Chris Ellison (WA, Liberal Party, Manager of Opposition Business in the Senate) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

At the request of Senator Abetz, I move:

That, upon its introduction into the House of Representatives, the provisions of the Workplace Relations Amendment (Transition to Forward with Fairness) Bill 2008 be referred to the Education, Employment and Workplace Relations Committee for inquiry and report by 28 April 2008, with particular reference to:

(a)

economic and social impacts from the abolition of individual statutory agreements;

(b)

impact on employment;

(c)

potential for a wages breakout and increased inflationary pressures;

(d)

potential for increased industrial disputation;

(e)

impact on sectors heavily reliant on individual statutory agreements; and

(f)

impact on productivity.

This is a reference to the Senate Standing Committee on Education, Employment and Workplace Relations of the Workplace Relations Amendment (Transition to Forward with Fairness) Bill 2008. It is an extremely important bill and one which needs adequate time for scrutiny. We have had a good deal of debate today about the necessity of scrutiny by the Senate and the use of legislative standing committees, and this is what this motion does. We have had those ad hoc issues referred to select committees. This is a bill going to a Senate legislation standing committee—and quite rightly so. But the issue at hand is the length of time of scrutiny for this committee. The reporting date in the motion is 28 April. That gives the Senate committee adequate time over the break to travel Australia and to engage those people who have an interest in this area, which is vital to all Australians and, indeed, was one of the major issues in the last election.

The government proposed an earlier reporting date around mid-March. Of course, in between, we have estimates committees sitting and other sitting weeks. It is the view of the coalition that more time is needed for such an important bill. This is something which needs to be considered carefully and, as indicated in the terms of reference—which, whilst general, also refer to some specific areas—is vital to this country and, of course, the scrutiny that goes with it is essential. Many Australians have concerns, one way or another, about this legislation. As I said, it was a major issue in the last election. It is therefore imperative that we have that time within which to report. And might I say that the government’s proposal would have seen this come back in the second sitting week in March, as I recall, and it would have left just three days—just three days—to pass what is a very important bill before that lengthy break in April. So the government was giving us a short period for scrutiny by the committee and an even shorter time for debate in the Senate. Previously we made an offer to the government to bring the date forward and also have an extra sitting week, but the government has rejected that. So we have reverted to the original notice of motion which has a reporting date of 28 April and which will provide adequate time for debate in the May and June sitting weeks in the Senate. I commend this motion to the Senate.

Penny Wong (SA, Australian Labor Party, Minister for Climate Change and Water) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise to speak to this motion and indicate I have an amendment. I will move that now and then speak to both the amendment and the motion at the same time. I move:

Omit all words from and including “28 April 2008”, substitute “17 March 2008”.

I think it is very important that we are very clear in this chamber and also externally about precisely what is occurring here. We have an opposition who are ideologically committed to Work Choices, an issue that played extremely large in last year’s election, and who are desperately trying to push out the date on which AWAs are abolished in this country. That is simply what it is: the opposition are refusing to accept the decision of the Australian people at the last election and are desperately clinging on to this Work Choices totemic issue to which they are so bound. They cannot think any other way.

This is an opposition whose position is that they want to continue the unfair Australian workplace agreements which we know have continued over the period of the Howard government, since they were introduced, to strip away wages and conditions from workers, particularly disadvantaged workers. So I place the opposition on notice: the Australian people will know that, for every day that you delay the passage of this bill through putting in place an unduly lengthy Senate inquiry, every AWA that is put in place where a young worker or any worker is asked to strip away conditions they would otherwise have received under Labor’s fairer industrial relations policy will be on your heads. This is after an election where no-one could say that anyone in Australia did not understand the difference between the parties on industrial relations. Leave aside all the colour and movement and smokescreens that Senators Minchin and Abetz and Ellison are trying to put into this debate.

At its core, this debate is about an opposition who are ideologically shackled to Australian workplace agreement, an opposition who cannot bear to let go the hard Right agenda about stripping wages and conditions from workers, an opposition who cannot bear the fact that this was an issue on which they clearly did not win the support of the Australian people at the last election. It is extraordinary, isn’t it, really, when you consider the high profile, the centrality of the issue of industrial relations at the election on 24 November? There is a lot of discussion in this chamber at various times about mandates. From memory, I have had the lecture—and I am sure the crossbenchers have at various times—from the previous government about their mandates. That is an issue that gets debated.

But let us be very clear about this. I do not think there was anybody in this country who paid any attention to the last election campaign who would not have considered industrial relations to have been the key issue, the issue that was most front and centre for the longest period, the issue that was most clearly debated, the issue where there were detailed and clear differences between the parties. This was an issue where Labor clearly have a very detailed mandate. The Australian people knew exactly what we were going to do on industrial relations. And they know exactly what you were doing, and they will know in coming weeks if your motion succeeds—because, as you know, you still have the numbers in this chamber—what you are doing by pushing out this reporting date. They will also know that any Australian workplace agreement that is put in place between when this bill should have been dealt with by the Senate and when you are proposing to deal with it is on your heads.

There are a number of particular issues that Senator Minchin mentioned in his earlier contribution to discussion on the Selection of Bills Committee about scrutiny. Firstly, on the issue of scrutiny, people may recall, as I said, that industrial relations was a central issue in the last election campaign. People may recall that Labor put out not only one but two policies in relation to industrial relations. We put out our Forward with Fairness policy and then we put out a very detailed implementation plan. It was far more detailed than anything we ever got from the former Howard government at the election prior to them introducing these extreme workplace laws that Labor are trying to remove through this legislation. I do not remember the former member for Bennelong ever coming out in the 2004 election and saying, ‘By the way, I am going to put in place contracts which allow you to have conditions stripped away without any no disadvantage test or without any reference to awards, which allow young workers to be exploited.’ I do not remember that being an issue that you campaigned on.

In contrast, we put out our policy in, I believe, April of last year, but I could be corrected on that date. Then we put out a very detailed implementation plan. The bill that is the subject of the referral that we are discussing is true to the implementation plan and the policies that we put out for scrutiny and upon which we were elected. This opposition in this chamber is trying to stop the abolition of Australian workplace agreements. You want the bill pushed out. You want more time for more AWAs. You do not want to abolish them because you still believe, despite the fact that you lost the election, that these are good things.

In terms of the time frame—and we have had some discussion about that and I think Senator Siewert has also made this point—we can look at some of the time frames around the legislation introduced by the previous government when it announced it was going to change the law to introduce a fairness test, and the scrutiny that this chamber was allowed to give that legislation. The former government’s Workplace Relations Amendment (A Stronger Safety Net) Bill 2007 was introduced in the House on 28 May and passed on 30 May and the Senate committee commenced its inquiries as soon as the bill was introduced in the House. The bill was introduced in the Senate on 13 June. The Senate committee report was tabled on 14 June and the bill passed on 20 June. So, when you were in government, for your safety net bill there were fewer than four weeks between its introduction into the House and its passage by the Senate, including the Senate committee inquiry.

The Australian people gave us a very clear mandate to implement this legislation. They understood very clearly what Labor’s policy was on these issues. We put out publicly our policy and our implementation plan. What those opposite are arguing for is a time frame far longer for consideration of this bill than they demanded of themselves in government. It is interesting, isn’t it? The shoe is on the other foot now. They are on the other side of the chamber now, but when the opposition were in government and retained control of this chamber they were very happy to rush things through and to have short inquires to suit their political purposes. They are now arguing for longer debate and longer consideration of this bill, which very clearly implements the policies that we articulated in detail prior to the election. If you want to talk in terms of a mandate, we have far more of a mandate for this legislation—given the detail, the discussion and the political focus on this issue prior to the election—than you ever had, when you were the government, for the safety net bill, as I have outlined.

Isn’t it amazing how things change when you cross over? There is only one explanation, and it is the one I started with: this is an opposition that cannot bear the fact that this legislation will remove Australian workplace agreements. I should not say that this is an opposition that cannot bear that fact. I think that is the position of most of the opposition, but we have had a fair bit of toing and froing on their side, with some people suggesting they should fold on this issue and others suggesting they should not—not because those who want to allow passage of this legislation or have a different view on the legislation have had a change of heart or have a different philosophical view; they just recognise the politics of this. Anybody who campaigned during this election—and I assume other senators also campaigned—knows that this was front and centre. For Senator Webber, who I know worked very hard in WA, it was a front and centre issue—as it was across the country. No-one could say that they did not understand that Kevin Rudd and Labor were standing for the abolition of AWAs.

So let us understand what is happening. The opposition is saying: ‘We don’t want to abolish AWAs. We don’t care that this was an issue in the election campaign. We don’t care that we lost the election. We don’t care that the government has got a mandate. We don’t care that the Australian people elected a government that was committed to doing this. We want to delay this as long as possible.’ Let us understand that that is what the motion will do. It will push this out to 28 April and we all know, given the sitting schedule, what that will mean.

The government is absolutely determined to press on with our amendments to these unfair laws. We absolutely will keep faith with the commitment we gave to the Australian people to remove Australian workplace agreements. We absolutely will keep faith with the policies and plans that we put forward and, in this area, the transitional arrangements that we articulated. We will push forward on that and Australians will know, if those on the other side continue to stonewall, who is responsible for the continuation of Australian workplace agreements in this country.

There was some discussion in the earlier debate about sitting hours. I want to make it very clear what the government’s position is. I have moved an amendment that requires a reporting date of 17 March. If that is passed, we will ensure that the bill is passed as expeditiously as possible. I flag to the chamber and to the Manager of Opposition Business in the Senate that, if additional sitting hours or days are required in order to pass this bill, the government will put those in place. We are committed to the passage of this legislation. So the challenge to the opposition is this: are you going to accept the fact that Australian workplace agreements are clearly something that the Australian people have rejected, or are you going to try to use the Senate processes to delay as long as possible the dismantling of these laws, which were soundly rejected at the most recent election?

I want to make it clear also that not only is this a bill in which this government is meeting its clear election commitments to the Australian people; it is a bill which is a product of genuine consultation. This may not be something those opposite understand. Not only was this bill put to the Australian people, who overwhelmingly endorsed it in effect at the last election, but the policy and detail of this bill went to the National Workplace Relations Consultative Council and its subcommittee on industrial relations. So this is a bill that has been worked on by experts from employer and employee organisations sitting around a table and, as a result of that consultation process, I understand the bill has been improved. We have also held consultations with state workplace relations ministers.

Because there has been a lot of discussion about scrutiny from the other side, I again want to make it clear that the government is not opposed to proper scrutiny of the bill. However, the government wants to ensure that this opposition does not unduly delay or frustrate the will of the Australian people being implemented into law. I again remind the chamber that the last time this parliament dealt with a piece of industrial relations legislation we dealt with the so-called fairness test. Again, I remind the chamber that that legislation, with all its complexity and uncertainty—and we saw some of that after its implementation—was processed within four sitting weeks, including a Senate inquiry. The then government, the current opposition, then believed that four sitting weeks was an appropriate length of time, inclusive of a Senate inquiry, for parliamentary scrutiny of a piece of industrial relations legislation which had not been put to the Australian people and which was announced—let us remember this—before it had even been drafted.

To those who might recall, send your minds back to May last year, I think it was. The government actually announced what it was going to do before it had the legislation ready. So we had this very strange situation where employers and employees were told something publicly that was in effect not enacted, nor was the legislation or the clarity around it introduced into the parliament.

I again remind those opposite that we announced our policy intentions in our Forward with Fairness policy in April last year—that is 10 months ago—and we provided the implementation details of our policy, to which I have already referred, in August last year. That was some three months before the election. It is our very strong view on this side of the chamber that, if four weeks was good enough for the consideration of the previous government’s so-called fairness test legislation, inclusive of a Senate inquiry, it is certainly good enough for the processing of this Labor government’s clear and simple transitional legislation.

This is a challenge for the opposition. Are they actually going to accept the will of the Australian people? Are they going to fairly and properly deal with this legislation or are they going to frustrate its passage? Those watching can only draw one conclusion from the delay that the opposition are proposing, and that is this: that you have not changed. The opposition have not changed. This is the same Liberal Party and National Party that were dedicated to deregulating the industrial relations system such that workers become substantially disadvantaged. This is the same coalition that supported the extreme Work Choices laws, the laws which we know are the most extreme this country has ever seen. This is the same coalition that supported and championed the Australian workplace agreements that we know stripped away the wages and conditions of Australian workers.

So what is happening in this chamber today is that the opposition are refusing to allow the abolition of Australian workplace agreements. That is what the opposition are doing. They are refusing to allow the expeditious passage of a piece of legislation which the Australian people voted for, because the Australian people voted for the dismantling of Work Choices. They knew exactly what the Labor Party’s position was on this, and they knew exactly what yours was as well. One thing we can take out of this debate is this: the opposition have not changed. We will remove Work Choices. We will abolish Australian workplace agreements. The other thing that is clear from this debate is that you have not changed. The opposition have not changed. You are still supporting the extreme Work Choices laws, which have meant a stripping away of wages and conditions amongst Australian workers.

Andrew Bartlett (Queensland, Australian Democrats) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Much of what Senator Wong has said I and the Democrats agree with. As I have pointed out a couple of times already in the chamber today, there can be no questioning the breath-taking hypocrisy of the arguments being put forward by the coalition. Across the board, people expect some degree of malleability, shall we say, in the cogency of the arguments that politicians put forward, but I think they do like to see at least some degree of consistency and intellectual honesty. It is impossible not to draw attention to the extraordinary hypocrisy in the assertions being made by the coalition today, in contrast to the arguments they made just about workplace relations laws, let alone everything else, over the last three years.

Frankly, I would be much more comfortable with what the coalition is putting forward on this—and I would suggest they might consider adopting this approach in regard to other legislation and inquiries, because I am sure we will keep seeing the same thing—if they could stand up and say, ‘Look, we accept that we overdid it; we accept that we were wrong.’ I am not here to give political advice, particularly given my own lack of political success at the last election, but I think it would send a message to stand up and say, ‘We accept that we got it wrong in the way we handled the Senate in the last few years and we are turning over a new leaf.’ Then you could much more credibly argue the positions you are now making about the need for greater scrutiny, rather than just asserting carte blanche that this is right in principle with no reference to your own record and statements over the last few years.

Indeed, I know at the declaration of the Senate poll after the last election, for example, Senator Ian Macdonald from the Queensland Liberals—he was the first elected in Queensland—made the point that he thought the previous coalition government did have some arrogance creeping into it. I think you could make that comment publicly a few more times and it might actually benefit the credibility of your arguments, whether you are putting them here or in the community. But the arguments you put forward are your business, I guess.

The other point that needs to be made is that it is one thing to draw attention to the double standards of the position the coalition is now arguing, but the Senate still has to make its decisions on the basis of what is best, of the issue on its merits. We have to examine the legislation and the proposal before us and decide what is best for the Australian community. Senator Wong again rightly referred to the apparent shift in views of a number of members of the coalition in regard to Work Choices being based upon their recognising the politics of this, and that seems to be quite clear.

Up to a point, there is nothing wrong with that because you are recognising that you might have got it wrong in the past. That would be good, if that statement were to accompany things. I would suggest, particularly in regard to the decisions the Senate makes, that making decisions, particularly about what becomes law and what does not, just on the basis of what is the best politics rather than what is the best policy and the best law is not good. It might be good for people’s election chances, but it is not good for the Australian people. We need to do better at making decisions predominantly based on the best policy rather than the best politics.

I am not being too starry eyed here. We have all taken into account the politics of the decision, but the day that that becomes the primary driver of our decisions is the day that the Australian public loses out. That is something we are all guilty of. I could certainly point to, but I shall not, examples in regard to past decisions of some in the Democrats being motivated more by politics than policy and that not leading to the best outcomes.

We are not debating, per se, the merits of the legislation that the government has put forward, but the proposal, in effect, for when the committee examining it will report. That is basically what we are arguing about. There is no disagreement about the committee it will go to; there is no general disagreement about the terms of reference. It is about the reporting date. We have already had that debate to some extent and both Senator Murray and I put on record that we thought that the time frame of 17 March was, while short, at the edges of what is acceptable in regard to a minimum time frame and something that we could wear. That is the reason that we voted the way we did in the earlier debate on this, but we certainly do not believe that it is problematic to have a somewhat longer time frame. I think the suggestion that was made earlier that, if it is not passed in March, it will not be passed till June ignores the fact that we actually have a sitting week in May.

I will now foreshadow, as part of my comments, the amendment that I have circulated to amend the substantive motion here to express the view that it would better enable full consideration of the committee’s report if the Senate were to sit an extra four days prior to the week beginning 12 May, prior to budget week. That is consistent with the comments I made earlier today and, I might say, yesterday about the Democrats’ view that there needs to be more sitting days across the board, to consider not just this one issue but issues across the board.

The point needs to be made repeatedly that this year we have a record low in the number of sitting days that have been scheduled in a non-election year. Indeed, it is extremely low even for an election year. I made that point yesterday. The Senate could have decided yesterday, when it adopted its sitting days for the year, to add some extra days on. It did not choose to do so and indeed nobody else even spoke to issue other than me. I am pleased to see, perhaps a day late, that today at least the coalition is now joining the Democrats in expressing dissatisfaction at the low number of sitting days.

I believe quite strongly that, if the majority of the Senate believes that there are too few sitting days, the Senate should schedule some extra days. That is within the power of the Senate. I understand—I will be corrected if I am wrong; I do not want to put words in the mouths of the coalition senators—that the coalition does not want to set a precedent of the Senate actually doing that. It is a convention that the government of the day, even if it does not have the numbers in the Senate, determines what the Senate sitting days are. Ideally, it does so with consultation, but at the end of the day the government of the day should decide. There is no doubt that it would set a precedent if the Senate said: ‘Well, that’s nice but the majority of us disagree. We will set and schedule more sitting days.’ That would set a precedent. I think it would be a good precedent to set because it would send the very strong signal to whoever is in government that the Senate is independent of the government and will choose for itself the order of its business, how many days it sits and what it is going to do. This is not in any way to capriciously frustrate the government but to ensure that the Senate is less driven by the political imperatives of the government of the day and more driven by a comprehensive examination of what is best overall. I think it would be a good precedent to set for the Senate to move its own motions to add extra sitting days should it so wish.

I understand the coalition does not want to do that. Certainly, I never got support in previous years when I have moved such motions, so the amendment that I foreshadow simply expresses a view that we would benefit from extra sitting days. I hope at least that would be accepted and recognised as a signal to the new government that we could do with some extra sitting days.

Whilst the substantive motion before us is about the reporting date, in effect, of the committee inquiry into this legislation, I do want to make a few points about the issue of mandate regarding the legislation and the broader issue of Work Choices and AWAs. The issue of mandate is one that is repeatedly put forward by all sides selectively to suit whatever they want to do and it is an extremely hollow theory, frankly. It has some very loose value. Certainly, it is worth noting the decisions of the Australian electorate in regard to how they voted. We note that because that is what ends up being reflected in the number of people in this place and the other place and who is in government. But to claim an automatic imprimatur for rubber-stamping any piece of legislation on the basis of an election result, even on an issue that was pivotal to the election, as I agree Work Choices was, is really stretching the idea of a mandate to the boundaries of intellectual honesty.

If you want a solid mandate, an incontrovertible mandate, on a specific issue then you put it to a referendum or a plebiscite and ask people. There is no other way you can credibly say that the Australian people support this specific issue. You can quote every opinion poll you like. I think the interchangeableness of the terms ‘AWA’ and ‘Work Choices’ that is being employed by the Labor government demonstrates that. I understand why they are doing that. It is good politics to do that. There is some accuracy in it, but there is some inaccuracy in it because AWAs and Work Choices are not synonymous. The particular type of AWAs that were adopted in the Work Choices legislation were unacceptable and extreme. I believe they were strongly opposed by the Australian government, they were certainly categorically opposed by the Democrats and we remain categorically opposed to Work Choices AWAs.

But AWAs in a different form, with a very strong safety net via the no disadvantage test, have been in place since 1996—heavily amended by the Senate and the Democrats in particular. Of course, the government that put them in place was re-elected in 1998, 2001 and 2004, with those AWAs as part of our workplace laws. It was only when it removed that no disadvantage test, bastardising, in my view, the intent behind AWAs, and removed a lot of the protections that were there—they were not perfect protections, but they certainly were reasonably good protections that could have been strengthened further—that it ran into political problems and, I might say, a lot of Australians ran into personal problems, having been subjected to them. But it is not synonymous: getting rid of Work Choices does not necessarily mean scrapping AWAs.

That does not mean we cannot do so, and Labor is in effect replacing one type of individual statutory agreement with another, interim, individual statutory agreement—that is all very good, and you have different labels and everybody can use them to sell their own messages. That is fine, and I am not expressing a view one way or another about the policy intent; I am simply saying that the mandate argument only goes so far. Getting rid of Work Choices, I think, is widely supported. Whether or not you can use that to say that therefore the Senate should rubber-stamp everything the government puts forward as long as the government says, ‘This is getting rid of Work Choices,’ is another matter.

A lot of people wanted to get rid of Work Choices; I do not think there is much doubt about that. Whether there is widespread agreement about what they want to replace it with is very much more in doubt, I think. The vast majority of Australians have an opinion about whether they are for or against Work Choices; there is far less certainty and clarity about what they see as desirable to take its place. In one sense you could say that, if you were ripping up Work Choices, all you would be doing, if you simply repealed the Work Choices law that was passed, would be going back to the pre-Work Choices laws. That is not what Labor is doing—and I am not saying they should do that; I do not believe they should. I am simply saying it is not as simple as just saying you can claim an automatic mandate. It is intellectually dishonest to say so, even though it may be intelligent politics.

Returning to the issue before us—the committee enquiry—the Democrats have already stated that we think 31 days or so to inquire and report is a short amount of time but not inappropriately short for a bill such as this, which is not massively complex. Having said that, we do not think it would be harmful for the time frame to be somewhat longer, as the coalition is proposing, particularly if the Senate put in place extra sitting days, as we believe should occur. As yet I have not read the bill in question, but my understanding is that it has a start-up date past the end of May anyway. So whether it is passed in May or passed in March—if it does get passed, which is a big ‘if’, I might say—my understanding is it still will not come into effect till later down the track. So it will not affect in any way the number of people who are put on AWAs or not put on AWAs.

There are very valid points to be made by the Labor government in pointing to the hypocrisy of the coalition, but I think their argument with regard to the mandate and the suggestion of expeditious rubber-stamping is somewhat thinner. As we move through the process of actually debating the legislation, I do think that point needs to be made more continually. The Labor Party have won the argument on Work Choices, and they were right. On the issue of Work Choices they were joined by the Democrats, the Greens and pretty much everybody except some within the Liberals. They won the argument and they won the election. They have got government, and I would think there is little doubt that that was probably the key factor in the election—not the only factor but the pivotal one. So you won your political argument and you won your election.

We are now dealing with what becomes the law. I am not naive enough to suggest that people should now put aside all political arguments and political point-scoring opportunities, but let us not allow that to dominate the decision the Senate finally makes. Let the Senate make its final decision on the basis of the merits of the legislation that is put forward and the evidence that is put forward in the Senate committee process. Score your points based on that; do not predetermine your position based on continuing the argument from the last election.

Frankly, I do not actually expect that to happen. I think that is a plea that will be widely ignored by all sides. But nonetheless I make it because I do think that would benefit the Australian public and our economy. We are all feverishly scrambling to emphasise economic responsibility and the importance of making sure our economy does not go south and more Australians do not get hurt by some difficult economic times ahead. So let us keep that in mind and match that rhetoric with reality when it comes to considering this and all other legislation.

In case it was not picked up the first time around, I foreshadow the amendment I have circulated to the motion. In effect, we already voted on that. As I said, the Democrats believe 17 March is an adequate minimum time frame, but we do not believe that the sky will come crashing down if that time frame is longer.

John Watson (Tasmania, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

As a matter of procedure, Senator Bartlett, I suggest you move your foreshadowed amendment to the motion after we vote on Senator Wong’s amendment.

Rachel Siewert (WA, Australian Greens) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I am going to show considerable restraint and not get stuck in once again about the former abuse of the committee process as I have already done that twice today and I do not want to bore everybody to tears. At this time I would like to discuss some of the proposed committee terms of reference. The Greens, of course, do believe it is important that this legislation be referred to committee. We believe it should have been done through the selection of bills process and supported the government’s referral to the Selection of Bills Committee, with the reporting date of 17 March. It is interesting to note too that, because the government was not proposing to put any restraints on what the committee could review, any issue would then have been open for a review through that process.

We believe the terms of reference that the opposition are proposing reflect their particular ideology around AWAs and individual statutory agreements in many of the particular points—particularly, terms of reference (c) and (d), which refer to the ‘potential for a wages breakout and increased inflationary pressures’ and the ‘potential for increased industrial disputation’. We believe these terms of reference are pre-empting a particular point of view of the impact of the changes to the legislation and, basically, running the opposition’s political point of view. They are not listening to the fact that the Australian people have said very definitely: ‘We don’t want AWAs. We don’t want them.’ The coalition continue with their particular point of view. They also seem to be a bit confused about AWAs. On the one hand, when it suits them, they reckon AWAs are increasing wages. On the other hand, when it suits them, they reckon getting rid of AWAs is going to lead to a wages breakout. So it is a bit fascinating. If you look at the terms of reference, they have changed the way they refer to AWAs. They are now adopting the term ‘individual statutory agreements’ rather than naming them what they are—AWAs. This is fascinating but it is an acknowledgement of the fact that they realise that AWAs are poisonous and that they know the community hates them. As Senator Wong rightly pointed out, you had to have been fast asleep during the election if you did not work out that a key part of the election was about AWAs and Work Choices.

I also take on board Senator Bartlett’s comments about a mandate. I agree with his comments in that I think the government does have a mandate to change the legislation, to get rid of AWAs and to get rid of Work Choices. But it does not give them the mandate to then just put any legislation in without letting this Senate carry out its proper work of review and scrutiny. With regard to the issue of mandates, the Howard government never went to the electorate with Work Choices; it only brought it in when it realised it had gained control of the Senate at the 2004 election. So, while the Howard government had no mandate for that legislation, the Rudd government was very strongly elected on the basis of industrial relations legislation. However, the Greens do not believe that the Rudd government’s proposed changes, as put forward during the election, went far enough. We will be using the Senate process to review this legislation and to make sure it is delivering much better industrial relations and the much promised industrial relations reform.

It is clear that AWAs fall into two categories: those used to lower wages and those used de-unionise a workplace. It is important that the committee understand the impact of AWAs on workers and what the transitional bill will mean for those workers. We believe there is a critical role to be played to look at this legislation to make sure it is doing what it is purporting to be doing. It is also interesting to note that the opposition do not seem to care about the impact AWAs have had on workers in terms of lowering wages. It is concerned about a wages breakout but it does not seem to be concerned about the impact AWAs have had on lost wages or about the reduction of conditions through these instruments.

The Greens strongly support this legislation being referred to the committee. We have made that abundantly clear ad infinitum in this place over the years. We will be supporting Senator Wong’s proposed amendment for 17 March. If it is unsuccessful, I am persuaded by Senator Bartlett’s arguments about the extra days of sitting. We Greens want to see, in particular, the awful blot of this legislation gone and the awful blot of AWAs in Australia removed. That is why we are putting the effort in to make sure we get across this legislation very quickly so that we are able to look at its impacts and ensure that it is delivering what it is promising to deliver. Let us get on with it. Let us refer this to the committee. As I said, we are not happy with these terms of reference. We would prefer to use the wider Selection of Bills Committee process. But let’s refer it to the committee on 17 March.

Gavin Marshall (Victoria, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise to speak in this debate, which is very similar to the debate that took place this morning on another motion about the same matter. Unfortunately, I did not get an opportunity to speak then, as the time allowed for that debate was expiring. I want to talk about some of the furphies that have been introduced into this debate over this motion and in relation to the same issues that were raised earlier this morning and try to deal with them, because, quite frankly, I took exception to many of the comments and allegations made about the motives of the government in this matter. This morning Senator Murray referred to this government as a lazy government with respect to trying to have a shorter—than what he would like—inquiry into this legislation. I take exception to those comments and reject them.

Let us just go through the facts about what the government has actually been doing. An enormous amount of work and consultation has been undertaken by this government to get this legislation right, right back from when it was developed as a policy position. We announced our policy intentions about this matter in April 2007 and we provided detailed implementation strategies of the policy in August 2007. These policies have been in the public realm for almost a year.

Since taking government, we have also been involved in a comprehensive consultative process with unions, employers and other experts about the development of our policy position into the Workplace Relations Amendment (Transition to Forward with Fairness) Bill 2008. That has taken place at many levels. There was certainly significant consultation with the National Workplace Relations Consultative Council and its subcommittee, the Committee of Industrial Legislation. That involved experts from employer and employee organisations sitting around the table and developing the policy into a bill through consultation. The bill was then subject to discussion at the Workplace Relations Ministerial Council, and the council debated the bill and the effects of the bill and ultimately endorsed the Rudd Labor government’s policy directions and our intention to go forward with the bill. There was enormous consultation. With the greatest of respect—through you, Mr Acting Deputy President Watson—Senator Murray knows how difficult that consultation can be. So an enormous amount of hard work has been done by this government to get this bill balanced, fair and right.

I do not suggest for one second that that sort of consultation should replace Senate scrutiny. I am not suggesting that at all. But whenever we talk about referring bills to committees, we need to also look at what is required, the work of the committee, and whether the committee can actually do its job in a particular time frame. Mr Acting Deputy President Watson, you are the new deputy chair of the committee that is going to look at this reference. The Senate Standing Committee on Education, Employment and Workplace Relations was established yesterday, and we have absolutely no work before us. So it is really a question of whether the committee can do the work required by this chamber—or what the government thinks the committee can actually do in terms of scrutinising this bill—in the appropriate time. There should not be any arbitrary minimum time for scrutiny. It really depends upon the size of the bill, its impact and the amount of time it has been in the public domain.

Contrast that consultation process with that of the Work Choices legislation itself. Had anyone seen it? No. It was developed in secret with some employer-friendly lawyers over a long period of time. There was very little consultation. We did not have any idea what was in it. There was never any policy position put out from the government. They certainly did not go to an election with any detailed policy or implementation plans. They put it in this place and effectively gave us a single day of hearings when we had to jam through all the people who wanted to make substantial submissions. It was really an obstructed Senate process as far as I was concerned, and we had a very short time to do it.

Senator Ellison made some reference this morning to the size of the bill. He said that it was some 100 pages in length. Let me remind the Senate that the Work Choices legislation was some 800 pages in length. And, after the truncated Senate scrutiny process, when we got to the day when the bill was going to be debated in the chamber, we had another 100 pages of amendments put on the table, none of which would have substantially changed the legislation.

We do not say that we do not want to have Senate scrutiny. In fact we say we do want to have Senate scrutiny. But what we also want to do is to make sure that the bill is passed in a reasonable time frame to put an end to AWAs. That was clearly what we went to the election with. We said we would end AWAs and that is what we will do. We have worked with unions, employers and academics to develop a bill resulting from our public policy position that was front and centre going into the election. I acknowledge that Senator Ellison acknowledged that this morning. He said that industrial relations were front and centre in the election—absolutely. There were no secrets about what our policy was, and we have gone through a comprehensive, consultative process right up until now.

Now that we are at the point where we have done that, we have a bill that in today’s press was described by Heather Ridout, Chief Executive of the Australian Industry Group, as being ‘balanced and fair’. I make the point that people from employer organisations can say that because of the work that was done by this government in developing this consultative process. Again, I make the point: that does not mean we do not need a proper Senate scrutiny process; we do. That is what we support. But the committee can clearly do this work in the time that has been allocated by the government. We have no other work before us. We have been in the position many times when we have had to work very hard, and I object to some of the statements that were made this morning by Senator Ellison, when he said: ‘Let’s do the hard work. What this government is scared of is doing the hard work.’ We want to do the hard work on our committee. We can do that hard work and carry out a proper scrutiny process—hear from everyone who wants to be heard and go wherever we need to go to hear from those people. But a lot of that work has already been done, as I outlined earlier in my contribution.

I reject the argument that this is the result of a government wanting to ram this legislation through. We want to do no such thing. But, because we have engaged in such a comprehensive consultative process and clearly made our policy position public over the last 12 months, clearly put it before the Australian people at the federal election and clearly got endorsement from them to do what we want to do, we want to get on and do it. The committee can do it in that time frame and the Senate should allow us to do that.

We had many furphies introduced into the debate about the sitting calendar. Quite frankly, the motion before us is not about the sitting calendar of the Senate. That is an important issue, but that is a different debate. It has been introduced into this debate simply as a red herring. The question before us is whether the committee can perform a proper scrutiny of this legislation in the time that the government would like, and the answer to that is yes. The opposition’s argument is not for the Senate to play a new-found, active scrutiny role. I have rarely seen that in the time I have been here, which is nearly six years. They are simply using that argument to frustrate this government’s legislative agenda, something that we have an absolute, clear and unambiguous mandate from the Australian people to introduce. Let me put some of those arguments to bed. As I said, if you want to have a debate about the Senate sitting calendar, let us have that debate at some point in time. But let us not confuse that argument with the process of referring a bill to a committee, because the committee is going to do its work outside of parliamentary sitting times anyway.

We have had to suffer some of the most ridiculous arguments about hypocrisy, as if our wanting to pursue our legislative agenda and give an appropriate level of time for Senate scrutiny, allowing the Senate committee to do its work, was somehow taking the reverse position of what we argued when we were in opposition. We are not saying that we want to simply ram the bill through. We are not doing what the previous government did on the Telstra bill. We are not doing what they did on numerous other bills, such as the Employment and Workplace Relations Legislation Amendment (Welfare to Work and Vocational Rehabilitation Services) Bill 2006. To put the record straight on that, the previous government opened up and awarded tenders for that process before they even introduced the bill, completely bypassing any Senate scrutiny process. They had a token inquiry at the end, but it was after it was all done and dusted because of their abuse of their numbers in the Senate.

Their arguments are just not true. We want to have, and will have, a proper scrutiny process. But the difference is we can do it in the time we say because of the enormous consultation with stakeholders that has already taken place, because of the public nature of our policy implementation position and the development of that into the bill.

The opposition do not seem to have understood the result of the election. The only choice Work Choices ever gave any worker was ‘take it or leave it’. The instrument which delivered that choice was the AWA. We were absolutely clear about wanting to remove that instrument. That is what the Australian people voted for in the previous election. We want to do that. The previous government want to frustrate us in doing that. They know that thousands and thousands of AWAs are still being made unfairly and that people are still losing conditions and pay, but they are still ideologically attached to AWAs.

We have heard all sorts of comments. I actually heard the Leader of the Opposition, Dr Brendan Nelson, say that he is going to ensure that we deliver on our election promises. He is going to ensure that! Let us make no mistake: one of our election promises was the introduction of the Workplace Relations Amendment (Transition to Forward with Fairness) Bill 2008 and the abolition of AWAs. That was one of our election promises, but what do we see from coalition senators? We simply see an attempt to frustrate that promise and to push the introduction of the bill out past the parliamentary sittings so that it cannot be passed for many months. So AWAs will continue in operation and the previous government will delay our election promises and implementing the mandate that we received.

I reject the arguments that have been put forward by the opposition. As I said, I also take exception to and reject the arguments put by Senator Murray in respect of how we got to this point. We support proper Senate scrutiny. We have always done so. The previous government cannot make that claim. Like Senator Siewert, I do not need to go into all the numerous examples. We have talked about them over the last couple of years. There are many examples of where the previous government used the Senate numbers to avoid any form of Senate scrutiny. They are trying to run the line that that is what we are doing when clearly we are not. You could not have a more transparent process than the one the new government have undertaken. This is simply a way to frustrate this government implementing its legislative agenda.

Let me say again very clearly that, as chair of the committee that this bill will be referred to, in my view, the committee is able to conduct a proper, thorough Senate scrutiny process of this legislation within the time frame outlined in Senator Wong’s amendment. It has no other work to do at this point in time. We are able to do it. In fact, we proved that we were able to do it many times in the past, even when the previous government set us much more unrealistic expectations than the time frame that we are suggesting at the moment. We have the ability to do this. The Senate has the ability to do this. The integrity of the Senate will be protected through this process. This argument can be for no reason other than that the former government is seeking to frustrate the introduction of this bill for debate in the Senate chamber.

Question put:

That the amendment (Senator Wong’s) be agreed to.

Andrew Bartlett (Queensland, Australian Democrats) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

As foreshadowed, I move:

At the end of the motion, add:

• (2)the Senate expresses the view that it would better enable full consideration of the committee’s report if the Senate were to sit for an extra 4 days prior to the week beginning 12 May 2008.

Question agreed to.

Original question, as amended, agreed to.