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

What an opportunity for the government to show that it believes in truth, integrity and honesty. What do they do? They run away from it. Senator Watt's talking about the delays. No, it's scrutiny. It's proper scrutiny. That's all we want. We want some urgency around bills that the government brought into the parliament saying that they were urgent and vital. What do we see? He's leaving. They're running away from it. Urgent bills? That's why we want to support this suspension: so that we can vote on the motion of Senators Pocock and Lambie.

This is about the Senate exercising the will of the Senate. The will of the Senate said, 'We want these bills passed urgently.' It went down to the House and has been put on the bottom of the order. To me, that shows the inconsistency with what Labor is saying about these bills and what the truth is. It proves that Labor is lying about the urgency of these bills. Senator Pocock reminded us very clearly of the long time frame for the wage theft provisions to be put in place—2025, I think he said. What is the government covering up?

We'll see more when we get to scrutiny of the other five sections of that bill, but I've been championing the cause of Hunter Valley and Central Queensland coalminers, and the only way that an enterprise agreement less than the award can be put in place is through an agreement with the Mining and Energy Union in the Hunter Valley. That's the only way. There is no loophole in the coal industry; it just needs enforcement of the Fair Work Act, which the Fair Work Ombudsman has dodged, the Fair Work Commission has dodged, the MEU has contravened deliberately, and some employers and some labour hire firms have deliberately compromised. There's no loophole; this is just designed to deflect and cover up. We will be getting to the bottom of this because I'm tired of these miners in Central Queensland and the Hunter Valley being put down. They're still on below-award pay despite what the government is saying.

We want scrutiny. We want it now.