Susan McDonald (Queensland, National Party, Shadow Minister for Resources) Share this | Hansard source

I don't know that we have ever faced a more distressing, country-dividing, business-destroying piece of legislation than what we are 'not' debating today—the Fair Work Legislation Amendment (Closing Loopholes) Bill 2023. There are 15 pages of amendments that we have had no opportunity to examine. There have been days of committee hearings and the report will not be tabled. This is absolutely shocking from Labor. I'm going to go through exactly why. Before I do though I want to acknowledge the Jacqui Lambie Network and Senator David Pocock for their attempt to mitigate the worst of this legislation by splitting out the non-controversial protections of workers that should rightly be in place. We've talked about the PTSD compensation, domestic violence, silica and some of the other elements.

Some 42 per cent of jobs in this country are generated by small business, not by the big businesses that the unions are attacking and that Labor is fixated on and obsessed by. A third of the country are employed by people who take a mortgage, who work themselves to the bone and who in bad times pay their staff before they pay themselves. I would like to see people in this place or the other place put their hand up if they've done that. I've done that. I've put my name on the directors form. I've taken personal responsibility for my workers, for their mortgage payments and for their ability to put food on the table.

This is a time when business has never done it more tough. Thanks to this government there's skyrocketing electricity prices, skyrocketing insurance prices and skyrocketing costs of doing business. If it's not transport, it's fuel. Everything is driving small business into the ground. What has this government done? It has brought in legislation that makes it harder for them to operate.

Businesses wonder what this is about. This is about going to jail if you are late with wages. Let me explain to you what that's like. Let me explain to you what it's like in a pandemic. Let me explain to you what it's like when you have a lull in trade, which is what small business is seeing right now. Retail businesses have been smashed. Discretionary-spend businesses have been smashed. What is this government's answer? They're going to send you to jail if you cannot get wages paid on time. If you are busting your guts, paying other people ahead of yourself and your own mortgage, and jeopardising your family's future, what will this government do? They will send you to jail. They won't send rapists, people who are paedophiles or thieves to jail, but they will send you to jail.

It means right of entry. It means unions turning this into a business plan to grow their membership numbers, because Australians are choosing not to be a member of a union. Australians are choosing to have a relationship with their employer. They're choosing to work in a business where they are part of it, where they offer their services and are paid fairly for it. We have a very rigorous fair work regime, with awards and protections for long service leave, annual leave and sick pay. Senator Roberts is right: we have a fair work award that works. This is a business plan for the unions—be clear. Labor don't care about you. They don't care about your wages. They care about the unions putting their hands in your pockets. More union fees and more super donations—that's what they care about, because they are barking for their union masters. The government are desperate and weak, and this desperation is shown, on this last sitting day of the year, by how they're jamming through legislation that nobody has had the opportunity to see the amendments for and the committee hasn't reported on. We know that Labor is not for business, which means it's not for you. If you have a job in a business, Labor is coming after your job with this legislation.

What do we expect? We can't expect much from a cabinet that has 23 members who have had, on average, 35 years work experience each, 750 years of work experience, but only four of those years in business. What would they know about how hard it is to generate a job? I hear them talking about the reduced discrepancy in female pay. It is not them doing it; it is business. It is the mining companies that are employing more women and paying more. It is small business doing that. It is not government that creates jobs. It is people who take risks and who put their homes and their lives on the line.

I have done this. I know the stress of running a business, of trying to support workers and of trying to support my suppliers and my customers. I know what it's like to juggle these things and to look into the faces of my employees and say, 'I will get you through this and I will take the pain and I won't tell you about it.' It is not just me; there are thousands of small-business owners right across Australia who are doing that. But Labor doesn't care about that. They don't care about what it's like to run a business, particularly right now when it has never been harder. Workers are important, and businesses know that. If businesses are forced to close their doors or if business owners say they cannot go on because of this legislation and they have had enough of the layers of government regulation and stresses, where will those workers go to get a job? Labor, I assume, thinks that because there is a workforce shortage low unemployment will go on forever. But it won't. It is hard fought for. It is hard fought for to create jobs. Labor claim to be the party for the working people, but they're not. They are the party for the unions, and they don't give a damn about you. They won't give businesses the flexibility to ensure they can continue to operate. Right now, it has never been harder to employ someone.

Labor make no secret of their disdain for the mining sector. We have the energy minister running around the world, saying that we'll stop investing in fossil fuels. Maybe he forgot to mention that to all the well-paid workers in the mining industry. What jobs are they going to go to where they will receive a 50 per cent higher salary than they do in the mining industry? It certainly won't be polishing solar panels. What is the alternative? I feel bad for the member for Hunter, Senator Chisholm and Senator Ayres because they understand the value of the mining sector for mining communities. I wonder what they are telling those workers. It is obvious that the Left, the unions, are running the show. They don't understand that mining is a cyclical business. It's a commodity business, like agriculture, with boom and bust cycles. Companies have to invest billions of dollars to get up and going. They're at the whim of global markets, and the cyclical nature means they use labour hire companies for surge capacity.

Apparently running a business or understanding how we compete on the world stage is of no interest to Labor. What Labor has just done is ensure that Australian workers on well-paid jobs—50 per cent higher than the average Australian salary—will be the first to go because it is so hard to get investment in this country. It is down, and it is going down like a sinking stone because of Labor policy over the last 18 months. This industrial relations policy and legislation is one more nail in that coffin.

We will look back on the golden years of high employment and the quality of life that we have; these years will be the golden years, because Labor is ensuring they will not last. Our children will not enjoy the same quality of life we have enjoyed. When your employer says: 'I can't go on. I'm closing my doors. I've got to reduce your hours or put you off', thank Labor. Make sure you thank Labor because they are responsible for your job going. Labor don't care about businesses, don't care about all the people who work in those businesses and certainly don't care about you.