Doug Cameron (NSW, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Human Services) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise to indicate that Labor will support the Fair Work Amendment (Repeal of 4 Yearly Reviews and Other Measures) Bill 2017, subject to an amendment which protects the penalty rates of 700,000 Australian workers across the nation. This bill will amend the Fair Work Act 2009 and the Fair Work (Transitional Provisions and Consequential Amendments) Act 2009. The bill will repeal the requirement for the Fair Work Commission to conduct four-yearly reviews of modern awards from the beginning of 1 January 2018. It will allow the Fair Work Commission to overlook minor procedural or technical errors when approving an enterprise agreement, where those errors were not likely to have disadvantaged employees, including errors related to the notice of employee representational rights requirements. It will ensure that the existing complaint-handling powers of the Minister for Employment and the President of the Fair Work Commission apply to Fair Work Commission members who formerly held office in the Australian Industrial Relations Commission and will apply in a modified form the Judicial Misbehaviour and Incapacity (Parliamentary Commissions) Act 2012 to Fair Work Commission members.

The bill's measures are contained in four schedules. Schedule 1 deals with the repeal of the four-yearly reviews of modern awards by the Fair Work Commission. Schedule 2 deals with the factors considered by the Fair Work Commission when approving an enterprise agreement. Schedule 3 deals with a modified application of the JMI(PC) Act to Fair Work Commission members and application of the Fair Work Act to Fair Work Commission members who formerly held office in the AIRC. Schedule 4 provides for application and transitional provisions in relation to the amendments made by schedules 1 to 3 of the bill. The principles contained in the bill are supported by the opposition, and we are aware of supportive correspondence to the government from the Ai Group, the Australian Chamber of Commerce and Industry and the ACTU.

I want to turn to the burning issue of inequality and its effect on Australian workers and families. Inequality is increasing within Australia. Despite the assertions of Treasurer Morrison that inequality is not increasing, the public, low-income Australians and the working poor understand that Treasurer Morrison is completely out of touch. This is a Treasurer divorced from the social and economic realities facing Australian families as they struggle to make ends meet. It's not only the Treasurer who is out of touch; this divided rabble of a government has no comprehension of or empathy for the growing number of Australians surviving week to week, battling to put food on the table and shoes on their children's feet. I have noted on many occasions in this chamber the failure of the National Party to stand up for their constituents in rural and regional Australia, who would be particularly affected by the attacks on penalty rates. We have former Senator Joyce, now pretending to be the Deputy Prime Minister, even though he's not eligible to be in parliament, saying nothing about the attacks on working families via these cuts to penalty rates in the New England region. Penalty rate cuts have been promoted by coalition politicians and businesses with vested interests.

Our amendments to this bill are in the exact terms of the amendments proposed by the member for Dawson, Mr George Christensen. Labor will do whatever we can to protect penalty rates, because we know how important they are to Australian families. The Senate has already passed my private member's bill to protect penalty rates, but the government has blocked its passage in the House. We know that the member for Dawson, despite all of his big talk about standing up for workers and their take-home pay, failed to vote for Labor's bill to protect penalty rates, on three separate occasions. Mr Christensen introduced a private member's bill in the House but failed to move to bring his private member's bill on for debate. It was only when Labor moved amendments to the bill, when it was before the House, which would have given effect to the provision of Mr Christensen's private member's bill, that he was forced to cross the floor and support Labor. While these amendments have some deficiencies and are clearly inferior to Labor's bill, if this is the only way that we can get this parliament to overturn the decision of the Fair Work Commission to slash penalty rates and prevent it from ever happening again then this is what we will do. If the Senate passes these amendments then the House will be forced to deal with them.

Labor asks the Senate as a matter of urgency to pass these amendments and give the government, Mr Christensen and the crossbench one last chance to stop these penalty rate cuts that will create so much hardship for the most vulnerable workers in the country. This will be both an opportunity and a test for National Party senators and Liberal senators who live in regional Australia to stand up for their communities. It beggars belief that coalition senators have supported a $65 billion handout to business and at the same time have actively defended and supported the worst decision ever in the history of the Fair Work Commission. Trickle-down economics does not work. There are no examples of trickle-down economics delivering on the ideological and theoretical outcomes claimed by neoliberal economists, conservative politicians and rent-seeking businesses. The National Party should stand up and support Labor's amendment that will protect 700,000 Australian workers from cuts to their penalty rates. The National Party should stand up for small business and the farming community, who rely on the bulk of Australians having sufficient disposable income to buy the goods and produce of regional and rural Australia.

Beyond the overall negative economic impacts, there is also evidence that implementation of the commission's decision would be particularly harmful to regional economies. Modelling by the McKell Institute on the impact of penalty rate cuts on regional communities estimated that, for the partial abolition of penalty rates in the retail and hospitality sectors, the size of the cuts in this decision would result in workers losing between $370.7 million and $691.5 million a year. This would lead to a reduction in spending of between $174.6 million and $346.5 million per year across local economies. How could the National Party support this decision and abandon its constituents across the country?

Under the proposed cuts to penalty rates, the most that low-paid and financially vulnerable workers can hope for is to work the same hours for less money or to work more hours for the same money. The opposition agrees with the Fair Work Commission in rejecting the unrealistic suggestion of the Productivity Commission that employees 'can seek other jobs, increase their training and make other labour market adjustments'. Is it any wonder that I have been a long-term critic of the Productivity Commission? In its decision the Fair Work Commission concluded that:

A detailed assessment of the impact of a reduction in Sunday penalty rates—

In the awards—

… on the national economy is not feasible on the basis of the limited material before us.

It is Labor's view that this is a significant flaw in the commission's decision.

If the government possessed evidence of a positive impact to the economy from cuts to penalty rates, it should have made a submission to that effect. The reason the government did not make this submission is that there is no evidence of a positive impact to the economy. On 2 March 2013, the Prime Minister asserted, 'The commission has found that cutting penalty rates would create tens of thousands of jobs.' This assertion is politically motivated, incorrect and one that not even the employers argued in the current four-yearly review. As the commission noted, the hospitality employers and the catering industrial do not advance the bold proposition that cutting penalty rates will increase employment. Labor noted that what the commission actually concluded was that a reduction in penalty rates in the fast-food award may result in a modest increase in employment, 'despite a paucity of direct evidence' from industry participants. There was no suggestion that tens of thousands of jobs will be created in the hospitality, retail and pharmacy industries, with the commission merely concluding that a reduction in penalty rates is likely to lead to some additional employment—it is not a very resounding analysis of the arguments we have heard from the government—because of the common evidence of the employers that 'owner operators would employ people, rather than work themselves', and, 'it would increase the level of services with consequent increases in employment or hours worked'.

The Fair Work Commission has accepted the Productivity Commission's assessment that 'any potential positive employment effects from a reduction in penalty rates are likely to be reduced due to substitution and other effects.' The suggestion that a reduction in penalty rates could lead to reduced prices and thereby increased employment is flawed. The evidence base for an increase in employment is not strong and relies on economic simulation models, rather than strong empirical evidence. Such modelling assumes the relationship rather than finds it and, as such, it should be treated with real caution.

A realistic result of the proposed cuts to penalty rates is that, rather than reducing prices or employing more staff, employers may retain any savings in wages as profits. Given that company profits are at a record high at the same time as wage growth is at record lows, this would not be an unrealistic result. In all the circumstances, the commission's conclusion was that while there may be some positive employment effects, and it is difficult to quantify the precise effect, this not sufficient justification for inflicting this pay cut on some of the lowest-paid and most vulnerable workers. In the opposition's submission to the commission, we outlined that the government has downgraded its forecast for employment growth and wages growth, employment growth has halved and remains well below trend, full-time jobs have declined by 23,000, job creation is dominated by part-time work, underemployment remains near record highs at 1.1 million and wages growth has fallen to new record lows at 1.9 per cent.

The risk to economic activity from lower incomes comes at a time when the government and many major economists are warning about the risk to consumption and overall GDP growth, particularly from subdued wage growth. According to the 2016-17 Mid-Year Economic and Fiscal Outlook, factors such as sustained subdued income growth may result in slower growth in consumer spending. The RBA has said:

Domestic wage pressures remained subdued and household income growth had been low, which, if it were to persist, would have implications for consumption growth and the risks posed by the level of household debt.

The IMF recently noted that:

… there remain significant risks and uncertainties, notably weaker-than-expected domestic consumption …

And that:

… growth could be slower, as consumption growth could remain lackluster with continued low wage growth …

According to ANZ:

… we see any significant acceleration in consumer spending as challenging given ongoing weakness in wage growth and high household debt.

According to the CBA, the Commonwealth Bank:

Consumer spending growth is constrained by weak wages growth and the predominance of part- over full-time jobs' growth.

This evidence suggests that cutting penalty rates will only increase the risk of slower consumption and economic growth.

In the face of coalition, right-wing media and business pressure for penalty rate cuts, the Fair Work Commission has made a historically bad decision. There was no evidence before the commission that cuts to penalty rates would create more jobs. There were assertions by business lobbyists and advocates that more jobs would be created. There was no specific evidence presented other than assertions based on ideological and theoretical claptrap. The Fair Work Commission itself considered that their decision would create hardship for many Australian workers. It beggars belief that a decision that will cost individual workers between $39 and $127 on an eight-hour Sunday shift could be supported by the coalition. Treasury's Mid-Year Economic and Fiscal Outlook 2016-17 states:

Government receipts, although growing, are expected to be affected by softer domestic prices and wages growth.

… … …

If inflation and wage growth remain low, this would slow nominal GDP growth and in turn have adverse consequences for tax receipts, somewhat offset by a reduction in payments.

Treasurer Morrison stated:

Lower wages growth and profits have an obvious impact on government revenue.

The Governor of the Reserve Bank has called on workers to start demanding large pay rises from their bosses. Philip Lowe said Australia's economy was suffering a crisis in wage growth and workers ought to realise that the relatively low unemployment rate meant they could start asking for a larger share of the nation's economic pie. The governor told a conference at the Australian National University that the labour market was in better shape than some critics are suggesting. He said, 'The crisis really is in wage growth.' He said that despite the relative strength in the labour market too many workers were putting job security ahead of pay rises, partly because they were worried about competition from robots and foreigners.

This is the Governor of the Reserve Bank. What he is saying is that forcing more wage restraint on workers is going to have an effect on the economy. We know that cuts to the take-home pay of retail and hospitality workers, which have already commenced, are just the start. The Fair Work Commission is still hearing applications which would have the result, if successful, of cutting Sunday penalty rates in the clubs award, the hair and beauty award and the restaurant award, and the Sunday shiftwork loading is under review in the retail award. These will have massive effects in regional and rural Australia. These will have significant effects on the buying capacity of ordinary people in regional and rural Australia. These will have an effect on farmers, small business and medium-sized business in rural and regional Australia.

When I moved my bill on penalty rates last time, it was supported by One Nation and by the Xenophon party. If they are going to be consistent they should support these amendments to ensure that the position they adopted on my previous bill is carried through to this bill and that they protect the penalty rates of workers who are doing it tough, workers who are under the pump and do not need further cuts to their buying power.

James Paterson (Victoria, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

It is always a treat to be on the receiving end of a speech from Senator Cameron, late on a Monday night, about an industrial relations issue, and that speech was no exception. It didn't relate very much at all, though, to the Fair Work Amendment (Repeal of 4 Yearly Reviews and Other Measures) Bill 2017, which we have in front of us. In fact, apart from a very brief acknowledgement at the beginning that we were debating a government bill and the opposition would be supporting it, that was about all that was said on the bill. What we did get was a real treat: Senator Cameron's views on inequality—the catch-all complaint of the Labor Party for every social ill, perceived or real; Senator Cameron's views on the Deputy Prime Minister's citizenship and eligibility to sit in the House of Representative—perhaps somewhat premature before the High Court decision on the matter. We got treated to a lecture on trickle-down economics, an economic philosophy that exists only in the minds of Senator Cameron and other socialists, who like to invent a caricature of their opponents' views on the world rather than actually understanding them. Of course, we got to hear about Senator Cameron's proposed amendments on penalty rates, which I will come to in a moment.

Before I do, let me state for the record why we are here, which is to fix a problem identified in the industrial relations system put in place by the government that Senator Cameron was part of, the previous government, which is the four-yearly reviews of the award system. We are doing so at the urging of not just the business sector but also the union movement. I want to quote from a letter dated 17 November 2016. It is from the Ai Group, the Australian Chamber of Commerce and Industry and the ACTU. They are three logos you don't often see on the same letterhead, but nonetheless they came together over this issue to write to the Minister for Employment, Michaelia Cash. They wrote to her to raise their concerns about the four-yearly review, and they say:

In the consultation processes associated with the Productivity Commission's Review of the Workplace Relations Framework, a clear position was stated by employer associations and the union movement that four yearly reviews of modern awards ought not continue to be a feature of that framework.

The current review has been continuing for nearly three years and there are matters programmed to continue well into 2017. The next review is scheduled to commence in 2018. The cycle of almost continuous review sits uncomfortably with the stated objective in the act of a modern awards system that is 'simple, easy to understand, stable and sustainable'. In addition, the resource demands upon the Commission and the parties have been substantial.

It concludes, after making further points in favour of changing the laws that Labor put in place:

We commend our proposal to you and look forward to the opportunity to progress it as a priority in this term of Government.

But, instead of facilitating this joint employer-union priority, which they had come together to lobby the government to address, and which the government is responsibly acting upon, those opposite are seeking to frustrate, delay, politicise and make more difficult what should be an easy process—an easy fix.

This is one of the many reasons so many Australians are frustrated with the workings of parliament. What they have been seeing in this debate is bipartisan consensus—consensus not just within the parliament but outside the parliament, from bodies that are normally in conflict with each other and which normally have disagreement, but, on this, are unanimous. This is an issue and it needs to be fixed. It will be to the benefit of workers and employers and it will be to the benefit of employer associations and unions. Yet the government's attempt to fix it are being frustrated in a ridiculously politicised way by involving a non-related industrial relations issue.

As Senator Cameron himself mentioned, he has brought his own private member's bill to this chamber before to have it voted on, on this very issue. There's nothing stopping him from seeking to do that again, in many different ways, if he chooses. But why is it necessary to bring it into this debate? Why is it necessary to make this debate unnecessarily and needlessly complex and delay the passage of what should be non-controversial legislation?

Of course, we know on the issue of penalty rates that the Labor Party—and particularly the Leader of the Opposition, Mr Shorten—have displayed extraordinary hypocrisy. The government does not agree with the opposition's approach of regulating wages through legislation. We agree with their former position of allowing the Fair Work Commission to be the independent umpire that sets these rates. We know that they at least used to believe that position—when the Fair Work Commission was making decisions that they agreed with. They like umpires who make one particular type of decision, but, when the independent umpire, in its wisdom, after considering the evidence, made a different decision, those opposite decided that the idea of an independent umpire was not such a good one after all, and we should have an extraordinary change to our industrial relations system—the legislative setting of pay and conditions, which would be an extraordinarily cumbersome and complex thing to do. That is one of the reasons why the government does not support the amendments and did not support Senator Cameron's bill when it was here previously.

The other very fundamental reason we don't support it is that we know that those opposite are very happy to see penalty rate cuts occur; it's just that they don't want to see them occur via the Fair Work Commission in the awards system, which primarily benefits small business. They would rather see them happen through the enterprise bargaining agreement system, where big businesses and big unions get together and collude and do cosy deals that slash penalty rates, including for the vulnerable workers Senator Cameron says he is concerned about and including for workers on weekends and Sundays. Yet we don't hear any concern from Senator Cameron about this. We don't see a bill from Senator Cameron to prevent this. We don't see any proposed intervention to the EBA system. All we see is the proposed radical intervention into the Fair Work Commission system—which, as I said, primarily benefits small business. I think it is telling that the modern Labor Party is happy to have these cosy deals between unions, like the SDA, and major retailers which reduce penalty rates—which they are supposedly concerned about—but they are uncomfortable with allowing an independent umpire to make the same decision for workers in other industries and other businesses.

I just want to go through a few examples of this hypocrisy, because it is not just a theoretical hypocrisy; it is a hypocrisy that they have demonstrated time and time again—particularly in the career of the Leader of the Opposition as a union leader prior to entering parliament, where he himself oversaw, signed off and ticked off agreement after agreement after agreement which reduced penalty rates for workers in cosy deals with big business. Of course, it wasn't just his union, but his union was one of the repeat offenders.

When he ran the AWU, his union did deals with not only Big W but also Target and Just Jeans, which cut penalty rates for workers in Queensland from 200 per cent to 150 per cent—the same rate that the Fair Work Commission is modifying the award rate to over a number of years. Workers at Rydges Tradewinds in Cairns got no penalty rates. At a company called Cleanevent, which has been mentioned in this place from time to time, Mr Shorten and his union stripped penalty rates for low-paid cleaners with no compensation. At the same time, his union accepted payments from the company. We can only but wonder what role those payments might have played in ensuring that that deal was achieved. For years, big businesses and big unions have been making these agreements to cut Sunday penalty rates, particularly in the retail and hospitality industries, and we've heard not a peep out of those opposite about it. Mr Shorten is fine with lower penalty rates when he does it and when his union mates do it for big businesses. He only opposes it when it happens through the independent umpire for small business.

What the Fair Work Commission's decision actually does is levels the playing field. Small business have been paying an extraordinarily higher rate of pay for their workers on Sundays than big businesses, and this is a fundamental inequity in our economy that the Fair Work Commission goes part of the way to addressing, because big businesses can use their power with their cosy deals with big unions to cut these rates and effectively have an unfair competitive advantage over small businesses. A small-business retailer does not have the resources to reach these cosy EBA deals, and they don't have the same opportunity to pay their workers a competitive rate on a Sunday. As a result, a lot of them are either going out of business or not opening on Sundays at all and denying their employees the opportunity to work. Many of those employees may, in fact, have to choose to walk across the road and work for Big W, Target or Just Jeans where they'll get less than they did working for a small business.

Here are some concrete examples of this. A bed and breakfast, for example, must pay $10 more per hour than a five-star hotel. A family chicken shop must pay $8 an hour more than KFC. A family-owned takeaway must pay $8 an hour more than McDonald's. A family greengrocer must pay $5 more an hour than Woolworths. A family pizza takeaway joint must pay $8 more an hour than Pizza Hut. A boutique clothes shop must pay $7 more an hour than David Jones. A family bookshop must pay $8 more an hour than Target. A family newsagent must pay $7 an hour more than Officeworks. A family bottle shop must pay $7 an hour more than Dan Murphy's. And a family hardware store must pay $5 an hour more than Bunnings Warehouse.

I strongly suspect that that this is a state of affairs which, in his heart of hearts, Senator Cameron is uncomfortable with and does not support. I am sure, in his record as a union leader, he would not have agreed to deals like this, but the reality is he has to support his leader. He is part of the front bench of Bill Shorten, and he is saddled with Bill Shorten's record as a union leader for years prior to entering parliament. He ran a union that was willing to do these sorts of deals. I'm sure Senator Cameron wouldn't have done those deals, but Mr Shorten did. Yet, what we have here today is Senator Cameron in here defending these practices, justifying these practices and trying to put in place, in our Fair Work Commission system, a workaround that will allow these practices to continue and will come at the expense of workers and employers in the small-business sector who rely on the award system.

To quote the former ACTU president and Labor minister Martin Ferguson:

In my opinion, the campaign of the Labor Party, in association with the union movement, is based on hypocrisy and dishonesty when you look at the nature of agreements that have existed for many, many years. But they now condemn the Fair Work Commission for having the decency to give small business the same benefits.

The Fair Work Commission has cited many examples of owners who work Sundays for free but would rather hire staff or pharmacies, for example, that provide health care on Sundays. Levelling the playing field will help thousands of small businesses open their doors, serve customers and create jobs on Sundays. Labor wants small business, as we know, to pay higher taxes and higher electricity bills, and now they're also trying to ensure that they pay higher penalty rates. Only the coalition can be relied upon to consistently stand up for small business, because we know how important they are to a strong economy and more jobs.

There are so many more examples of the hypocrisy. Another which I think is worth mentioning and putting on the record is, of course, that this decision by the Fair Work Commission to cut penalty rates is not the first decision of the Fair Work Commission to cut penalty rates. In fact, the previous decision of the Fair Work Commission to cut penalty rates occurred under the previous government. That is right—it was under the previous Labor government of which Senator Cameron was a part. Yet, when in 2010 penalty rates were cut in some awards, including for some hotel, cafe and restaurant workers, under Labor's award modernisation process, not only did those opposite not do anything about it and not only did they not seek to pass an amendment or a bill like the one before us today but they didn't even speak up about it or complain about it. This is supposedly a new outrage they have suddenly discovered, but when it happened on their watch it wasn't one to be worried about.

I think it is important to just finally put on the table a few facts on this issue of penalty rates. The Fair Work Commission is independent. It is not a body that was established by this government. It was established under legislation passed not by this government but by the previous government. It was set up to be independent for a reason, and its independent decision in this case does not actually affect all workers; it affects approximately three to four per cent of Australia's workforce. Penalty rates for Sundays are being modified in four awards only and for public holidays in five awards out of 122. It does not affect people on enterprise agreements, as I have mentioned. The Fair Work Commission specifically ruled out modifying penalty rates in other industries, and so the claim that has sometimes been made in this debate, for example, that nurses may be affected is a blatant lie. Workers on awards in retail and hospitality will still get Sunday penalty rates; they are just now more in line with Saturday rates. So, for example, instead of getting double time on Sundays, casuals on a retail award eventually, after this has transitioned through, will get time and three-quarters and permanent staff will get time and a half. It is interesting, as a side point, to hear those opposite defending the sanctity of a Sunday compared to a Saturday when that is based on a principle that Sunday is a day for worship. In a modern secular country with people from diverse faiths and no faiths at all, is it really appropriate for the law to privilege the religious faith and observance of some on a Sunday when many people do not share those religious views and faiths?

As I mentioned, there will be transition arrangements. They will be phased in over a number of years, including over three annual instalments from 1 July 2017 for workers on the fast-food and hospitality awards and casual workers under the retail award and over four annual instalments for workers under the pharmacy award and full-time and part-time workers under the retail award.

I want to turn back now to the actual bill which is before us, which I was referring to at the beginning of my contribution. I think it's important that we get to some of the motivations of the government and what it has sought to put into effect by legislating this bill. It's a very sensible measure to fix very clear issues in the operation of the Fair Work Act 2009. It repeals the requirement for four-yearly reviews of modern awards from 1 January 2018. It enables the Fair Work Commission to overlook minor procedural or technical errors when approving an enterprise agreement. We have all heard ludicrous stories about how pages were not stapled together and other minor technical issues and typos that caused an EBA to be struck down. That is now going to be addressed. That is something that you would think that every member and senator would agree should be addressed expeditiously. It will apply the Judicial Misbehaviour and Incapacity (Parliamentary Commissions) Act in relation to FWC members.

As I said earlier, it is unfortunate this has become politicised in the way it has. The first amendment that the bill seeks to achieve is repealing the current requirement for the four-yearly review of modern awards by the Fair Work Commission. The regulatory burden of the current review has already been enormous. The current review began in January 2014 and is still going, more than three years later. The Productivity Commission has found the current system is hugely resource-intensive for all involved. It is resource-intensive for the Fair Work Commission, unions and employers, and I think the resources in all three cases could be better spent elsewhere. The government is pleased to be removing these costs for these groups and to be streamlining the operation of the Fair Work Act. As I said earlier in my speech, having the ACCI, the AiG and the ACTU on the same page is not a common occurrence and yet that is what we have seen in this debate and that is what the government is trying to give effect to.

To ensure that there's an appropriate transition period, the bill will allow the current four-yearly review to conclude under the existing framework. Importantly, it will remove the requirement for the new review which is set to commence next year. That is something that all stakeholders have broadly supported. As I mentioned, it's really important that in the future the commission will be able to overlook minor errors. It is a commonsense change to the Fair Work Act. It will mean that the Fair Work Commission can still approve enterprise agreements if a minor procedural or technical error has been made.

This has been a significant issue in relation to the Notice of Employee Representational Rights, the statutory notice required to be provided by an employer to employees at the commencement of bargaining. For example, agreements have been knocked back, as I mentioned earlier, by the commission because an employer has stapled the Notice of Employee Representational Rights to other documents. It is ridiculous that this should mean the bargaining process must start again. Similarly, a typo in the notice should not be grounds for the agreement failing to be approved. This makes bargaining more expensive and protracted than it reasonably needs to be, denying pay rises to employees and denying productivity gains for Australian businesses and the economy. In some circumstances it means that bargaining must begin again from an early stage, and that is clearly ludicrous.

The Productivity Commission recommended that the Fair Work Commission be given the ability to overlook these errors as long as employees are not likely to have been disadvantaged. The government agrees with this commonsense recommendation. The government is committed to providing Australia with a balanced framework for enterprise bargaining and these sensible targeted amendments will move us closer to that goal. There have been some inaccurate criticisms of the bill, that it somehow removes safeguards or equates them with technicalities. To be clear, the bill does not undermine the existing safeguards in the Fair Work Act that are designed to protect workers or equate these safeguards with mere technicalities. These safeguards remain and the government expects they will continue to be strongly enforced.

Finally, I mention the introduction of a complaints-handling regime for commission members. This is the implementation of a sensible reform suggested by former Federal Court judge the Hon. Peter Heerey AM, QC in his report of the inquiry into matters concerning former vice-president Michael Lawler of the Fair Work Commission. The report found that there is currently no formal mechanism to inform the parliament's consideration of allegations of misbehaviour or incapacity against Fair Work Commission members. Like Commonwealth judges, the tenure of FWC members can only be ended, because of proved misbehaviour or incapacity, by the Governor-General at the request of both houses of parliament. However, the Judicial Misbehaviour and Incapacity (Parliamentary Commissions) Act 2012 presently only operates in relation to Commonwealth judicial officers, so there is no formal mechanism to inform the parliament's consideration of allegations of misbehaviour or incapacity against Fair Work Commission members. The judicial misbehaviour and incapacity act enables the parliamentary commission of inquiry to investigate allegations of misbehaviour or incapacity with powers to hold hearings, take evidence on oath and require the production of documents, and obligations to observe natural justice requirements. I hope their powers never need to be used but it is certainly comforting to know they will be there should the passage of this bill be secured.

Murray Watt (Queensland, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise to make a contribution on the Fair Work Amendment (Repeal of 4 Yearly Reviews and Other Measures) Bill and, as with my earlier contribution today on the protecting vulnerable workers bill, there are some aspects of this bill that we do welcome but of course there are many that we feel are deficient. We are very keen to move some amendments in relation to penalty rates, which I'll come to a little later. Firstly, to satisfy Senator Paterson, I want to make sure I begin by talking about what is in the bill as opposed to only what is not in the bill.

The general proposition in this bill is to abolish the four-yearly review of awards that currently occurs, and Senator Paterson is correct in saying that this was agreed to by employers and unions and it is a partial response to recommendation 8.1 of the Productivity Commission's report into workplace relations. The bill also contains provisions which will allow the Fair Work Commission to overlook minor technical or procedural errors when approving an enterprise agreement where those errors were not likely to have disadvantaged employees. This is also done in response to a recommendation of that same Productivity Commission report, in this case recommendation 20.1.

The Productivity Commission report that I'm referring to was handed to the then Abbott Liberal government on 30 November 2015 and was publicly released on 21 December 2015, just before the Christmas break. In what has become quite standard practice for this government, a year and a half later there has been no government response to the Productivity Commission report. We see this pattern over and over again, not just in this portfolio but across the board. Reports are handed down to the government, they languish on someone's desk or in someone's bottom drawer for a very long period of time, and eventually the government gets around to responding to them or responding to part of them, or picking up some aspects of a report and not others. This is another example of that practice that we see here.

So, we are still in the dark and the Australian public is still in the dark about which Productivity Commission recommendations the government does or does not support. And we will remain in the dark until we get government responses to individual recommendations, which are most commonly drip fed to the public via bills such as this one. Unfortunately, even though the original proposition of removing four-yearly reviews was put to the government in a joint approach by employers and unions, it appears that this bill differs from what was put to the minister in that joint approach from employer associations and the ACTU. That is of concern to us and it's a little bit unfortunate that we see some government senators misrepresenting what was put to government by employer associations and unions. There clearly has been some change in what is now being put forward by the government compared with what was originally sought in that joint approach.

The opposition has been concerned to ensure that removing the four-yearly review in the manner proposed in this bill does not have unintended consequences. It's very important that modern awards continue to be reviewed to ensure that they meet the modern award objective and that this is able to be done through a process whereby workers and employers have equal access and equal standing. That's why, if you look at the Senate committee report which examined this bill, opposition senators called for amendments to the bill in that report. And that's why the opposition supported those amendments in the House when the House considered this bill.

The bill also gives the Fair Work Commission the power to approve an enterprise agreement which would have been genuinely agreed to but for minor technical or procedural problems if the employees covered by the agreement were not likely to have been disadvantaged by the errors. We've all become used to the government and the Productivity Commission citing an example in which an enterprise agreement might be rejected because the employer stapled additional pages to the 'notice of employee representational rights' form. We were pleased to see that this bill was amended in the House to address a number of drafting concerns that the opposition raised.

Finally, the bill also applies complaint-handling powers of the minister and the president of the Fair Work Commission to Fair Work Commission members who previously held office in the Australian Industrial Relations Commission. The bill also applies the Judicial Misbehaviour and Incapacity (Parliamentary Commissions) Act 2012 in relation to Fair Work Commission members. As Senator Paterson has acknowledged, this responds to the recommendations of the report from Justice Heerey. That report was commissioned by the government in the wake of the saga concerning former commissioner Michael Lawler.

So, there are some aspects of the bill that we support, and we are pleased that some of the amendments the opposition put forward were adopted in the House. But in the remainder of my contribution I want to talk about one of the things that is not in this bill, and that is any protection for Australians who either have lost penalty rates or stand to lose their penalty rates as a result of the Fair Work Commission's decision earlier this year. People will remember the decision of the commission to reduce penalty rates to workers in the retail and hospitality sectors for Sundays and public holidays. That is already having a devastating impact on those workers' pay packets, on the incomes of the families those workers belong to and on the very businesses that are in the process of cutting those workers' wages.

While there has already been some impact on workers who have lost their penalty rates, we can only imagine the even greater impact that cut will have on more and more workers who face these cuts in the future. We know that these cuts amount to up to $77 a week when fully implemented. It is not as if the people getting these penalty rates are high-income earners. They are not the kinds of people who will be benefiting from the government's cut to tax rates for millionaires. They are not the people who were paying the deficit levy because they were earning so much money that they could afford to chip in a little bit more. No. These are low-paid workers in retail and hospitality who depend very much on the penalty rates they receive to be able to pay their basic bills—to be able to pay their rent, their electricity, their gas and their mortgage payments. These are not wealthy people that we are talking about, yet this government has been very happy to support a pay cut for those people.

It is not really that surprising that the government has taken that position. Under this government, we know that wages across the economy are stagnant. They are growing at a lower rate than under any other government we have seen in Australian history. Ever since wages growth records were first prepared, wages have always increased at a higher rate than they are doing under the current government. But this government—in pursuit of its ideological agenda to support big business, to lift corporate profits, to lift income for the top end of town and to drive down the wages of average working people—has been happy to stand by and let those wages go down and has been happy to stand by and let these cuts to penalty rates go through.

I mentioned earlier today in my contribution on another bill that the government's own employment practices are contributing to this stagnation in wages. The government is proving incredibly unwilling to come to enterprise bargaining agreements and negotiated outcomes in terms of wage rises for their own employees. I have lost count of the number of different agencies where enterprise bargaining negotiations with this government have stalled after years of negotiation. In agency after agency, overseen by the Turnbull government, we have got workers— again, not highly paid people—whether they be in admin roles, clerical roles, professional roles or policy roles, not getting any pay rise at all, year upon year, because this government is not prepared to come to an agreement to give them a pay rise simply in line with inflation. This government continues to insist on pay rises below inflation. As a result we're seeing wages across the public sector decrease, and that is contributing to an overall decrease in wage growth across the entire economy.

In terms of penalty rates, I'm very pleased to report that, in a number of the duty electorates I represent in Queensland, we are finding examples of employers who are prepared to go against the tide, who are prepared to continue paying their employees the wages they deserve and the penalty rates they deserve. In the electorate of Capricornia in Central Queensland, over the last few weeks, I have met with the owners and workers at a number of businesses where the employer has decided to continue to pay their penalty rates. Only last week I was in Rockhampton and I was very pleased to have a steak sandwich—I think it was; I can't remember now—at the Giddy Goat, an establishment I often frequent in Rockhampton and that I'll be frequenting more.

Dean Smith (WA, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

It might have been goat that you had.

Murray Watt (Queensland, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

No, it definitely wasn't goat; it was steak. In Rockhampton, the beef capital of Queensland, you wouldn't eat anything other than steak. The Giddy Goat does serve a very good steak sandwich, but it also does the right thing by its employees who cook the steak sandwich for you and who bring it to you, and that's why I and many other people will be supporting them with our custom. When you are in Rockhampton, I recommend getting your coffee from Patti Mules's Fast Lane Drive-Thru Coffee, which the shadow minister, Brendan O'Connor, and I visited some weeks ago to congratulate Patti on her decision to continue to pay penalty rates to her workers who make coffee on weekends and on public holidays. You could feel from going into both of those establishments the high morale, the camaraderie and the shared objective between the employer and the employees, because they were being treated fairly. They felt they were all on the same playing field and everyone could contribute to making sure that there was good customer service. People wanted to turn up to work. So there are great examples of businesses in Central Queensland which are still doing the right thing by their employees and continuing to pay penalty rates, despite the fact that this government is effectively urging them to go forward and cut their workers' wages.

I have mentioned on numerous occasions that the problem of insecure work and stagnant wages is crippling Central Queensland. We know that they have been going through very tough times since the end of the mining boom. Not only are people struggling to hang on to the work they have got; but they're struggling even more to get secure work, permanent full-time work, rather than having to take up options of labour hire and casual employment. So the very last thing that the Central Queensland economy needs is people's wages being cut in the form of cuts to penalty rates.

The other main part of Queensland that I have the honour of representing is the Logan-Gold Coast corridor. Statistics from the Australian Bureau of Statistics make very clear that, if you're looking all around Australia to see what impact this cut to penalty rates will have on different locations, it is no exaggeration to say that the Gold Coast will be the epicentre of the cuts to penalty rates. When you think about that, it's actually not surprising, because so much of the old Gold Coast economy is based on tourism, retail and hospitality. That's why most people in this chamber and most people in this country go to the Gold Coast. Sure, it's a holiday location. It's a fantastic holiday location. But the reason that everyone has a great holiday when they go to the Gold Coast is that they're waited upon and served by hardworking people, who depend upon their penalty rates to be able to afford their family bills.

The Bureau of Statistics figures show that there are nearly 60,000 workers across the Gold Coast who potentially stand to lose their penalty rates because they work in these industries where penalty rates are going to be cut. In fact, if you look at it in terms of federal electorates, of the top 10 federal electorates across Australia with the most people who stand to lose their penalty rates, three of them are on the Gold Coast. Three of the top 10 federal electorates in Australia with the most people who stand to lose from the penalty rate cuts are on the Gold Coast, and it's headed by the minister for tourism, Steven Ciobo, the member for Moncrieff. That is the electorate across the entire country with the most people employed in retail and hospitality and, therefore, that is the electorate in Australia where most people stand to lose pay out of their own pay packet because of these penalty rate cuts. It's closely followed by the electorate of McPherson on the southern end of the Gold Coast, held by Karen Andrews. That's the fourth most affected electorate in the country. The sixth most affected is the electorate of Fadden, held by Mr Stuart Robert. So three of the top 10 electorates across the whole country where people will suffer most from these penalty rate cuts are on the Gold Coast.

One thing that is common across these electorates on the Gold Coast and the electorate of Capricornia, which I have already talked about, is that they are all represented by members of the LNP, all of whom have not said one thing to stand up for those workers who are going to lose their penalty rates. Instead, each of those members of parliament is cheering on the penalty rate cuts under this ridiculous economic theory that it's going to lead to more people being employed. We know the real reason why these members of parliament from the LNP have been happy to stand by and encourage bosses to cut the penalty rates of their workers, and that is that these members of parliament don't actually care about the working people on the Gold Coast or in Capricornia. All they care about is lining the pockets of the people they represent, particularly big business.

The other thing I'd like to mention in terms of penalty rate cuts is that it is another example of how this government completely has it in for young people. It doesn't matter what kind of young people we're talking about. If you're a young working person, particularly in retail and hospitality, where a lot of young people work, you're going to get your penalty rates cut under this government. If you're unemployed, they're coming after your Newstart, your dole. They want to make you go through random drug testing. They're putting forward dodgy internships under the PaTH program, where people are already coming forward and showing that they are being required to work many, many hours over the number that they're paid for, to get nothing in return. Only last week there was another example that came out of someone doing one of these PaTH internships sponsored by the Turnbull government, and rather than actually getting pay for the hours above 40 hours that they're working, they're getting gift cards. That is the kind of exploitation that we're seeing under a program put forward by this government.

Young working people are losing their penalty rates. Young unemployed people are losing their dole, getting drug tested and getting pushed onto dodgy internship programs. If you're in training you're suffering from apprenticeship cuts and cuts to funding to TAFE. Of course, if you're a university student, you're about to suffer, if the government gets its way, from the cuts to university funding and increases to university fees. Penalty rates are just one more example of how this government is doing everything it can to hurt the future of young people and make their lives harder. It's got to stop. That's why we are putting forward these amendments to this bill to try to restore the penalty rates which have been taken away and to make sure that young working people or older people who are receiving penalty rates get the wages they're entitled to.

The only other thing I want to say in terms of penalty rates is to respond to the argument that is sometimes put by the government that cutting penalty rates will be good for the economy. Nothing could be further from the truth. What businesses need to be sustainable and profitable, and to have a long-term future and employ more people, is a secure customer base that has money in their pockets and can come in and buy a cup of coffee and something from the shop. The surest way to make sure that people have the money to go and spend in shops, cafes and businesses across the country is to make sure that people's wages are increasing at a reasonable rate. This government is doing the opposite. It is taking money out of people's pockets by reducing their wages. They're doing it to their own workers in the public sector by refusing to enter into fair wage deals and driving down wages. They're doing it by supporting cuts to penalty rates for people in the private sector. All these things put together are having a devastating impact on our economy. They are taking money out of people's pockets, meaning they have less money to spend in the economy. That is going to be bad for business. It is going to mean fewer jobs—whether we're talking about the Gold Coast, Capricornia or anywhere else—and that's why I support these amendments to restore penalty rates.

Brian Burston (NSW, Pauline Hanson's One Nation Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I'm not sure whether I'm debating the right bill or not; I'm a bit confused after Senator Watt's ramblings about penalty rates. I'm not sure it even relates to this Fair Work Amendment (Repeal of 4 Yearly Reviews and other Measures) Bill.

Murray Watt (Queensland, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

You've already voted against labour hire people. What are you going to do now?

Brian Burston (NSW, Pauline Hanson's One Nation Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Go back to law. That's where you belong.

Glenn Sterle (WA, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Order!

Brian Burston (NSW, Pauline Hanson's One Nation Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise to speak in support of this bill. There are a lot of people who at one time or another have chucked a sickie. Sometimes there's a personal matter that needs to be dealt with, and it's easier to simply call in to work pretending to be sick in order to get time to deal with it. Mostly this sort of behaviour gets tolerated. If you only do it occasionally, no-one will begrudge you the odd sickie, but there's a point where it becomes unreasonable.

In 2005 and 2016 I saw a gold medal performance with sickie chucking. Most people would lose their jobs if they didn't show up for a week, let alone a month. Mr Michael Lawler, then the vice-president of the Fair Work Commission, took things to a whole new level. He managed to go for nearly a year, drawing a $435,000 salary without doing a day's work. For $435,000, the average person might find time to come to work occasionally—perhaps to answer an email or two at least. But Mr Lawler was too sick—he assured us! He didn't go to work so he could deal with all the difficult legal issues that his partner, Kathy Jackson, was involved in. He stayed at home to deal with them. The Federal Court ultimately ordered her to repay $1.4 million in union funds, some of which went into Mr Lawler himself. No wonder he felt sick. He also made illegal recordings and failed to disclose conflicts of interest. Mr Lawler was able to get away with his flagrantly corrupt behaviour because there was, astoundingly, no legal way to fire him. As a statutory officer earning a very high wage and being responsible for very important decisions, he was subject to far less scrutiny or accountability than the average fast-food worker.

This bill will prevent incidents like this happening again and for that reason I am eager to support it. But this is too little, too late. Attempts to call Mr Lawler himself to account have ultimately been unsuccessful. The parliament appointed a former judge to investigate him, and Mr Lawler resigned to avoid responding to that investigation. Today, even after his behaviour and corruption have been exposed, he faces no legal consequences. He's not been fined or punished; he's not even been required to give an explanation of his behaviour. The Australian people are sick and tired of this sort of blatant corruption. They are fed up with people in the upper echelons of our society taking them for a ride again and again. Normal people work hard for their money. It's offensive and disgusting to see individuals getting rich at the expense of others.

Mr Lawler is one case but there are plenty of others. This kind of naked and corrupt self-interest is apparent everywhere amongst people who think themselves important, entitled and untouchable. We see it in the unions that take bribes to trade away their members' wages, and we see it in the banks where directors award themselves massive fees and bonuses while facilitating criminal money laundering and foreclosing on customers who have never missed a payment. We see it in the public sector with multimillionaire posties, and with politicians taking joyrides in helicopters. One Nation will not stand for it. We owe nothing to big business, big unions or big parties. The only favours we have to repay are to the people who elected us, and to them I say we will not rest until we have cleaned out all of this corrupt dead wood. We will not be happy until those at the top in our society do an honest day's work for an honest day's pay, just like everyone else.

The Labor Party will put amendments before the Senate to this Fair Work Amendment (Repeal of 4 Yearly Reviews and Other Measures) Bill, and, despite the fact that this bill has nothing to do with penalty rates, I don't think they should be supported either. The opposition bizarrely tried to amend this bill in the House of Representatives yesterday to undermine the independence of the Fair Work Commission on penalty rates. This was a stunt from a populist who has shown time and time again he will always obey union bosses but never listen to small business. It was a stunt from someone with a short memory. It was Mr Shorten who set the rules for the Fair Work Commission inquiry. He appointed the umpire and said he would respect the decision.

When Mr Shorten was a union leader he was happy to cut penalty rates. When he was workplace relations minister he was happy for big unions to do deals with big businesses to reduce Sunday rates. And now the Greens are trying that stunt in this place. Labor opposes tax relief for small business. Labor puts Greens ideology before affordable and reliable electricity for small businesses. Labor opposes reforms to protect small businesses from CFMEU thuggery on work sites. More recently the CFMEU in Newcastle ran attack ads attacking me for my support of the ABCC bill, running full-page advertisements in the Newcastle Herald over a week. There were prime-time television advertisements attacking me, and radio ads as well. That would have cost that union at least, in my estimation, $100,000—another waste of members' money. It's about time the CFMEU realised that bullying does not work, especially on me.

Jane Hume (Victoria, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise this evening to discuss this urgent and vital measure that will alleviate the growing regulatory burden on employers and employees across Australia. The government is proud to introduce the Fair Work Amendment (Repeal of 4 Yearly Reviews and Other Measures) Bill to ensure that the Fair Work Act continues to operate effectively and prudently while also ensuring that the Fair Work Commission retains its independence. This bill contains three key measures. The first is to repeal the requirement for the four-yearly review of the modern awards. The second is to enable the Fair Work Commission to overlook minor procedural or technical errors when approving enterprise agreements. The third is to apply the judicial misbehaviour and incapacity act to Fair Work Commission commissioners in order to improve public confidence in the Fair Work Commission and ensure the highest standards of behaviour from this very important role. There is absolutely nothing controversial about this bill. The bill seeks to take the politics out of the Fair Work Act. It will in fact ensure that, whether you are an employee or an employer, the application of the legislation will allow for timely resolution. Unfortunately, those opposite in the Labor Party, and their wayward allies in the Greens, for reasons of posturing and theatre alone have decided to oppose these measures and to introduce their own amendments.

But let me first speak to the strengths of this bill. The centrepiece of this legislation is the repeal of the four-yearly reviews of modern awards. These reviews represent an immense regulatory burden that needs to be removed to allow the Fair Work Act to provide steadfast rulings and decisions. The current review began in January 2014, and it is still going. In its review of workplace relations, the Productivity Commission has found that the current framework is one that is 'hugely resource-intensive for all involved'. The government, I can assure you, is committed to removing these burdensome costs in a timely manner for employers, for unions and the Fair Work Commission. By seeking to streamline the current operation of the Fair Work Act, employment disputes and agreements will be able to be resolved in a far more timely manner. This repeal has wide-ranging support from the Australian public. Indeed, it is a rarity to have the Australian Chamber of Commerce and Industry, the Australian Industry Group and the Australian Council of Trade Unions in lock-step in consensus on a legislative change. It is a truly revolutionary moment when the partisan lines of industrial relations are set aside to allow Australians, employee or employer, to benefit from a robust piece of legislation that delivers fair and just enterprise agreements for all. This bill has done exactly that.

In November of last year, these groups co-authored a letter to the Minister for Employment, Senator Cash, indicating—in fact, pleading—that the four-year review requirement be removed from the Fair Work Act. Surely this act of unity demonstrates that this bill is a measure designed specifically to improve workplace agreements for all Australians. By lifting such a time-consuming and resource-intensive constraint from the Fair Work Commission's operations, the government is ensuring that the Fair Work Act can operate in a comprehensive and timely manner.

Furthermore, the bill will adequately provide an appropriate transition period. The current review that has been ongoing since 2014 under this bill will be concluded under the existing framework, but, importantly, after this mandatory review has been concluded the bill will remove the requirement for the new review to commence in 2018. This is a position that is broadly supported by the Fair Work Commission, by businesses and also by the trade unions. This amendment is both thorough and considered. I remind the chamber that the Fair Work Act's stated objective is that the award system be simple, easy to understand, stable and sustainable. Repealing the requirement for four-yearly reviews of modern awards will go some way to meeting that objective.

The second measure of the bill is what is technically known as a no-brainer. The fact that, currently, entire enterprise agreements can be thrown out over a simple mistake, such as a typo or a spelling mistake, illustrates the level of unneeded regulation and ridiculous red tape that is weighing down the bargaining process. We in the government are committed to providing Australia with a balanced framework for enterprise bargaining. By targeting these absurd barriers in the current legislation, these amendments will guarantee that the framework can operate with ease. Let me give you an example of the absurdity of the current regime. The current legislation states that if an employer were to staple a notice of employee representative rights to any other documents, the commission, within its current framework, is allowed to reject the entire application and force the employer to start all over again because the staple is in the wrong place. Heaven forbid that there is a typo in any of these forms, for, yes, a typo in the current framework also constitutes a procedural error that warrants rejection from the commission.

As it stands, the current legislation makes enterprise bargaining more expensive, the process protracted and entirely unproductive. This is not only a cost to the employer but it is an immense cost to employees and to the Australian economy. If you want to promote a sluggish and low-growth economy, as those opposite seem to want, then by all means let us sit belligerently on our hands and maintain the status quo of the current legislation. But, while I can see the flimsy trade unionist rationale from the Labor Party, who oppose those reforms, we on this side of the chamber will not sit idly by as the economy is held back by cumbersome barriers such as this one.

Those opposite will say that we are removing the safeguards in the current legislation. I can assure you that we are most certainly not. How can this bureaucratic process be a safeguard if it promotes more paperwork, more red tape and, ultimately, more confusion for businesses and employees alike? Yet this is what we are hearing from those opposite. We are committed in this government to a common-sense approach to the agreement-making process. This amendment will allow employees who are satisfied with agreements from their employers, even those with a minor spelling or procedural error, to be approved by the Fair Work Commission provided that these small technicalities do not disadvantage the employee. This is a flexible and a fair measure, and it's designed to allow the legislative framework to continue to operate in the rare event that employers commit a minute procedural error.

To allow for these reforms to operate fairly, the government is seeking to implement the sensible reform of applying the Judicial Misbehaviour and Incapacity (Parliamentary Commissions) Act 2012 to members of the Fair Work Commission. It is only fair that those administering the rulings of the bargaining agreements are kept to the highest standards of impartiality and good conduct. The government is adopting this reform as suggested by former federal judge the Honourable Peter Heerey AM QC, who has delivered a report concerning former vice president of the Fair Work Commission Michael Lawler. As spoken about by Senator Burston so eloquently, as indicated in the report, there is no formal mechanism currently that informs the parliament of allegations of misbehaviour against the Fair Work Commission members. Without any formal checks or balances, the Fair Work Commission's position as an independent body is severely compromised. How is this possibly fair?

By not reforming the current legislation, we enable bad behaviour. We become enablers of bad behaviour. We allow individuals to abuse their positions and allow the vital process of enterprise bargaining to become a protracted and costly affair. Mr Heerey's recommendation ensures that the parliament, upon the discovery of allegations of misbehaviour against the Fair Work Commission members, will be able to quickly establish an inquiry into those allegations. This particular reform guarantees that due process and accountability are restored to the Fair Work Commission, and these actions will strengthen the commission. Furthermore, it will improve public confidence in the Fair Work Commission.

This issue has drawn significant commentary from our friends in the fourth estate. The measures we're introducing are designed to improve workplace relations for all Australians. The aggressive behaviour of the militant trade unions over the past year has drawn ire from our side of politics and from the press, but, most importantly, from the Australian people. There is no appropriate time for bullying and harassment in any workplace. The lawlessness displayed by the CFMEU and by John Setka demonstrates that Labor will continuously support malpractice and criminal conduct in the workplace. But the government will not be deterred from ensuring that public confidence in the workplace agreement process is not sidelined by the actions of a few violent thugs. The integrity of our workplaces for both the employee and the employer requires that the legislation can be relied upon to effectively rule on agreements when such issues arise.

It is bizarre—it's extremely bizarre—that those opposite in the Labor Party and in the Greens wish to link these measures to penalty rates. I found Senator Watt's 20 minutes of talking about penalty rates to be nothing short of extraordinary. This bill has absolutely nothing to do with penalty rates—nothing to do with penalty rates at all. To assume otherwise or pretend otherwise is nothing more than political opportunism.

This bill is purely about reforming the procedural and accountability measures of the Fair Work Act and of the Fair Work Commission. The actions of the ALP and the Greens witnessed in the House of Representatives, where they sought to insert their own amendments into this act with the explicit purpose of compromising the commission's independence when ruling on penalty rates, demonstrate the divisive politics that those opposite seek to extract from this very important bill. If the Labor Party and the Greens want to ensure that all employees get a fair go then, surely, their support of this bill could be taken as a given. But if we want to talk about undermining Australian employment prospects, if we want to talk about limiting access to new employment opportunities, limiting access to jobs, well, then, let us look no further than the Australian Labor Party. Let us turn to their political agenda that has been promoted under the shroud, this guise, of fairness and equality that is nothing more than a covert cover for a redistributionist agenda.

The irony, of course, is that the Leader of the Opposition, Mr Shorten, established the Fair Work Commission in 2009 as an independent body. This decision by Mr Shorten in 2009 was his most noble and conciliatory action to date. It was the Labor government in 2009 who appointed all of the fair work commissioners who ruled on penalty rates, and it saddens me to think that Mr Shorten, who was once committed to giving Australians a fair go, has come to this. Mr Shorten used to support measures designed to grow the pie of the Australian economy, but surely this is not the case anymore. Mr Shorten is now firmly in lock step with militant trade unions and their desire to engage in futile and divisive class warfare. Mr Shorten, who was once the champion of lower penalty rates and flexible workplace agreements, has now committed to doing little more than punishing small businesses. Mr Shorten was once a supporter of lower company tax rates. He's on the record as saying so. These lower company tax rates are so vital for the millions of businesses in Australia to grow, but now he has committed the Labor Party to one of the most redistributionist agendas that we have seen since Arthur Calwell. Gone are those days of the economic rationalists of the Hawke and Keating Labor governments. This is not a progressive Labor Party. This is an economic nationalist and reactionary Labor Party that most Australians had thought to be consigned to the pages of history. Well, it has been resurrected again by Mr Shorten.

The best way to protect and grow Australian jobs is not to adopt the politics of fear and division but to take a sensible, policy-minded approach which is grounded in economics and not the politics of populism. This bill is thoroughly grounded in independent policy analysis. It has been designed to cut through the day-to-day politics and the regulatory burdens to allow employees, employers and the Australian economy to go forward on a more stable footing.

It is imperative that the Senate pass this legislation, that all of us in this chamber come together to support this bill and discard the hollow rhetoric of fairness and inequality for the sake of efficiency and productivity. We must all be committed to providing Australians with an enhanced framework of workplace law. The government have introduced these measures to do exactly that. We, the Turnbull government, are committed to delivering a prudent workplace framework, we are committed to delivering an efficient workplace system and we are committed to guaranteeing that all Australians are given a fair go. I thank the chamber for its time.

Chris Ketter (Queensland, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise to spoke on the Fair Work Amendment (Repeal of 4 Yearly Reviews and Other Measures) Bill 2017, subject, of course, to Labor's proposed amendment in relation to the protection of penalty rates. I note the bill and other measures have the broad support of the Labor Party, unions and, most notably, also employer groups. In the consultation processes associated with the Productivity Commission's review of the workplace relations framework, a clear position was stated by employer associations and the union movement together that four-yearly reviews of modern awards ought not to continue to be a feature of that framework. The cycle of almost continuous reviews sits uncomfortably with the stated objective of the Fair Work Act of a modern award system that is simple, easy to understand, stable and sustainable. In addition, the Ai Group, the Australian Chamber of Commerce and Industry and the ACTU have all unanimously agreed that the resource demands on the commission and the industrial parties have been substantial. I think I am safe to assume that we are talking millions and millions of dollars of resources of unions, employer organisations and the Fair Work Commission that have been taken up in these reviews of the modern award system.

Importantly, in speaking to this bill I think it's relevant to highlight the history surrounding the Australian industrial relations system and the ongoing public service provided by the trade union movement in seeking to uphold the wages and working conditions of Australian workers. I look forward to this opportunity to set out in some detail the work that, in particular, the union that I have been associated with, the SDA, has done in recent times in trying to ensure that the awards that apply to retail workers are robust and immune to attacks by employer organisations. Since the creation of penalty rates, we have seen attacks on these conditions and on workers and their unions expand and grow with the changing tides of the regulatory environment. We now need stability in the system.

I think it is important to reflect at the moment. Let's just look at the retail industry, which has been the focus of the Fair Work Commission's decision in respect of penalty rates. We are looking here at probably something in the order of 1.3 million retail workers throughout Australia. A very substantial proportion of those workers would be subject to the awards of the Fair Work Commission. We know that the SDA, the union that I have previously been associated with, has something like 200,000 members. The work of the SDA in protecting award conditions and mounting arguments in the Fair Work Commission to protect the award—

Debate interrupted.