Paul Scarr (Queensland, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

I'm very pleased that Senator Urquhart spoke about labour hire before I rose to speak on the Fair Work Amendment (Supporting Australia's Jobs and Economic Recovery) Bill 2021, because it triggered a few memories in my mind with respect to the tradition of labour hire companies donating to members of the Labor Party. I'd like, at the outset, to read from an article dated 8 July 2015, from The Sydney Morning Herald. The title of this article is 'Bill Shorten failed to disclose $40,000 donation from labour hire company Unibilt to his 2007 election campaign'.

Senator Farrell interjecting—

Oh, he's done it now? He forgot! Senator Farrell says he's done it now. How long did it take him, Senator Farrell? I'll continue to quote from The Sydney Morning Herald article. Senator Farrell has shown his keen interest in reliving these memories, and I'm happy to accommodate him, so I'll continue to quote:

Opposition Leader Bill Shorten failed to declare a political donation of about—

'About'—a thousand here, a thousand there—

$40,000 from a labour hire company he received in the lead up to the 2007 election campaign.

In his much anticipated appearance before the royal commission into trade unions on Wednesday, Mr Shorten admitted the donation was only declared to the Australian Electoral Commission in recent days.

Now, Senator Farrell, this news article was dated 8 July 2015, and this donation of 'about $40,000' was made in the lead-up to the 2007 election. By my figuring, that's about an eight-year delay.

I'm sure, Senator Farrell—knowing you as I do, from being in this chamber over the past year and a half—that you would not, I am absolutely sure, omit to make such a declaration. I'm absolutely sure. But Bill Shorten, the opposition leader at the time, did. Well, he forgot. The article continues in relation to a few other matters, including, of course:

Mr Shorten also faced questions about his knowledge of the pay and conditions of workers at Melbourne cleaning firm Cleanevent, and how the firm's employees became members of the AWU.

Now, if I were in the position of one of those workers, I would much rather be represented by Senator Farrell, in his previous days, or Senator Ciccone, from the shoppies union. I would much rather be represented by Senator Farrell or Senator Ciccone. And I should note that I did admire, in my teenage days, the fact that the shoppies union reached out to the solidarity movement in Poland and formed a bridge from the Southern Hemisphere to the Northern Hemisphere and supported the solidarity movement. So I admire that. I admire far less Bill Shorten, then opposition leader, in his failing to disclose an about $40,000 donation from a labour hire company. There you go.

In speaking on this legislation I'd like to make some preliminary remarks with respect to the reform process generally, and I think it is a shame in this country today that when we see a reasonably modest and sensible proposed bill containing some amendments to Australia's current industrial relations system there is such resistance from those opposite. It is a shame, because this is not a bill that is being presented on any ideological basis whatsoever. One of the speakers opposite, I think it was Senator Urquhart, in her earlier contribution—and I think Senator Farrell commented on this, too—said that this reform was coming out of the government's seeking to take advantage of the COVID-19 pandemic. That is simply untrue.

The reason I can say that with some authority is that so many of the elements contained in this amending piece of legislation were referred to by the Productivity Commission in its report in 2015. A lot of the issues that are addressed in this bill were referred to in the Productivity Commission's report in 2015. So it is really base politics to try and characterise the elements of this bill as some sort of ideological warfare. It's absolutely far removed from that. It is simply a modest suite of principles and proposed changes to Australia's industrial relations system to take into account real inefficiencies.

I would like to walk through a number of elements of the changes. The first deals with casual employees. Just to provide some context to this, the fact of the matter is that in certain circumstances where there is genuine uncertainty with respect to the pattern of work and the hours which an employee is going to be able to be given in a workplace it is appropriate for that employee to be considered a casual employee. So the first element of the suite of amendments introduced in this legislation deals with providing a definition of 'casual employee'. You would not have thought that this would be an earth-shattering proposal—that we should actually have a definition of what it means to be a casual employee. That was something that those sitting opposite failed to provide when they introduced the current provisions. How earth-shattering is our definition of casual employee that is proposed? The bill says:

(a) an offer of employment made by the employer to the person is made on the basis that the employer makes no firm advance commitment to continuing and indefinite work according to an agreed pattern of work for the person …

I fail to see anything controversial in relation to that definition.

Then there is a proposal contained in the bill that would actually clean up an issue that has arisen with respect to the legal system determining that someone was not a casual employee when the employer, in good faith, considered that they had hired someone not on a permanent basis. There was a court decision in the Workpac case which provided that an employee could effectively double-dip in that situation. So the employee has been hired on the basis that the employee was a casual employee.

Senator Farrell interjecting—

They were being paid on the basis they were a casual employee. They were given loading to cover the entitlements which Senator Farrell is referring to. Then it was determined that they were not a casual employee, so they could keep the casual loading but also get the benefit of the entitlements. You can't have it both ways. You can't have the double-dipping, because the impact of that is that now there are thousands of Australian employers across this country who have had to provide for contingent liability in an amount estimated to be $39 billion because of the uncertainty which is now in the system. It needs to be addressed, and this bill achieves that.

The next issue I'd like to move to is with respect to the modest proposals in relation to the award system. There's no doubt that, with the COVID pandemic, there still needs to be some flexibility provided in the retail and hospitality sectors. The bill provides again for some relatively modest proposals in that respect. Again, these proposals are only intended to continue for a further temporary period of two years, and that is certainly in keeping with the temporary, targeted and proportionate approach the federal government has taken with respect to all of its measures.

There's also a proposal that would allow employers and part-time employees to agree that a part-time employee would undertake further work at their relevant rate without attracting overtime rates. The whole purpose of that is to avoid a distortion, which is occurring where employers are not able to provide those further hours to part-time employees because of the higher rates. So those part-time employees are losing out on those hours.

The whole gist of this bill is to provide situations where employers and employees can come to an agreement that is in their mutual best interests so that the part-time employee can get the benefit of additional hours. There are also a number of checks and balances, safeguards, to protect employees. They include a maximum number of continuous days of work, the part-time employee has to be working at least 16 hours a week, and protections with respect to employees under the age of 18. That's clearly appropriate.

The third area I'll speak to is that of enterprise agreements. This country needs more enterprise agreements, not fewer, so that employers and employees taking into account the specific circumstances of a relevant enterprise and can come to a mutually beneficial agreement that maximises their collective positions. The current law, as it has been interpreted, is driving employers away from negotiating enterprise agreements and that is against the best interests of both employers and employees, and against the best interests of Australia as a nation. Enterprise agreements pay, on average, 69 per cent, or $542 per week, more than award wages. Why would we have a system that drives employers back to the award when enterprise agreements, on average, provide 69 per cent per week more than award wages? There's something wrong with the system if it's driving employers away from negotiating enterprise agreements with their employees.

There are a number of modest proposals that would address some of those issues and that I believe would lead to better outcomes for both employers and employees. Schedule 4 of the bill deals with greenfield agreements and provides that they could last for a term of up to eight years as opposed to four years. Coming from the mining industry, I used to conduct due diligence with respect to prospective investments all over the world, on five continents—I counted them before this speech. I looked at industrial relations systems on five continents when the company I was working for was trying to determine whether to invest a capital dollar in this country or Botswana, or Chile, or Laos or wherever.

One of the issues that was always apparent with the Australian industrial relations system was the uncertainty created by enterprise agreements that only lasted for four years if the time to construct a major project extended beyond that four-year term. If we've learned anything over the last few years, we know that if lawless unions—I don't talk about the SDA here, but particularly the construction division of the CFMMEU—have any leverage they will use that leverage and hold a gun to the heads of those who are trying to get a major project built on time and within budget.

This notion that in some way the interests of employers and employees have to be out of alignment is simply incorrect. If you're building a major project, you are absolutely incentivised to keep the employees who started working on the project with the project for the duration of the project. That's the first point: you want that continuity of employment. Secondly, you want the project finished within budget and on time, and you will be prepared to incentivise the employees who are working on the project. With that concluding comment, I commend the bill to the Senate.

Debate interrupted.