwealth Bank, you don't have to worry about anything like this. If you're Westpac, you don't have to worry about anything like this. If you're a corrupt public servant, you don't have to worry about anything like this. And we know what happens around the world when governments impose politically and ideologically based legislation on the rights of working people to organise. It means that workers' wages fall; it means that rights at work fall. You can't get any dignity at work; you cannot operate effectively as a trade union movement in this country.

So this is bad law, this is unequal law, and it should be rejected. I would ask the crossbenchers to support the amendments that we have put, because it means that everyone will be treated fairly and equally under the law. This does not achieve that.

The CHAIR: The question is that amendments (14) and (15) on sheet 8143 be agreed to.