Jonathon Duniam (Tasmania, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Environment, Fisheries and Forestry) Share this | Hansard source

It is a delight to be back and pick up where I left off. I was reminding the chamber of an event in history that many of us can't forget and that is 'Baghdad Bob', who, in the early 2000s, was the foreign minister in Iraq at the end of the Hussein regime, and how, comically, 'Baghdad Bob' reminded me of a certain colleague we have in this chamber—that is, the Minister for Employment and Workplace Relations, Minister Watt.

'Baghdad Bob' told us that there were no US tanks rolling into Iraq and taking over that jurisdiction. He was holding a press conference, telling us everything was okay, while tanks were a couple of hundred metres from the room. This week, much in the same way as 'Baghdad Bob', Minister Watt stood up on the second floor of this building and told the media that the government had everything under control, that these laws introduced into this parliament, perfect in their first form, were going to pass, and that pesky Senate, that group of people elected by the people of Australia to interrogate and scrutinise legislation, didn't know what they were talking about, that it was all mis and disinformation and that this crowd, with their objections, were totally incorrect, as were all of the concerns being raised about this legislation.

As many of my colleagues have already outlined, there is a long history of these concerns being raised about the CFMEU and its actions that these will laws purportedly address, not only by members of this place, not just by Liberal politicians, but also by workers, by the Federal Court of Australia and by the former ABCC. There are entities out there that have of course pointed to concerns around the CFMEU and their actions. So why is the minister standing up in the Press Gallery holding press conferences telling us, 'Everything is okay. These laws are not necessary. We don't need to do anything beyond what the government proposes to do.'? I will come to the substance of the legislation, or lack of it, I might say, and what the coalition aims to do to improve these laws. It was amazing though, as I said, to watch Minister Watt at his finest, spin like there was no tomorrow, telling everyone that the bills were perfect and that this pesky thing called democracy was getting in the way of the government doing its job, getting in the way of urgently acting on clamping down on the CFMEU and their unlawful activities.

The fact is, these issues have been around for a long time. It's not like they weren't alerted to it, as Senator Cash, the shadow minister, has pointed out on a number of occasions. It is not like this government was only just recently informed of what was going on. We had years of allegations, court findings and claims against the CFMEU. Only now is the government seeking to act, having stood idly by doing nothing about the actions of the CFMEU and their leadership, standing idly by while workers got nothing out of their lawlessness. Now this government tells us it's urgent and has the gall to tell the Australian Senate, elected by the people of Australia, to just ram these through, saying, 'They are perfect. There is no improvement to be made here. Indeed, we are so in control as a government, we will have a deal done by end of week.' Yet it was only yesterday that we considered in this place what is known as a guillotine motion. This government often likes to use its numbers in partnership with the Australian Greens—thankfully, on this occasion it failed—to curtail debate on important legislation. It is an end point in time for this place to debate legislation. The government had a motion on the books to bring debate to an end today, only having introduced the bills this week. There was no proper scrutiny, no Senate inquiry, so we couldn't actually look at the bills in any detail; we just had to rush it through here.

We couldn't interrogate the department instructed by the government to draft these bills and ask them on what basis certain provisions were drafted up, why they were formed up this way, and was it a request from the minister or was it something from stakeholders? There was none of that, no interrogation of that whatsoever. It makes you wonder, why? Why would they want to just push this off? It's this whole 'nothing to see here' approach.

The government have adopted over a long period of time now an approach to doing business on behalf of the people of Australia. But if there is a problem, they will try and get you to look the other way, saying, 'Nothing to see here'—again, back to our 'Baghdad Bob' analogy. They say, 'Things are not as people might tell you but as we tell you. We will tell you what's going on. We will tell you whether things are good or bad and we will ignore the reality out there, the facts that actually relate to the situation, the facts relating to the workers that have been affected by the CFMEU, the facts that were outlined by Senator Colbeck in his contribution a little earlier on—the 30 to 40 per cent premium on public infrastructure projects, of course, because of CFMEU involvement.' How is that in the interests of this country? But, as I say, this minister spins like there's no tomorrow. He tells us that it's all under control and we've just got to get on with it; that it's the terrible Greens and coalition who are holding up this decisive action being taken by government.

Again, I go back to the motion moved yesterday as we opposed the government's attempts to curtail debate, their attempts to prevent democracy from doing its thing and prevent this Senate from interrogating this legislation. We had the Leader of the Government in the Senate, Senator Wong, and the minister himself, Minister Watt, whom I've already referred to in this debate, say: 'Okay, you move an amendment to this motion. You tell us when you want to end debate.' Hang on! Government, it's your job to get your bills through this parliament. It is your job to take people on the journey with you. It is your job to ensure that the legislation is right, on behalf of those who elected you to government. Instead of saying, 'Opposition, you tell us when you want this done by,' work with us on the amendments.

That is why I now want to turn to some of the things that our shadow minister, Senator Cash, referred to. The holes in the legislation, the shortcomings—many in number—render this bill ineffective. It does not do what the government claim it will do. In line with Minister Watt's farcical claims that everything is under control and we just need to pass these laws is the fact that this bill does nothing at all, despite what he says. It does not deal with the issues at the heart of the problems being faced by Australian workers and taxpayers because of the lawlessness of the CFMEU. As the shadow minister has pointed out, the legislation before us, if rammed through as per Labor's intention, would vest in the minister—Minister Watt, who has told us there's nothing to see here and we should just get on and pass his bill, not interrogate or scrutinise it—too much power, too much discretion, too much ability to do whatever he wants whenever he wants in response to what we believe is a significant situation. It is to that end—we've heard it referred to multiple times in this debate, and rightly so—that we have concerns about at least a perceived conflict of interest. When a union donates to a political party, in this case the Australian Labor Party, which is, of course, the party from which the minister hails—it was a party elected to govern in the interests of all Australians—$6.2 million, you've got to wonder whether a minister elected as part of that political party, which was funded in its election campaign by this union, is genuine in seeking to deal with the issues that we face through the lawlessness of this union.

The administration of the union would not apply to all branches of the union for an extended period. With the bill as it stands right now, without any amendment—and this is one of the 20 things that the shadow minister raised—the minister, at his discretion, can end the administration early. To go back to the point I made before: union donates to Labor Party; Labor Party, from which the minister comes, gets elected; Labor Party introduces laws and has sole discretion as to when administration of the union ends; Labor Party could get elected at the next election and end administration the next day. I'm pretty sure Australians can draw a solid line between donation and action. That is a conflict of interest that needs to be managed, and it would be remiss of this Senate not to deal with it. We would not be doing our job on behalf of Australian workers, a group of people that the Australian Labor Party say they stand for.

The fact that the scheme of administration can only be varied by the Federal Court on the application of the administrator is also of concern. There is the fact that the legislation doesn't set out what must be in the scheme of administration. It should not be determined solely at the whim of a minister. Again, there is the fact that the minister has discretion in a situation where they're a political player, as part of a party funded in large part by the union that is the subject and central concern of the legislation.

The fact that political donations and campaigns and advertising by the CFMEU are not explicitly banned during the period of administration is also of concern. The fact that it is silent on that, that we would allow this to continue to occur despite what concerns have been raised—again, not just by coalition politicians but many sectors, many quarters of our community, including law courts—is just unbelievable. The minister, our friend Minister Watt who, as I said, reminds me of 'Baghdad Bob'—'Nothing to see here; no problems to deal with'—doesn't see this as an issue. Australians are not stupid; they're not mugs. They know when projects are costing a third more than they should—public infrastructure projects like roads and hospitals, schools, essential things that we all need to live in this developed and growing society. I find it astounding that the minister does not have their interests at heart and does not wish to address these issues.

There's no transparency around this process either—the administrator not being required to report to parliament as much as it should. One of the requests we've made is that there be a written report every three months from the commencement of administration so that, on behalf of the people of Australia, we can interrogate what it is that is actually happening in this black box of administration of the CFMEU.

There are 20 proposed changes that our shadow minister is seeking to deal with and amend within the legislation. Yet Minister Watt has the gall to front up to the press gallery to try and tell Australians that it is all okay and that these silly politicians from non-government parties have got it all wrong and there's nothing to see here. Well, as I said, Australians aren't stupid. The facts, the history, the numbers relating to public infrastructure projects bear out our concerns. Our amendments are reasonable. Our amendments are ones that Australians expect to be put in place to ensure the best outcome for them as taxpayers, as workers, as mums and dads of people on worksites who've experienced some of the issues that Senator Cash and others have referred to.

But, again, rather than taking the issue seriously, we've got a minister who, in his first real test, instead of properly dealing with things, simply seeks to spin in the way that failed Iraqi foreign minister 'Baghdad Bob' did. And we know how that ended. It didn't end well for them because it was not based on truth. It was based on a lie. I hope this minister sees these amendments and sees fit, on behalf of the people he purports to represent, to actually make good this legislation, make it fit for purpose, rein CFMEU in and restore law and order to building and construction sites and to the union movement in our country. Workers do occasionally depend on these bodies. Let's make them do the right thing by workers.