Glenn Sterle (WA, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

I rise to contribute to this debate as well. I think it's very important that we get all the facts out and get the truth out. For someone who's spent a lifetime not only fighting for my mates but fighting for my members in the TWU for all those years, every time the cost of living moves, absolutely, it hurts us. But let's not forget that this opposition over here, when in government, was the government who made it a deliberate plan of their time in government to suppress wage growth—to keep wage growth low. The former senator Mathias Cormann, who was Minister for Finance at the time, actually said it. He didn't hide that. He came out and said it—to keep wages low.

I tell you what, if we don't keep wages moving, every time we have a cost-of-living crisis, it will get worse and worse, the knock-on effect, so we just have to get the truth out there. We now have a tranche of industrial relations reform, closing the loopholes, in front of the Senate now. We know what side of that the Lib-Nats sit. They totally oppose any opportunity to get the wages moving in this country. None of them will look at me and argue. They'll all keep looking down. We know that for a fact because they're on the side of the baddies. They're on the side of the chamber of commerce, the Minerals Council of Australia, COSBOA—I don't think they even represent any small business—the National Farmers Federation. Do I have to say any more? We are trying to outlaw wage theft. What we've clearly said is if an employee steals from the boss then the employee should be sacked. Make no mistake about that. We don't hide that. It is a crime. But this mob opposite, when an employer deliberately steals from an employee, they support it. They're opposing our bill to criminalise wage theft. Here they all are, looking down at their desks, not arguing with me, not trying to interject or get me to retract.

Earlier this year we put through our first tranche of industrial relations reform. It was called Secure Jobs, Better Pay because we want people not to be working 40, 50, 60 hours a week casually when they don't want to be casual. Let me put this out there as an ex-union organiser for the Transport Workers' Union, an ex-truck driver: some people like to be part-time and some people like to be casual. We understand that. It's not for us to say they can't. But there are a heck of a lot of people who are working massive hours—day-in, day-out, week-in, week-out, month-in, months-out—who would love nothing better than a permanent rate of pay. All of you in the chamber and up in the gallery know this: it doesn't matter how much you earn, you can't go to the bank and say, 'Look at all this money I'm earning. I'm only casual but I'd love to buy a home.' You cannot buy a home if you don't have a permanent job. Sorry, I'll rephrase that. You can't get a loan.

This same mob opposite will gingerly keep their heads down—I don't know what they're checking out, maybe the real estate markets for their holiday homes—will not take the argument up with me and will then try and condemn us to get the nation moving. We're the first party in here to say we want to share the common wealth. We want employers to be bouyant, because when employers are buoyant, they pass it on down the chain to their employees. It is this side of the parliamentary chamber that understands how to keep good relationships going out there in the industrial relations scene—happy workers, happy bosses.

But you have those massive corporations—the majority of them from America—squeezing the living daylights out of our supply chains while they're protected, unfortunately, by that side of parliament, opposing us, opposing our every opportunity to get this great nation moving and going forward together. We should never, ever be embarrassed to say, 'Australia is a wonderful place to live. Australia is a wonderful place to bring up your children.' We do enjoy, over the years, a good wage. When we have a good wage, guess what we do with it? We spend. The first thing we do is we buy more things or we go out more often or we spend it on our kids and spoil them as much as we can. Is that a sin, I ask Australia? Is that a sin? I don't want to live in South-East Asia on a suppressed wage but my bowl of food only costs 80 cents. No, thank you. I live in Australia. I want to keep Australian wages and conditions moving. Ask the question to that side of the chamber: Why did they oppose every opportunity we have to increase wages in this nation?