Nita Green (Queensland, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

Madam Acting Deputy President Smith, you and I have both been in the Senate now for almost five years. Actually, I think we might have reached our five-year milestone a few days ago. And, for the last five years in this place, you will have heard me on many occasions talk about the issue of BHP and its in-house labour hire provider Operations Services. I have been, as Senator Sterle might say, banging on about this for five years now, because for five years I have been calling out the dodgy practices and relentless attacks on workers by BHP through their Operations Services, and I am here today—no surprises—to do the same thing again.

I am banging on about BHP and Operations Services because, again, they are attacking workers. That is because, despite the passage of the government's same job, same pay legislation, and despite the fact that workers at BHP's mine in Queensland were awarded the pay they deserve under these laws, BHP and Operations Services are once again fighting tooth and nail to stop their workers from receiving fair compensation.

Now, we on this side believe in a simple, fair rule: if you work the same job, you should get the same pay. Yet at BHP, Australia's largest and most profitable mining company, they seem to think that they are above this law—and it is now law in this country. They have consistently exploited loopholes to underpay workers, relying on dodgy labour hire arrangements to cut costs at the expense of hardworking regional Queenslanders. This isn't just a question of dollars and cents. It's about dignity and respect and fairness for those workers.

BHP's strategy of creating its own labour hire firm, naming it Operations Services, and using a couple of workers in Western Australia to sign up to an EBA with Operations Services that would then apply to thousands of workers in regional Queensland was a blatant abuse of power, and it really is high time that we call it out for what it is, plain and simple. For years, BHP have used Operations Services to create a second-class workforce within its own operations, and they did this—by having a couple of workers in another state sign up to this EBA—because they could because they had a government and laws under the coalition that let them do that. Well, that's not what they have anymore. Now they have a federal government who is committed to making sure that people who work the same job get the same pay. Those workers have the same uniforms, perform the same tasks and have the same hours as their direct employee counterparts, yet they receive tens of thousands of dollars each year.

Now, when a case like this goes to court, many people will understand that there's an opportunity for these decisions to be appealed. They even go to the High Court sometimes. This case is going to go to the High Court, and what we've decided to do as a government is to intervene in the case. We are intervening in this case—in this same job, same pay case—because we want to support the workers. We are intervening on the side of the workers, against BHP, because we support same job, same pay. There have been many cases across the years similar to this case that have gone all the way through to the High Court. Who can forget WorkPac Pty Ltd v Skene [2018] FCAFC 131, the labour hire case that went all the way to the High Court? Of course, it was up to the government at the time to also intervene in that case. And what did the coalition do? They intervened in the case and took it all the way to the High Court, but they intervened on the side of the employers. They intervened against the workers. They intervened to stop same job, same pay being law in this country. That is the difference that workers in regional Queensland have under this government, a government that is willing to intervene on their behalf to protect same job, same pay.

I'm here today, again, five years later, calling out Operations Services and BHP for this dodgy behaviour. But I'm so proud that finally workers have a government that is on their side and literally standing next to them, shoulder to shoulder, in the High Court to protect them.