Raff Ciccone (Victoria, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

I also rise today to join my Labor colleagues in placing on the record my opposition to the bill that we are debating tonight, the Fair Work (Registered Organisations) Amendment (Ensuring Integrity) Bill 2019. We have always known that, despite all the shouting from the rooftops of it being 'dead, buried and cremated', Work Choices has never stopped lurking in the shadows of coalition industrial relations policy. Despite all the claims that they have listened and had heard loud and clear the rumbling of hundreds of thousands of Australian workers marching for their rights at work in 2007, we knew then and we know today that they have not listened. We knew that when they said Work Choices was gone they really meant that it had been quietly tucked away in a drawer somewhere, just waiting for the right moment to re-emerge. Today, I'm sure, is the start of many bills to come.

We know this because attacking the rights of workers and their democratically elected representatives is in the coalition's DNA. Think back to the Fraser government's use of sections 45D and 45E of the Trade Practices Act, the forerunner of the Competition and Consumer Act. Remember how they used that legislation to pile on fines for unions taking industrial action to support workers and their members in industries and workplaces. What the Fraser government did then is what the Morrison government is doing now: stifling many of these actions. The conservatives' long obsession with undermining organised labour in favour of the employer has never ceased.

When Work Choices was introduced—and let's not forget it was around 1,500 pages long—it was done without a mandate and without genuine consultation, just like this bill before the Senate today. Work Choices introduced the making of Australian workplace agreements. It failed the fairness test. It gave too much power to the employers, creating an imbalance in the bargaining relationship. It wasn't simple; in fact it created a more complex system, one that Labor eventually replaced. It also failed the productivity test. Work Choices made the fundamental error of returning our economy to a framework of conflict. Not surprisingly, the result was a policy that was never accepted by the Australian workers, despite an unprecedented advertising barrage to convince them that they would be better off.

The conservatives are determined to ignore the lessons of the past and frame a workplace relations system that does not gain broad acceptance and support through consultation. A system based on trust, certainty and fairness is essential if we're going to remain a nation of innovation and rising prosperity. In this bill that we are debating, we have the latest re-emergence of the coalition's vendetta against organised labour, a greatest hits album of the Work Choices of old. Now, I must say that this CD is a little worse for wear. The cover's so dusty you can actually write your name on it. The insert is long since lost and the back is all scratched up. But don't worry; it's all here: the attacks on workers' rights to organise and on their delegates and their representatives, the gross disparity in governance rules between unions and corporates, and the draconian penalties, described by one organisation as characteristic of some authoritarian regimes that you see in many countries across the world.

Under this bill, normal industrial activity would become criminal activity. Advancing the wages, working conditions and overall welfare of workers are some of the basic rights that unions and employees should be able to negotiate without any fear. Unions would be tied up with vexatious litigation, forced to fight costly legal battles using their own members' money instead of protecting their members and Australian workers. This bill would hinder the rights of unions and their members to merge, to an extent that no corporation is even close to being subject to. The bill would make it possible for the government and disgruntled employers to shut down democratically elected unions and deny working people their right to choose their own representatives. It would make it far simpler to deregister unions and to disqualify their officials. It would make it harder for organisers to fulfil their health and safety duties. According to the Senate Education and Employment Legislation Committee dissenting report into this bill:

The bill … would erode the confidence and empowerment that union organisers, delegates and workplace health and safety representatives should feel they have in relation to organising, collectively bargaining and in maintaining safe workplaces.

In many instances, workplaces are also public places, meaning unsafe workplaces can be unsafe public places. The shops that retail workers, who I used to represent, work in are Australian public shops. The cafes and restaurants where chefs and waiters work are the cafes and restaurants that Australians frequent. If those workplaces are not safe then that poses a direct risk to the public. Worryingly, the Senate committee heard from the Tasmanian branch of the nurses' union that, if this bill were passed, it would limit their organisation's ability to provide support to members and to advocate for the best interests of their patients and that this would eventually lead to poorer outcomes and degradation of both private and public health services.

But the impact is not only felt by unions. The Senate committee, when considering the bill, heard from stakeholders who raised serious concerns about the impact that this bill will have on the Australian economy as well. Professor Jim Stanford, from the Centre for Future Work, outlined the dynamics in our current economic climate in his submission to the committee inquiry: stagnant wages that can barely keep pace with the cost of living, and weak consumer spending and economic growth driven by a range of conditions, including low wages growth and a shrinking labour share of total GDP, contrasted with growth in GDP share for corporations and financial investors—surely an indicator of growing inequality. Contrary to the claims of employee groups and those opposite who like to say that the deregulation in industrial relations will have a positive impact on our economy, Professor Stanford—an accomplished economist, I should add—went to lengths to outline how the current arrangements, which are highly restrictive when compared internationally, are already having a negative effect on the economy. He submitted that he could find no evidence that the measures contained in this bill would have a positive impact on the economy. He wrote:

At best, these proposals constitute a distraction from those more urgent labour policy matters. At worst, they would achieve an incremental worsening of the deeper problems and imbalances which are contributing to Australia's generally poor labour market performance.

It's important that we're honest about what the so-called ensuring integrity bill is, because there is very little integrity to this proposed piece of legislation. It is a politically motivated attack on effective, law-abiding unions and organisers who seek better pay and conditions for their members and help keep employees safe at work. Rather than ensuring integrity, this bill is the latest in a long Australian history of silencing the voices of workers and preventing their attempts to stand on equal ground with their employers.

This bill hearkens back to an Australia of nearly 200 years ago. James Straighter, a convict shepherd, was punished with 500 lashes, one month in confinement and five years penal servitude for gathering together with his fellow workers to demand better pay and conditions from their employer. The ensuring integrity bill may not be imposing thrashings on delegates or sending workers into confinement, but it directly interferes in the arrangements of unions—democratic organisations—and the capacity of workers to gather together to demand better pay and conditions.

The Masters and Servants Act 1828 imposed severe penalties on workers who behaved poorly and minimal penalties on employers who mistreated their employees. It provided that servants could be imprisoned and have their wages forfeited for refusal to work or for destruction of property and that masters found guilty of ill usage should be liable to pay damages of up to six months of wages. Under that legislation, a worker who was absent for just one hour could be imprisoned, yet employers who did not treat their servants well faced minimal repercussions.

The parallels between that act and the current arrangements around wage theft are quite clear: there is one rule for workers and another rule for employers. Today we are again seeing a situation where a worker who steals from the till can face prison time but an employer who steals hundreds of thousands of dollars from its workers faces minimal repercussions. In the bill before us, the penalties imposed upon union officials are considerable—more than the penalties imposed on businesses. The grounds for disqualification from holding office in a registered organisation in the bill are broader than the grounds for disqualification of company directors in Australia.

As we remember the examples from around 200 years ago, let's also get back to more recent history. Work Choices abolished minimum workplace standards and left workers without the most basic protections for wages and conditions. It divided workers and pitted them against one another in individually negotiated contracts designed to erode workplace standards. Together, the labour movement defeated Work Choices. Ordinary Australians took to the streets, demanding the right to negotiate a fair day's pay for a fair day's work. The coalition lost government in 2007, and the Prime Minister at the time suffered the indignity of being the second prime minister, after Stanley Bruce, to lose his own seat in the other place.

Since then, we know the coalition has long harboured ambitions to return to Work Choices. They have already enacted cuts to penalty rates, with barely an increase in employment hours or an improvement in economic measures. Last week, the current Prime Minister, Mr Morrison, flagged so-called simplifications to the award system, while the Attorney-General singled out awards in the retail and hospitality sectors as being too complex. For six years, the Liberal-National government have been unable to move for fear of stirring the same uprising against them as they saw when Work Choices was enacted. So this is their approach: decimate the union movement in 2019 and decimate workers' rights in 2020.

The union movement in Australia has a long and very proud history of achievement for Australian workers. The movement brought us eight hours of work, eight hours of recreation and eight hours of rest. It brought us annual leave, maternity leave, superannuation and the opportunity for a comfortable retirement. The movement brought us sick leave, redundancy pay, protection from unfair dismissal and the right to have a meal break. How many of us today take a simple break to eat for granted? It is unions that work every day to win pay rises for Australian workers, to assist them when they're unfairly dismissed, to provide simple workplace relations advice, to protect them from bullying and harassment in the workplace and to make sure that they get home safe.

This bill comes at a time when bad behaviour from big corporates—including, as we've heard today, from the big banks—is rife, and in these times unions are needed as much as ever to protect workers against the excesses of some bosses. Let us be clear that, if this bill does pass, it is ordinary workers who will suffer. They are the ones who are punished, not the big corporates who seek to underpay them of wages and to rip their hard-fought-for and hard-earned conditions away. I've seen what workplaces can become when unions are undermined and locked out.

Prior to my time in this place, as an official for the SDA union in Victoria, I represented some of the lowest-paid workers in Australia. I was there when we supported workers at 7-Eleven who were subject to mass exploitation, driven primarily by a severe power imbalance in the relationship between a worker and an employer. These workers were paid between $8 and $10 an hour, and in one instance I met a young foreign student who was making as little as $5 an hour. These workers came to Australia to get an education and improve their future but were instead too scared to speak up or not aware of their workplace rights. I can't fathom the fear that these workers would have felt studying, struggling to make ends meet and feeling powerless in the face of employers who were determined to rip them off, because their boss had all the power and they had none.

When we undermine the strength of organisations such as unions, we undermine the welfare of our entire worker base. When I took my seat in this place earlier this year, it was with the intention of keeping the best interests of Australians and Australian workers at heart. And, as I said in my first speech here, I've seen firsthand what happens when employees have no power and there are systematic patterns of stolen wages, exploitation and abuse. I also said that I have always believed in hard work and in the dignity of work and that I have always believed in a fair day's pay for a fair day's work. I will never vote for any measure that will put that at risk, and like my Labor colleagues I will not be voting for this bill when we end up coming to that point during the week.