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

Now the government has brought on this bill, which contains those four uncontroversial measures and wraps into it four more issues for eight in total. The four additional issues in this package of Tony Burke, the Minister for Employment and Workplace Relations, include the criminalisation of wage theft and industrial manslaughter. We support both of those; we agree with them. But his legislation introduced with no notice this morning includes two poison pills wrapped up in the uncontroversial. Those two poison pills are unfettered right of entry for union bosses and the deceptively named same job, same pay framework. It is deceptively named, as I'll explain.

Again we are seeing Labor wrap up a bundle of things everyone supports with the most-controversial proposals in industrial relations law. The right to entry allows union bosses to enter any business at any time under the pretext of safety issues. There are no criteria for what satisfies 'reasonable entry', because the assumption is that union delegates should never be prevented from entry. Union bosses will abuse this. Union bosses in some lawless large unions already are concocting safety reasons for claiming entry to businesses and then, inevitably, hanging around to apply pressure on employees to join up. If a business believes the right to entry has been abused, it has next to no recourse. The Australian Building and Construction Commission used to enforce workplace entry and union conduct in workplaces—no more. Employers can't complain to the Australian Building and Construction Commission because the Labor Party disbanded it for being a check on the unreasonable behaviour of union bosses.

I turn now to the real poison pill: same job, same pay. It sounds good. One Nation totally supports a fair day's pay for a fair day's work. Let everyone in this chamber remember that I introduced into the Senate the first bill for same job, same pay. Let me tell you why and then explain why we knew it would cover up the real problem, which is wage theft that the Mining and Energy Union, formerly under the name Construction, Forestry, Maritime, Mining and Energy Union, enables—not just sanctions, but enables and drives. I'll tell you why I support same job, same pay. A courageous miner in the Hunter Valley, Simon Turner, and some of his mates came to see me about what was going on. I thought it was a major coal company and a major international labour hire firm were colluding to screw workers. Then I found that the CFMMEU in the Hunter enables these agreements, that it drives these enterprise agreements. Not only do they not pay the award, not only do they not pay the enterprise agreement of the host company—the employer, the mine owner—they underpay the award, sanctioned by the CFMMEU in the Hunter. It is sanctioned by them, driven by them, resulting in the theft of over a billion dollars from miners. Tony Burke, the minister, knows because we have provided the details from miners on dodgy enterprise agreements that dodge the Fair Work Act. It is something we have been working on relentlessly with the miners in Central Queensland and the Hunter for 4½ years since it was first brought to my attention. Miners provided them directly to senior ministerial staff, to senior staff of his Department of Employment and Workplace Relations in personal meetings the miners had that we arranged. The provided the details in writing with documented evidence. There were details that I put in writing to the minister himself twice.

The loophole is a fabrication that Labor senators echo like propaganda through this chamber. In the mining industry, that is false. There is no loophole. The core problem is that the Fair Work Act has been breached repeatedly, systemically, systematically and cold-bloodedly. The underpayment of miners in the permanent casual rort is possible only with enterprise agreements signed by the Mining and Energy Union, formerly the CFMMEU. In some cases, that union sold enterprise agreements to labour hire firms. In fact, speaking of labour hire firms, the Hunter CFMMEU started the first labour hire firm in our coal industry and pretends to oppose labour hire. It enables labour hire and rewards labour hire companies with dodgy deals, enterprise agreements and paying below the award.

As a former coalface miner and later a mine manager, I am absolutely appalled at what I see going on at the moment in the coal industry and in a union that used to be very proud and strong. Elements of it are now gutless and crooked. The Hunter CFMMEU approved and signed a statutory declaration as part of the Fair Work Act process for approving enterprise agreements. All of the deals were done with the signature of the CFMMEU. The Fair Work Commission oversees the process of developing an enterprise agreement. Repeatedly, it has breached the statutory process. It has broken its own law repeatedly. When we've drawn the Fair Work Commission senior management to that fact, they have done nothing. They don't give a damn about workers, whom they're supposed to be protecting. It's duplicitous. When miners draw the Fair Work Commission's senior management to that fact, the Fair Work Commission does nothing. We have told Minister Burke, and he does nothing.

Miners have made formal complaints to the Fair Work Ombudsman, who were stumped until they were given a bevy of documents including court rulings, an Australian Taxation Office declaration, PAYE slips and PAYE group certificates. Those are legitimate documents. To those legitimate documents, they responded with a fraudulent document that a labour hire firm fabricated. The Australian Taxation Office has said that it is a fraudulent document. And then the Fair Work Ombudsman's senior managers used that fraudulent document in the Fair Work Ombudsman's office knowing it was fraudulent. We will not fall for Minister Burke's cover-up of his mates in the CFMMEU. We will continue to fight for back pay for thousands of coalminers. We will not allow this cover-up. We will not look the other way, as Senator Lambie and Senator Pocock have. We will double down and hold Minister Burke accountable.

How was it done? Let me give you a hint. The Construction, Forestry, Maritime, Mining and Energy Union, formerly the CFMEU, own 50 per cent of coalmines' insurance and workers compensation for coalminers—Coal Long-Service Leave and AUSCOAL Super. They have co-directors, who approve various contracts. For example, the Coal LSL administration was contracted out to AUSCOAL. A director was on both of those boards when the contract was signed. This is really sloppy stuff. I'm surprised with Senator Lambie, as I said. After I arranged a meeting with her and a particular miner in the Hunter Valley, she spoke with the miner and confirmed it with me. Senator Pocock was offered the same opportunity. As miners caught in the permanent-casual rort know, the solution is simple: enforce the Fair Work Act and get the more than $1 billion in back pay that miners are entitled to. Simon Turner and other miners in the Hunter initially thought that, yes, the same work, same pay bill that I introduced to this parliament was needed. Now they know, having dug deeper and seen the corruption that's gone on, all that's needed is to enforce the Fair Work Act. This bill pretends to be closing loopholes. In reality, though, every time you add a page of legislation, you just create an extra loophole for lawyers to find. The answer is less legislation, not more. The current legislation is too complex and hides protections from miners and small business and makes it easy for the industrial relations club or large union bosses, large employers and industrial groups to clobber workers.

Minister Burke, stop burying the evidence. Face up to the fact that your mates in the CFMMEU are directly responsible for wage theft of more than a billion dollars, as you've been informed. The solution is not covering up the rort or fabricating an imaginary loophole. The solution is simply to enforce the Fair Work Act. That is your job as minister. We will not fall for this bill's deceit. We will continue to fight for workers to be paid their full entitlements and make up for wage theft and for workers to obtain their full lawful entitlements.

When I started working with miners in the Hunter 4½ years ago I put forward—and they agreed with this—three aims. The first was to get Simon Turner his lawful and moral entitlements in full. We are still chasing that. We have gone part of the way. The second was to stop this permanent casual rort across the coalmining sector. We've heard from one large employer group. They're coming to the party. The third was to bring justice to the Hunter CFMMEU, which is now the Mining and Energy Union, and the Chandler Macleod group, the perpetrators at the Mount Arthur mine. We will continue to fight for industrial relations reform. We will continue until all my three aims are achieved for the miners in the Hunter and Central Queensland.

One Nation will always fight for workers being able to understand their rights and fighting for those rights. The first step towards doing that is making them simple enough to understand. This bill does nothing to help that, and we will be opposing it. The big gorillas in the room—to use Senator Sheldon's term—are the Mining and Energy Union in the Hunter; the CFMMEU; the Chandler Macleod group; Recruit Holdings, the largest labour hire firm in the world; the Fair Work Commission; and the Fair Work Ombudsman. Hiding mates and crooks from scrutiny will not get the Labor Party out of this. This bill will be the Labor Party government's death knell.