Tony Sheldon (NSW, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

Thank you, Deputy President. Senator Scarr might learn something here, because this is about their other farcical policies. There's policy 3, the $315 billion of cuts to essential services—only they won't tell us what they're going to cut; and policy 4, their never-ending war on unions and working Australians. That, Senator Scarr, is what you're onto today and what you were doing last week. It's a farcical attempt to turn around from the policies you don't have and make sure there's a war on unions and working Australians. I've never seen an opposition that wants to be in government with more ridiculous and offensive policies than those opposite. This rehash of the ensuring integrity bill is part of that fourth policy, opposition leader Mr Dutton's never-ending war on workers.

Let's take a step back and look at what Mr Dutton and the Liberals and Nationals are doing in their war on workers. First of all, they have opposed every single wage increase that this government has fought for. Under Labor the minimum wage has increased by 19 per cent across the three annual wage reviews. A 19 per cent pay increase for our lowest paid workers in three years is unprecedented. Those opposite have repeatedly opposed those increases. Yes, Senator Scarr, those people opposite me have opposed those increases. Who can forget former prime minister Morrison saying a $1 increase was reckless and dangerous for those on low pay? That's what this is about. That's what they're about. They're making sure that working people have less of a voice. Who can forget former deputy prime minister Barnaby Joyce saying Labor's minimum wage rises of $110 are just window dressing? Say that to those low-paid workers. What this is really about is a war on workers.

We've seen the shadow Treasurer opposing our workplace reforms because he was terrified that they would 'push up wages'. That's what they're opposed to, not the rubbish we just heard in the opening speech. What they're opposed to is the opportunity for people to actually get a fair earning, as we saw earlier this year, when Senator Cash, the shadow workplace minister, had a letter leaked to the press. In that letter she described getting rid of the better-off-overall test as a good idea that aligns strongly with the coalition's approach. We know that getting rid of the better-off-overall test would mean pay cuts for millions of workers. They just can't get enough.

Just this week we saw Senator Hume's train-wreck interview on Insiders, where she kept saying the quiet bit out loud. She promised the coalition would get rid of the right to disconnect to make sure that not only would people be earning less under Mr Dutton but they'd also be working longer hours for nothing. She promised the coalition would gut our changes to make casual work more secure, because the only thing the Liberals and Nationals hate as much as wage rises is job security. Lastly she promised a review of the same job, same pay. It sounds more like the targeted packages of repeals that the shadow Treasurer let slip on Insiders in February. I should commend Insiders because, every time a member of the opposition frontbench goes on there, they let slip another workplace right they plan to kill off.

This gives you a flavour of Mr Dutton's war on working Australians. His plan is to have you working longer for less, and this dog's breakfast of a bill is the latest element of that war. This bill rehashes a bill that those opposite couldn't get through the Senate on three occasions when they were last in government. There was an excellent Senate inquiry into the ensuring integrity bill back in 2019, with a dissenting report that did an excellent job of highlighting what an atrocity that bill was. The bill effectively creates grounds to disqualify union officials and deregister entire unions on the basis of minor and unintentional breaches of the law and gives the types of laws Mr Dutton would introduce for our workplaces, for example—