Michaelia Cash (WA, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Employment and Workplace Relations) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Ladies and gentlemen and businesses across Australia, here we go again. Welcome to 2024. The Albanese government, just as it did in 2022 and again in 2023, now, at the very beginning of 2024, is giving you a slap in the face. Why do I say that? Because, for the business community across Australia, it does not matter what size of business you are—whether you are a large business or a medium business. It probably does actually matter if you're a small business, because, quite frankly, I do not know, based on the feedback that I have received from businesses across Australia, particularly small businesses, how you are expected to cope—when you are already drowning under significant pressure from rapidly rising costs et cetera, all due to the Albanese government's policy decisions—with what is now the third tranche of industrial relations legislation, the Fair Work Legislation Amendment (Closing Loopholes No. 2) Bill 2023.

So, as I said, welcome to 2024. This is the Albanese government saying, 'Happy new year,' to businesses across Australia. We expect a lot from businesses across Australia. We expect them to continue employing Australians. We expect them to prosper, to grow and to create more jobs. But, on behalf of Mr Albanese and the Australian Labor Party, let me be very clear: we are not going to put in place the economic framework or the policy decisions that are going to allow them to do this. In fact, what we are going to do for the third time—we did it in 2022 and 2023 and are now doing it in 2024—is whack them with another raft of job-destroying, complex, confusing and, of course, union-friendly industrial relations changes.

Well, Mr Albanese, guess what: the businesses across Australia are saying they don't like this, and it's not because they don't want to comply with the law, prosper, grow, create more jobs and pay higher sustainable wages. It is quite literally because they know—since they go in to work every day and employ people—that, under the first, second and now third tranches of industrial relations legislation, this legislation is going to continue to harm them. That is what the employers across Australia are telling us. They tell us that this legislation—which, as I said, is the third tranche, not the first—will impact the prospects of the employees that Labor purports to protect. Let us not forget who the employers of Australia are. I know who they are. I know those on the coalition side know who they are, but obviously Labor and, in particular, the Greens—and, I have to say, some of the crossbench—clearly don't know who they are. They are the job creators of this country. They are the people who employ millions and millions of Australians across every region, every town, every sector and every city in our great country. They get up every morning and they provide Australians with the jobs that they so desperately need. Mr Albanese whacked them in 2022 and whacked them again in 2023—and happy new year 2024: let's go for the triple whammy. If you're lucky, Mr Albanese, you might actually take a few of them out. I'm being sarcastic there.

Let me tell you what the employers of Australia are saying about these changes. It's very simple: the changes are going to add additional costs to their businesses. Mr Albanese and Labor don't seem to understand or, alternatively, they don't care. I will probably go with the latter, actually: they don't care. They don't seem to understand what happens when you add additional costs to business. Let me tell you what happens. This is what the businesses have told us will happen. They pass those costs onto the community, in the first instance, or, secondly, if they can't pass the costs on—guess what?—they have to lose employees from their business. So what you have is further costs passed onto the community or, alternatively, job losses. Wow, that is a great combination going into 2024.

Based on the state of the economy, I wouldn't have thought that the community in Australia need further costs passed onto them. The reality that they face, 18 months after the election of the Albanese government, is that anyone who goes into a shopping centre or a shop to purchase something feels the impact of food inflation. And you are feeling it because, under the Labor government of Mr Albanese, food has actually gone up nine per cent. Don't talk to people about housing. All they'll say to you is (a) 'I can't get a house,' and (b) 'If I'm looking to get one, property prices have gone up 12 per cent.'

What about the great promise Mr Albanese made to Australians prior the election, 'If I'm elected I will reduce your energy bill by $275'? They can't even mention the number '275' now because electricity, under the Labor government, has gone up more than 23 per cent. Gas has gone up more than 29 per cent. Let's talk about interest rate rises. After 12 interest rate rises under Labor, interest rates are at their highest since 2011. Let's translate that into what the average Australian family with a mortgage of $750,000 now needs to pay. They have to pay a not insignificant, I would have thought, extra $24,000 per year. On top of all of those increased costs, the first big piece of legislation the Albanese government wants to deal with this year will whack businesses across Australia with additional cost, additional complexity and complete, total and utter confusion which, as the businesses have told us, will only mean they will pass on those costs to consumers—the poor Australians who are currently struggling under the cost-of-living pressures. Alternatively, if small businesses in particular can't pass the costs on anymore, the only alternative they will have is to sack the workers. So increased costs and job losses are actually going to be the result of this legislation.

One of the things that has been missing from the industrial relations agenda under the Albanese government is the one thing that an economic agenda should incentivise—that is, increasing productivity, or, as I like to say, prosperity; you increase prosperity for all Australians. The link to productivity is the key. The more productive we are as a society, the more Australians can be employed—and you're actually growing businesses—and the more prosperous these businesses can be. And what does that then mean? They can actually pay higher and, the key here is, more sustainable wages. But, again, tranche 1, whack; tranche 2, whack, whack; and now we get to tranche 3, the triple whammy—productivity is not talked about by the Albanese Labor government.

There is so much that is wrong with this bill. Unfortunately, given the time today, we're only going to get a short amount of time to talk about it. But I've got to deal with the right to disconnect. This is fantastic, seriously! I see Anthony Albanese, the Prime Minister, has come out today and backed in that right to disconnect. Let's talk about this right to disconnect. It wasn't talked about prior to the election; that's not unusual for the Albanese government. It certainly wasn't raised in any of the non-consultation that the government had on any of their industrial relations bills. In fact, Senator O'Sullivan, do you recall, at any of the committee hearings, looking at the legislation and actually saying: 'There's a section on the right to disconnect. Can we interrogate it?'? It's not in the bill. You've got to love that, don't you! So we have gone through a sham committee process to look at the bill, only to find out that we haven't even seen a key part of it; it has been dreamed up by the Albanese Labor government. They haven't consulted on it. They haven't spoken to businesses. None of us have seen it—well, maybe Senator Pocock has seen it—and, apparently, it's going to pass through the Senate by the end of this week.

This is another one you're going to love about this government, seriously: what did Mr Albanese, prior to the election, say about transparency? He made it very clear: his government was going to be the most transparent government this country has ever seen. There is a word that I cannot use in this place, but everyone knows what it is—there's a saying of 'something, something, pants on fire'; I think it's pretty obvious what that is. He completely, totally and utterly misled the Australian people in terms of that.

What do we know about the right to disconnect? In the first instance, there has been no scrutiny because we haven't seen it. We haven't been able to say, 'Hey, hold on, can we work through this and what the implications are for business?' We know that this supposed new right will see the hours of the day where businesses are able to work with others across Australia, or even globally, potentially made more unworkable. I would have thought that, in a global economy, one would be putting in place legislative requirements that make us more competitive, not requirements that are going to make it harder to do business. Mr Albanese is always out there telling Western Australians, my home state, that he is a great friend of theirs. I have to say, again, two words followed by 'pants on fire'. I just don't think Mr Albanese—

Deborah O'Neill (NSW, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Order, Senator Cash! Please resume your seat. We're at the beginning of the year, and there have been very clear directions about unparliamentary language. While you haven't used a word that's not supposed to be used, I think the implication there was pretty clear—so it's taking the language in context. I ask you, for the benefit of the chamber, to withdraw, and then I'll give you the call.

Michaelia Cash (WA, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Employment and Workplace Relations) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I'm not quite sure what I'm withdrawing, so you're going to have to explain to me what I'm withdrawing.

Deborah O'Neill (NSW, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Senator Cash, I'm not going to debate. I'm asking you to assist the chamber and withdraw.

Louise Pratt (WA, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Are your pants on fire, Senator Cash—that you don't know what you're talking about?

Deborah O'Neill (NSW, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Senator Pratt, if you could resist—

Michaelia Cash (WA, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Employment and Workplace Relations) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

If it assists with the facilitation of the chamber, I withdraw.

Deborah O'Neill (NSW, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Thank you, Senator Cash. You have the call.

Michaelia Cash (WA, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Employment and Workplace Relations) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

However, it's pretty clear the Labor Party—you try and expose Mr Albanese for misleading Australians, for blatantly saying things prior to the election that he had absolutely no intention of following through on, and guess what? They are going to make sure we don't get to even talk about that in the Senate. That is the type of government you currently have in place. It is a government that, prior to the election, talked big about transparency and talked big about promises. I tell you, though, the minute they get into power and the minute they have the numbers, they are duplicitous. That is what they are. They are deceitful and they work against Australians every single step of the way.

That includes Western Australians. You only have to see the front page of the West Australian on Monday 5 February: 'Rarely open state. WA fears being left behind in disconnect shake-up'. Then you only have to read the editorial by the editor of the West Australian, Anthony De Ceglie. What does he say on behalf of Western Australians to Mr Albanese, the members of the Labor government and the Labor members in Western Australia, who are not standing up for Western Australians, who are rolling over and having their little tummies tickled like little puppy dogs smiling at their master? He writes:

Yet again, Western Australia has been forced to remind the rest of the country of its importance to the nation's economy as proposed "right to disconnect" laws threaten to slash businesses' operating hours in half.

That is the contempt that the Prime Minister of this country has for the great state of Western Australia.

I say to the Prime Minister: you might actually want to look at your bottom line. You might actually want to look at what Western Australia and Western Australians, through sheer hard work and effort, contribute to the economy of this country. Instead of saying that you get us, why don't you, for once, put in place legislation that doesn't attack us and that does not attack businesses across Australia but allows us to do what we do best, not just in WA but in this country. All businesses want to do is prosper, grow and create more jobs for Australians, and you are killing them.

David Shoebridge (NSW, Australian Greens) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

It's difficult to understand why workers in WA don't want a right to disconnect. What's unique, in Senator Cash's view, about workers in WA? If you really sit down and talk with them—I know the people I talk to in my home state of New South Wales, particularly young workers, are often being chased home by work emails and calls from the boss. It could be 10 o'clock at night or 8 am on a Saturday. We should give those workers a right to disconnect from work. It's mystifying to me. What's so unique about WA, in Senator Cash's view, that young workers don't want a right to disconnect? Of course they do. Perhaps the reason for the angry opposition to a basic right like that for workers is that, if you only listen to a small group of large employers, you probably don't hear those concerns. You probably don't hear those concerns by everyday Australians who actually want their job to end at some point in the day. They want to be able to spend time focusing on their family and their friends without the constant intrusion of work. I'm pretty certain it's the same for young workers, especially, but also for workers across the field in Perth as it is in Sydney. To just ignore that and to pretend it's not an issue, I think, is pretty disrespectful or shows a real disconnect.

The Greens are on record as supporting this bill and wanting it to go further. We are supporting this bill and acknowledging that it goes some way to giving Australia a fairer and more equitable industrial relations system that really focuses on the rights of working people; to having a system that gets away from the idea that the market will determine everything and that workers are just little widgets that get put into the economy; and to actually ensuring that peoples' rights as workers, as employees, are respected and that they're treated as people—not as little economic widgets that can just be squeezed, manipulated, sacked, reengaged and contracted out but actually as people. I think that's what the Australian public want us to do. We support those provisions in this bill that will be delivering real benefits and protections for Australian workers.

I want to particularly focus on some of the standards that have been put in place for gig workers and the stronger pathway to permanency for casuals. You wouldn't realise it listening to the contributions from the coalition, but it's a fact that one-third of Australian workers are in some kind of insecure, unpredictable work. They're either on rolling, short-term contracts; they're gig workers; or they're casuals. One-third of Australian workers. That insecurity echoes through so much of their life. You don't have predictability about when you're working, so how do you organise the kids if you've got a family? You don't have predictability about the income you're going to get, so the bank won't give you a mortgage, so you can't even get a start on the crazy housing market in this country. You don't have predictability about the hours you're going to be working, so you can't plan with your friends or your partner what you're going to do on the weekend. And you don't have predictability about the income you're getting, so you don't even know if you're going to be able to put food on the table at the end of the month. Of course we have an obligation to do what we can to put that predictability in to improve those rights and to give people certainty in their life that they've got enough work, their conditions are sufficient, they're going to be protected, they're going to be able to put food on the table, they're going to be able to look after their kids and they're going to be able to afford housing. Of course we have that obligation.

Some of the work I did as a state MP, in particular on gig workers and the insecurity of gig workers, comes to my mind in this debate. One of the issues we looked at at a state level was statutory workers comp insurance for gig workers. The reason we looked at that was that gig workers were being excluded from workers compensation. They were told that they weren't employees. When we drilled down into what was actually happening, particularly for delivery workers—people delivering Uber Eats or delivering your parcels—they were getting paid, at best, barely minimum rates. They had totally unpredictable work hours and often incredibly dangerous time frames in which to get product from either a restaurant to a home or from a distribution centre to a home. They were putting themselves at risk, largely to provide convenience for consumers.

The workers compensation scheme at most state levels kind of ignores them. They're not actually workers. They're not actually covered. When they were in, tragically, fatal accidents or very serious accidents, they were just getting nothing. Some of them were gig workers here on temporary visas. They would literally get seriously injured and then just have their visa cancelled because they couldn't work. Tragically—and I saw this happen more than once—if they were killed doing this gig work, then no workers compensation rights at all and grieving families would have to come and collect their bodies. Do we have an obligation to protect those people? Absolutely, we do. Do we have an obligation to put protections in so that gig workers have rights and are treated like people, not just like some sort of disposable economic widget? Of course we do. This bill goes some way to doing that, and of course we would support it. A right to safe work; a right to a minimum wage; if you're casual, a right to seek permanency; and pushing back against that widespread job insecurity.

I want to acknowledge the work of my colleagues Senator Barbara Pocock and the Greens leader, Adam Bandt, to try and push this bill further: to put in improvements on things like intractable bargaining, which I will address in a second; strengthening those protections for casual workers; and giving workers that right to disconnect. I want to commend their work. They've been forensic, they've been consultative, and I think they have done a great job in ensuring that these issues have progressed as best we can during the bill.

Of course, one of the other key issues we should be looking at in this legislation is getting rid of superannuation wage theft. You won't hear a thing about this from the coalition. It's almost as though that's just a cost of doing business from the coalition's perspective. The ATO estimates that workers missed out on almost $3½ billion in unpaid superannuation in 2019-20, and it's probably grown since then. That's $3½ billion stolen from working people—stolen from their retirement funds. It's a further attack on their job security and their economic security. Of course, the coalition did nothing about it. The Australian Greens strongly believe that superannuation theft should be in the same category as wage theft, and we'll be pushing for amendments that criminalise superannuation theft. Why does a young 14-year-old kid who steals a Mars Bar from a service station face the prospect of going to jail under the current rules, but a corporation that steals 20 to 30 million bucks or an employer that steals $10,000 of superannuation from a worker face no criminal penalty? Why is it illegal to steal a Mars Bar but not illegal to steal $3½ billion worth of superannuation? We can't understand and we think it should be criminalised.

When it comes to casual workers, for over a decade the Australian Greens have been pressing for greater protections for casual workers. We know they're often in precarious employment situations. I want to focus on one set of workers that are sometimes forgotten. Sometimes it's ignored because you wouldn't believe it unless you looked at the data, but teachers, including in public schools all across the country, and university lecturers and academics often face this kind of double-barrelled disadvantage. Teachers and lecturers are often on these fixed-term contracts and often get excluded from the definition of casual worker, so of course we need a broader definition of casual worker. No one indicia, whether it's a pattern of work or otherwise, should be taken to determine whether or not someone is casual or part time.

The reforms do go some way to say that. They say it's not just one indicia that can be determinative. But we are still concerned that those academics—some of whom have been working at the same university in the same job for 20 years on a contract that starts on 1 February and ends on 15 December—have had that same contract for 20 years. The contract is designed to avoid paying them annual leave or giving them job security. They've had that same contract for 20 years. Of course they need greater protections for those fixed-term contracts. I don't think we're there yet with this bill. Workers in schools and universities like that who aren't ongoing employees are often classified as fixed-term employees or casuals, and we need to ensure that this bill protects them. I want to commend the work of the National Tertiary Education Union and I want to commend the work of the New South Wales Teachers Federation in my state in drawing these concerns to the government's attention and to the parliament's attention. We need a solution to it.

When it comes to intractable bargaining, yes, there were the fair work legislation amendments in 2022 in the Fair Work Legislation Amendment (Secure Jobs Better Pay) Act. The rationale behind those provisions that allow the Fair Work Commission to intervene in bargaining that's reached an impasse is to prevent protracted bargaining disputes by giving the Fair Work Commission some kind of compulsory arbitration. We understand the rationale behind that, but the practice has been that employers are willing to just hold out and offer nothing or push for even lesser standards than in the existing agreement. They basically stare down employees with the aim of driving down conditions at work instead of driving up conditions.

This bill proposes reforms that put an additional requirement for the Fair Work Commission, before it makes an intractable bargaining order, particularly when it's replacing an existing bargaining agreement, to say that that will only be allowed when it includes terms that are not less favourable to each employee and union than a term of an existing enterprise agreement that deals with the matter. So you can't have the employer just stonewalling and saying nothing and then applying to the commission and saying: 'Okay. Nothing has happened in the last 12 months. I want an intractable bargaining order and I am now going to push down wages and conditions.' It effectively is an intention to force some kind of good-faith negotiation.

I know there is criticism of the inquiry, but, from my memory, it was kicked off sometime in September and went through until January. It was a substantial inquiry. It got a lot of submissions. At one of the inquiry's hearings—I think it was on 10 November—the ACTU president affirmed support for this kind of reform. I think her evidence was that the change will make a big difference to make the system work. What is difficult to know, apart from some sort of ideological basis, is why the opposition continues to oppose that. Senator Barbara Pocock and Greens leader Adam Bandt have pushed to improve those intractable bargaining provisions, fixing that loophole in the arbitration system, protecting workers and putting some integrity back into the bargaining process, and I commend them for their work.

I will finish on the right to disconnect. There may not have been some kind of election promise on this from the government, but one of the key things you should do in parliament is respond to concerns that are coming from the community and listen to the community. This issue about the right to disconnect is really alive out there if you talk to, particularly, young workers. They want to know when work ends. They want to have a right not to open up their email. They want a right to a weekend and a right to spend time with their friends and family and not constantly have work in their head. I look forward to this parliament granting a solution on that—a solution that doesn't just listen to the coalition and a handful of corporate interests but actually listens to the millions of workers who want us to get this right and want that right to disconnect. I look forward to this parliament landing on a solution that gives it.

Helen Polley (Tasmania, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise to speak on the Fair Work Legislation Amendment (Closing Loopholes No. 2) Bill 2023. It finishes what the Albanese government started when we came to office. It is a new day in Australia for working families and their right to dignity and fair conditions at work under the Albanese Labor government. When we came to government, we passed the Fair Work Legislation Amendment (Secure Jobs, Better Pay) Bill, which has transformed outcomes for the lowest paid Australians. We know that our efforts in delivering for workers is never finished, so we continue that journey together again today. This is why the Albanese Labor government brought into this place the Fair Work Legislation Amendment (Closing Loopholes No. 2) Bill 2023. This bill completes the work of the original bill. It will ensure that no worker slips through the cracks of IR loopholes and a corporate race to the bottom on working conditions.

For too long well-intentioned rules and regulations have been left vulnerable, with bad employers undercutting workers and taking their livelihoods away from them. We recognised this pressing reality in 2022 and swiftly enacted the secure jobs and better pay legislation. These reforms were nothing short of life-changing for Australia's lowest paid and disproportionately female workers, introducing modest mechanisms that have worked to increase wages, add job security and equalise the gender pay gap. That includes in two of the sectors that I have been involved in and advocating for since I came to this place—that is, early childhood education and aged care.

At that time, those opposite, as usual, were against ordinary workers and their families. They told Australians, with a straight face, that the sky would fall in and that inflation would spiral because of our reasonable measures. What happened, instead, was the opposite. Jobs growth has been the strongest for any government's first year, rates of industrial action have fallen dramatically and inflation has continued to moderate. This is all while Australians have seen their wages grow at the highest rate for more than a decade. There is no doubt that we will again hear the same fearmongering from those opposite who enthusiastically claim that low wages were a deliberate design feature of their economy while they were in government. Again, we must ignore that for the bile that it is. It is in their DNA. They don't care about Australian workers; they just care about their mates.

In relation to the substantive amendments, closing the loopholes does precisely what it says it does. It will eliminate cracks in the system so that it functions as intended to protect Australian workers from exploitation. It will give Australian workers the peace of mind that they will be subject to minimum standards that both employees and employers have already agreed to. It does nothing more and nothing less, and anyone here telling Australians otherwise is selling a dangerous lie. This bill has the potential to empower working families with dignified conditions and working stability. It is fair, and it is reasonable. We can stop the corporate race to the bottom and ensure that workers are paid properly. It establishes a choice of security for casual workers, protecting gig workers on the road from danger and upholding the primacy of workplace agreements.

At its core, this is a bill to keep Australians safe at work and to pay them fairly for the work that they do. It is about stopping poor work practices and ending exploitation in the workplace. In relation to casual employment in this bill, these amendments clarify that an employee who works a regular pattern of work can be a casual if there is no firm commitment to continuing indefinite work. To highlight this factor, last year we had a delegation of workers come to this House, and I heard yet again the story that there was a gentleman who was working on the north-west coast of Tasmania who had been working casually for 17 years. He wanted a full-time job. He wanted a permanent job. He wanted security. He wanted to be able to go and get a home loan, but he couldn't because he didn't have security of employment. This bill will change that. That is life changing for his family. If he chooses to seek to have a permanent job, then he will be able to have that with all the protections and security that come with that.

The Albanese Labor government is standing up for casual workers who want to become permanent employees. We are closing the loophole that leaves people stuck classified as casuals when they actually work permanent, regular hours. This will help casual workers who have a regular work arrangement, giving them greater access to leave entitlements and more financial security, if desired. They don't have to, but it's about choice. This is all about giving workers choice. We need to have a minimum standard to make sure Australia doesn't become a nation where you have to rely on tips to survive. We all look to America as this great international country—the powerhouse that it is. I've been to America and seen 80-year-old people packing groceries in a supermarket during the day and having to have a cleaning job as well to try and survive. They do that because there is no security like we have here in Australia. This bill continues that hard work and the tradition of the Labor government to ensure that we protect workers rights at the same time as working with business and employers.

This change will allow the Fair Work Commission to make orders for minimum standards for new forms of work, such as gig work. Just because someone is working in the gig economy doesn't mean that they end up being paid less than they would if they were an employee. We're not trying to turn people into employees when they don't want to be. A whole lot of gig workers like the flexibility they get from using this technology. They like that type of work. It allows them to continue to study. But they should have that choice. And, if you are a gig worker, you still deserve to have safety and the same terms and conditions as the person who is an employee in a company. We know there is a direct link between a low rate of pay and safety. It leads to a situation where workers take risks so that they get more work because they're struggling to make ends meet. This bill ends that. When we went through the pandemic, if you had COVID and you were a gig worker and you didn't work, you didn't get paid. Remember back when we were all saying thank you to the frontline workers, those truckies that were delivering food to keep food on our tables and retail workers in supermarkets on the front line? We were all singing their praises. But did the former government do anything about raising their pay and conditions and giving them security? No, they didn't, because that's not a part of their DNA.

The Albanese Labor government is also taking action to ensure that the trucking industry is safe, sustainable and viable. Thank you to the Transport Workers Union. Again, they were in this place this week, and their advocates had the opportunity to explain what it's like to be a gig worker and how difficult it is to be a truck driver. And, importantly, they were bringing with them their peak bodies and the sector of owners and drivers. They were talking to us and expressing how difficult it is. Let's face it: without the trucking industry and without truck drivers, we won't be able to sustain ourselves as a nation.

As part of the government's legislation, the Fair Work Commission will have the power, as I said, to set minimum standards for the road transport industry as well. Setting standards in the road transport industry will save lives. Just remember: when drivers are working extended hours—because if they don't work they don't get paid—it's you, it's me, it's my family and it's your families that are on the road. They're the ones who are as much at risk as the truck drivers because—let's face it—most of the truck drivers are driving these big semitrailers but it's your family, it's my family and it's the families of people out there that are on the road. This is crucially important to this sector. For too long we've heard stories of the deadly impact of cost-cutting and unrealistic deadlines, as starkly illustrated by the Without trucks Australia stops Senate report. The commission will be required to ensure any minimum standards do not adversely affect the viability and competitiveness of the owner-drivers.

These vital reforms would not have been possible in the first place if it were not for the work of Minister Tony Burke within the Employment and Workplace Relations portfolio, as well as the tireless efforts of the union movement in fighting for their workers and their members. I want to put on record my thanks to Minister Burke and draw attention to the Shop, Distributive and Allied Employees Association, better known as the SDA, for all the wonderful advocacy that they've done for those within the retail sector, who are mostly casual workers; to the Transport Workers Union; to the ACTU; to all unions across the country; and, more broadly, to the labour movement. It's because of your hard work and the work of the Albanese Labor government, who have been listening and know only too well how important this legislation is, that we are here today and are going to bring dignity and safety back into Australians' workplaces. It won't matter whether you're on a factory floor, whether you're driving a truck, whether you're a gig worker, whether you're working in aged care or whether you're working in retail. Australian workers deserve nothing less than the highest protection at work for their safety so that they get to go home every night to their families. This legislation tries to stop the exploitation at the hands of greedy employers who have been taking advantage of them for far too long. It's not just new migrants to this country who have been exploited. It's Australians.

I want to assure the Australian people that you can always rely on the Australian Labor Party and the Albanese Labor government to stand up for working Australians. We are the party of fairness. We are the party of dignity at work. We are the party of the labour movement and the union movement. None of us who have come into this place—and I didn't come from a union background—have ever forgotten where we've come from and the values of what Labor stands for and what the union movement stands for.

When I and my older siblings were going out into the workforce, my mother and father told us, 'There are two things you must do when you go to work: you must work hard and do an honest day's work and then expect an honest day's pay, and you should vote Labor.' The third one was, 'You should join your union.' Guess what? Each of my grandchildren, when they turn 14, gets a membership form for the Labor Party. So I'm honouring that, Mum and Dad. Fighting for fair pay and conditions and fighting for workers' rights and a fair go is a noble quality. It is what makes the Labor Party. It is a great privilege. I'm so proud to be part of the Albanese Labor government.

To the unions, like the TWU, the AWU, the SDA—all the unions that have been coming to this place, visiting us in our electorates and talking at our conferences: we have heard you. We have listened to all the delegations of workers that have taken their time. Quite honestly, for a lot of these workers, like some I was hearing from yesterday, it's a big deal to come to this place and to talk to politicians if you're never done it before. I keep telling them we usually don't eat people! We're just like you. We just want to hear your true story because your truth is what is important. It's our responsibility as Labor government members, whether we're in the Senate or the other place, to listen to and respond to the concerns.

There will be amendments to this legislation. I am encouraged that we will get support in this chamber. This is such a fundamental change for Australian workers and for young people going out for their first jobs. My second-eldest grandson has just started work, and coincidentally he's working for a well-known supermarket chain. Yes, he's joined the SDA. He listened to his 'oma' when I said to get a job. He had a choice of two jobs. He chose the supermarket chain. I said: 'You work really hard. When you're offered a shift, you turn up every time and you give 110 per cent—but also join your union, because you need that protection.'

I commend this legislation. As I said, I'm very proud to commend Minister Tony Burke, the Prime Minister and my fellow Labor members both in this place and the other place, and I commend this to the chamber.

Matt O'Sullivan (WA, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise to speak on the Fair Work Legislation Amendment (Closing Loopholes No.2) Bill 2023. Firstly, I move second reading amendment on sheet 2359 on behalf of Senator Cash:

At the end of the motion, add ", but the Senate:

(a) is of the opinion that consideration of the amendments in the bill relating to the road transport industry should be deferred until after the conclusion of the current ACCC inquiry into Australia's supermarket sector; and

(b) calls on the Government to:

(i) amend the bill to remove the elements of Part 16 of the bill that relate to the road transport industry so that those amendments may be dealt with in a separate bill, and

(ii) direct the ACCC to specifically consider those amendments as part of its inquiry into Australia's supermarket sector".

Without doubt, this is the single worst piece of industrial relations policy that has been seen in this country for over three decades. This legislation is nothing more than a pursuit of hyperfixated obsession of left-wing ideology. Let me be crystal clear: this is arcane and draconian legislation. It looks in the eye of the industrial relations legacy of the Hawke and Keating governments and tears it asunder. It's nothing more than ensuring that the traditional owners of the Australian Labor Party are kept happy at the next federal election. It's nothing more than trying to keep alive the dying embers of their trade union allies.

It was the poet Alfred Tennyson who said, 'Knowledge comes, but wisdom lingers.' Surely, when it comes to industrial relations policy, this government possesses neither.

This country is confronting a cost-of-living crisis not seen in a generation. For most Australians, it's the first time that they have encountered such rises in their cost of living. The Albanese government has blamed the previous coalition governments. It's blamed the Ukraine war, the former Reserve Bank Governor and, indeed, the Israel-Hamas war, but, if it looked itself in the mirror, it would see where the responsibility lies. Instead of addressing rampant inflation, interest rate pressure and a sustained period of low productivity, this government thinks that the best step forward right now is to grow union membership and increase their sphere of influence in the Australian workplace. If you were to momentarily close your eyes, you would have thought that we had returned to the early 1970s, when Jim Cairns and Rex Connor were running around driving the economy onto a rocky shoal during the time of the discredited Whitlam government.

If it was the intent of this government to mobilise the business sector, if government's motivation was to unify conservatives, this bill goes a long way to achieving that. In my time in this place, I seriously doubt another piece of industrial relations policy will energise its opponents like this bill has done.

For some time, I've been talking about labour productivity and the government's lack of focus and discussion on it. Labour productivity plays a critical role within our economy in lowering inflation. Productivity growth is a fundamental key to long-term prosperity. It has delivered Australia the higher living standard and quality of life that we as a society enjoy today, yet the original bill mentions the word 'productivity' only twice. There is scarcely a mention of productivity. This government is lost at sea when it comes to productivity. The Minister for Employment and Workplace Relations, who is very fond of sound bites and one-liners, did not mention it once in his second reading speech. It's no wonder, given the unions' hatred of the word and their longstanding loathing of the Productivity Commission.

The Prime Minister has gone missing altogether when it comes to discussing this important economic measurement. In fact, he has basically handballed the economy to the Treasurer and said, 'Good luck.' The Prime Minister knows that the long-term forecast for inflation returning to the two to three per cent band is in 2025, after the next federal election, so he might as well damage the future prospects of his Treasurer at the same time as ruining the economy. One thing is crystal clear. At the next election, one thing will be front and centre for all Australians: are we better off than we were three years ago? The evidence would suggest clearly not.

This government likes to boast that this bill is about growing wages. Without stating the obvious, of course we all want higher wages, but this government is presenting it like some magic pudding, as if we could all benefit from higher wages without achieving higher productivity. It is akin to the theory of all those who once believed that simply printing more money would get rid of hyperinflation. Herein lies the government's problem: Treasury is also telling them that, if the unit labour price keeps going higher while productivity growth is negligible, inflation won't come down from the three-decade high we've seen under this government's watch. The government's magic bullet theory is to get the trade unions infiltrating the Australian workplace and ramp up union delegate rights, and they think that somehow this is going to improve the prosperity of Australians. We have seen that in this country before, when unions had the grip of the Australian workplace, and we know that it didn't end well.

The Education and Employment Legislation Committee, of which I am the deputy chair, held seven public hearings across the country, and time and time again we heard from stakeholders about the negative consequences of this bill and the impact that it would have on the cost of living, inflation and, more broadly, the economy. We know that this bill will actually increase costs for Australians. Food delivery platform Menulog have said that they will have to increase their charges. They estimate that the average costs will go up by $15 per delivery. This significantly increases to $39 if the calculated per hour rate is used as applied by the explanatory memorandum. Uber undertook its own impact modelling. It revealed that rideshare and delivery fee prices across the country would increase by 60 per cent and 85 per cent respectively. Higher prices will make rideshare and delivery services more expensive for consumers. The pizza which the minister claims will only cost a few extra dollars more will in fact cost substantially more.

I want to turn to Western Australia, my home state. This bill is a blatant attack on Western Australia. The mining industry in my state is largely non-unionised, which is not surprising given that union membership in the private sector is just eight per cent—hence why the government thinks that there is a problem. Through this bill, they have demonstrated that they see the problem as a trade union problem and as a loophole that needs to be fixed. Even worse is the fact that the federal resources minister is a Western Australian and has allowed, on her watch, the Minister for Employment and Workplace Relations to run riot with this bill in her home state and, from what I can see, she has done nothing to stand up against the attack that this bill will make on her own home state of Western Australia. Did she speak up in the interests of her state or the industry that she purports to represent? The mining sector has largely underpinned Western Australia's success since the 1970s. Every Western Australian should be shocked and dismayed by what the Albanese Labor government is attempting to do with this bill.

The Chamber of Commerce and Industry Western Australia were blunt in their assessment of the impact that this bill would have on Western Australia. It told the Perth public hearing:

It's no overstatement to say that these changes pose a significant threat to WA's economic prosperity. Our state is at a crossroad. We are rich in the critical minerals that will power the green revolution, like lithium, nickel, copper. But having these minerals in the ground isn't enough. In the race for global capital we need to be competitive. Aspects of this bill, combined with already onerous regulation and more to come, risk putting Australia in the too-hard basket for global investors.

If that doesn't send a chill through you in this place, I don't know what will. We are competing internationally for projects to go ahead. Capital is competitive. If we're going to attract investment in this country and indeed in my home state of Western Australia, we have to be competitive on all fronts and provide a value proposition for that capital.

For the benefit of those that are living over here on the east coast—I know you don't care to think too much about us on the west coast; that's coming from a Western Australian, of course—in 2021-22 the Western Australian resources industry generated $186 billion in gross product, accounting for almost half of Western Australia's economic activity. The industry's exports totalled $233.6 billion, accounting for 95 per cent of WA's goods exports and 66.1 per cent of national resources exported.

It was during the Perth public hearing that the Australian Hotels Association WA told the inquiry of the 'lottery style' nature of the casual employment changes that this bill proposes. They said it was 'operationally insane'—operationally insane—for business. This is ridiculous! They asked how this would function in practice for Western Australia. They queried that. They couldn't make sense of how it would work, practically.

All of this is for the sake of appeasing trade union, left-wing ideology. Federal Labor pays lip-service to Western Australia. It even appointed a Western Australian as a cabinet minister, to the important resources portfolio. But it's merely smoke and mirrors when those same elected members sit idly by while the Albanese government launches a full-scale offensive on the state's private sector employees. This bill will not benefit Western Australia, and it certainly won't help the workers in the mining industry. But it will assist the trade unions to get a foothold in an industry that predominantly has remained a non-unionised workforce.

Back in September last year I was sitting here in this chamber, and Senator Ayres got up and spoke, and he boasted about this bill and the government's agenda. He said the Albanese government 'are moving from red tape for business to a red carpet for business'. That's what they were doing. If the inquiry's public hearings demonstrated one thing, it was that this government, through this bill, has laid out the red carpet not for workers in this country, not for businesses in this country and not for the Australian economy but, indeed, for the trade unions. Is it any wonder that the ACTU gleefully said:

… it's very good. Finally we have turned the corner in terms of this relentless, really 30 years of either going backwards and clawing things back, to now actually going forward …

Of course we would want more, but honestly the government has responded to problems that are there and they campaigned on, such as job security.

The business community knows the true intent of this bill. As the Business Council of Australia summed up in its submission to the inquiry: 'This bill is unnecessary. It will return Australian workplace relations to an age of unnecessary conflict and low productivity and does not respond to the key challenges for jobs, for enterprises or for Australians facing rapidly increasing costs of living. This bill is complex, is unworkable, has not been demonstrated to achieve its policy aims and, in most areas, is not based on clearly articulated or properly evidenced need for change.'

Credit to the minister for workplace relations; with this bill, and the one passed before Christmas, he has delivered big time for his trade union mates—there's no doubt about that. They will certainly be pleased with his performance and will be stamping his leadership credentials. A front seat at the next ALP national conference awaits him; there is no doubt about that.

This bill has seen a proliferation of unfettered trade union power not seen in a long time, increased rights of entry and union delegates rights. Anyone would think that union membership was hovering around 80 per cent, given the weight of this bill, but it's not happening.

Above all, the economic modelling represents something akin to a year 8 economics paper. The RIS was cobbled together. The way this government has presented this bill is an embarrassment. Its data limitations, its assumptions, are completely inept and completely unacceptable, given the original bill contained 800 pages. This government was not interested in knowing the full cost implications of this bill; its calculations were inept at best. This bill does nothing to benefit Australian families or reduce cost-of-living pressures, and it does everything to increase trade union influence in the workplace.

Deborah O'Neill (NSW, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I just want to note for the record that we have a new member in the chamber—and I'm not referring to Senator Varun Ghosh, who has joined us from Western Australia. With his first appearance in the chamber, I acknowledge Amato Leslie Ciccone, who has joined his very proud father. I congratulate him and his beautiful wife, Sarah—who is with us, here in the advisers' box—on the birth of the newest recruit to the Labor Party in Victoria!

Karen Grogan (SA, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise to speak to the significant and timely Fair Work Legislation Amendment (Closing Loopholes No. 2) Bill 2023. This legislation presents a crucial step in us addressing the various loopholes and shortcomings that currently exist in the Fair Work Act 2009, aiming to promote fairness, equity and protection for workers across Australia.

Let's be clear about this: the Albanese Labor government came to power on a platform of getting wages moving, of addressing the challenges we have seen in this country for a decade underneath the Liberal and National parties, who had a deliberate strategy of stagnating wages to affect and impact in the most negative ways on those who are on some of the lowest incomes in this country. We need to provide equity and protection for workers, and that's exactly what the Albanese Labor government is intending to do and that is exactly what this bill is aiming to do.

Closing the loopholes will stop the undermining of wages and the undermining of conditions we have seen too much of over the previous decade. The Liberals and Nationals were doing everything they could to stagnate wages, disadvantage workers and impact conditions. They showed a complete and utter lack of understanding of what life is like for those workers who provide essential services across our country. These are the workers that we rely on for every aspect of our lives, and they are being treated so poorly. This legislation, which has been dragged out for months and months and months, needs to pass this chamber. They've fought against this legislation every single step of the way.

The Fair Work Legislation Amendment (Closing Loopholes No. 2) Bill 2023 seeks to rectify several critical issues that have caused significant issues in the labour market in this country. The bill introduces measures to provide greater certainty for casual employees and casual employers, addressing the ambiguity that surrounds the definition of casual employment and the entitlement to permanent employment benefits.

I am on the employment and education standing committee in the Senate, and we have held many hearings and have heard over and over again that the sky is falling in. The idea of taking a casual worker who has worked in the same organisation—I remember that one who gave evidence had been in the same organisation for 16 years and was still counted as a casual. It doesn't make a lot of sense when that casual is working very similar hours, in the same job, over and over again, year in, year out. What this legislation does is to provide a pathway for the employer and the employee to have a clearer perspective, to have a better understanding and to be more crisp about what that definition is and how you might go about changing your status. Employer after employer, when we unpack it, says, 'Oh, yeah, but.' The reason is that this is not a risk. This is not a challenge. This is a fair and equitable way to deal with employees across this country.

We've had great support for this legislation. What seems to be left is the political 'sky is falling in' fearmongering, which has no place. This legislation is fair, it is equitable and it goes about addressing the decade of disgraceful employment relations that we have experienced in this country. As we go about creating a fairer and more transparent framework for casual workers, ensuring that they receive the entitlements and protections they deserve, the bottom line is that the sky will not fall in. This is fair. This is equitable. This is what we should expect from a responsible government of this country. Properly defining casual work will end the exploitation.

Various other measures in this bill will end exploitation for gig workers and provide some certainty and some safety measures. The Transport Workers Union yesterday, as they have done many times in the last 12 months, brought affected workers up to the parliament so that they could speak with those in this chamber and the other about their experience, to try and get them to better understand exactly what it is that workers are facing and what this legislation is going to fix.

I'd just like to share a couple of stories. Nabin, who's a food delivery driver, has been working for multiple apps, which is necessary to make enough money in the gig economy. To get enough work, you have to work across multiple platforms. That is what people are telling us over and over again. After costs, he currently earns $13.60 an hour, and sometimes, when there isn't a great deal of work around, he can earn as little as $4 an hour. Just imagine what it would be like to try to live on that wage, to try to feed your family, to keep a roof over your head, to provide the essentials in life—on $4 to $13.60 an hour. We cannot, with any conscience, allow this to continue. There have to be changes, and this legislation provides those changes.

There are others in exactly the same boat. This is not outlandish. This is not an outlier. These are the stories that various people in various industries are seeing in huge numbers, and we're hearing the stories over and over again. If only we would listen to them. I implore those opposite to listen to those stories, to imagine what these circumstances must be like, to think about how you would cope if that was the situation you were in, if that was what you had to deal with every single day, and how that would make you feel. I implore you to think about this in the sense of what it is doing for workers on the ground—not the politics, not the hoo-ha, not the trench warfare; put all that to one side and think about the impact on workers. As I said, these are workers who are providing those essential services across our country that we rely on day in, day out.

The changes are not radical. They are sensible, fair, equitable changes. The changes are about fairness, about safety and about respect—respect for those people who go to work every day and sometimes at the end of an extraordinary long week still cannot afford to live, because their hourly rate ends up being so low. That, colleagues, is exploitation.

The other kinds of people we heard from yesterday, from the Transport Workers Union, were people like Mugdha, a delivery driver who was knocked off her scooter on her first day of work and suffered injuries that were extraordinarily painful. She said the injuries left all of the left side of her body and her lower back in pain, but she had no access to workers compensation because of the independent contracting scenario that all our gig workers have to endure. She had no access to support. She was forced to return to work while still injured, while limping and while in pain and was working hours to make up the time she'd had off. That's not safe. That's not fair.

Then we go to Robert, who was in the trucking industry for 30 years—an employee driver, an owner-driver and a company fleet manager who, as the owner of a fleet running 11 trucks, had up to 50 subcontractors. So, he is a highly experienced person in this industry. He says that the pressure to breach the fatigue rules was the difference between having work or being let go. If you're trying to feed your family, what decision are you going to make? He was constantly pushed to do more, to overload and to miss breaks. When he went on to employ drivers, he always insisted that they pull over, that they take their breaks, knowing full well the impact it had had on him. But, unfortunately, with these pressures, he had to close down his business because he could no longer afford to run the company while being safe, and he wasn't prepared to continue being unsafe.

These are the decisions people are having to make. These are the kinds of things we're talking about: how those workers, those people who are out there providing the essential services that we use every day, the essential services that we rely on, are doing so without having the kinds of protections that are required.

This bill also deals with the concerns of franchisees, particularly in relation to single-enterprise bargaining. This provision is significant because it aims to safeguard the rights and interests of franchisees to ensure that they are not unfairly disadvantaged in their dealings with the franchisor. By enhancing the access of franchisees to single enterprise streams, the legislation will promote a more balanced and equitable relationship. Surely that's what we want? We don't want to be in a situation where one group has all the power and can crush the others. That's not what we need in this country. We are looking to ensure that people can earn a decent living.

The Albanese Labor government has moved mountains in the last 12 months, in my humble opinion, to improve the wages and conditions of workers and to improve the situation of people out there doing it tough, trying to earn a decent living and having to do it against the odds because of the current legislation. So, again, I implore you to look at the stories of the people who are actually being impacted. Look at the reality of what is occurring out on the streets. Look deeply at this legislation and the fairness, safety and equity that it promotes. Then ask yourself if you can, in all consciousness, vote against it.

The bill has a range of things that were not passed in tranche 1 last year. These are the harder things, the things that people on the other side have more objections to. As I said previously, I think a range of those objections are ideological. They're about politics. They're about a form of trench warfare. They are not about the good of the people in this country. They are not about what's right, fair or safe. I implore you: think long and hard about how you intend to vote on this particular bill that is about workers' rights, workers' safety and finding a balance in our employment system that allows employers clarity. We have found so many good employers who do not have a problem with this bill and will support this bill. This is a critical bill. It is about fairness, safety and equity. Get on board and, please, vote for this bill.

Maria Kovacic (NSW, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise today to speak on the Fair Work Legislation Amendment (Closing Loopholes No.2) Bill 2023. Plenty of people have a problem with this bill, particularly small-business owners, Australian small and family businesses and their employees. The government's crushing war on small business continues. After the complete shambles we saw at the end of last year, we now have this condensed 183-page recipe on how to kill an Australian small business, cooked up by the lifelong servant of the union movement and now minister Tony Burke.

This is a bill that is incredibly complicated. It adds extra significant cost to small and family businesses. It adds it to all businesses but particularly small and family businesses. It does that at a particularly difficult time, in the middle of a cost-of-living crisis that this government has been unable to rein in. Hardworking Australian families are continuing to have trouble keeping their heads above water, paying their bills and deciding what to put in the trolley and how much petrol to put in the car. The government has said: 'That doesn't matter. We still have to press ahead with this further impost on Australian families and small businesses.'

This bill does nothing to address the productivity crisis and it does absolutely nothing to increase competition. It places jobs at significant risk and it seeks only to act as part of the blank cheque that the Labor government writes to the union movement every single election. It does nothing for Australian small businesses and Australian employers. What it does do is seek to divide our country, instigating conflict between employees and employers, and playing the old class-warfare tune that seems to be the go-to for the Labor Party. It is completely neglectful of the legitimate concerns of Australian small businesses. Late last year, I sat in the main committee room with over 150 key stakeholders of Australian small and family businesses, and not one single stakeholder in that room representing a small or family Australian business said that they were happy with this bill. Worst of all, this bill weakens our economy, making an already bad situation worse.

There are a couple of parts of the bill that I specifically want to speak on today. The first one relates to complexity. This is a complex bill. It is not simple. It is confusing. We have a duty here in this place to make sure that the laws we make are accessible and comprehensible to the Australian people, that they make sense and that they are simple to follow. This bill doesn't do that, and that couldn't be more important than in the realm of industrial relations, where it is very important that workers and businesses know both their rights and their obligations, and that they understand their rights and their obligations without necessarily having to pay for legal advice to be able to understand.

What is hidden behind this is an agenda of union domination, where unions are heavily funded and resourced, capable of understanding and perhaps designing these incredibly complex provisions, and with direct advocates at the highest level of government, whereas small and family businesses are left on their own to navigate costly red tape.

This government has failed to demonstrate how these new laws will make it easier for businesses to employ people, increase productivity, create a higher skilled workforce or raise living standards while we continue to navigate a cost-of-living crisis. This is a radical reordering of Australian workplace law which every business organisation in this country has pleaded with the government to review. This sort of complexity, and the costs associated with it, will be almost impossible for Australian small businesses to deal with.

The Department of Employment and Workplace Relations's appearance at a Senate estimates hearing was characterised by a series of complex and confusing explanations in relation to this bill and, in particular, its impact on casuals. If the department is confused, how are small and family businessowners meant to know? Numerous departmental officials were required to explain various parts of the controversial bill. Let's think about that. That means that a number of different experts from the department were required in order to, in some way, explain this bill. How is a small Australian business meant to navigate that? It often took two or three officials to contribute to the answer to a single question. So, for one question, an Australian small business might need to go to two or three separate experts in order to understand how to meet their obligations under this legislation. Many in the room were more confused at the end of the explanation about the complexities imposed on businesses than they were at the start. Australian small businesses will have to pay for confusing legal advice that may not give them the clarity that they require in order to meet their obligations under this legislation.

Next I want to turn to the costs that will be imposed on consumers and businesses as result of this bill. At a time when hardworking Australian families are really struggling, this government has decided that they need higher costs for products that they use every day. Because things aren't expensive enough, we're going to make them more expensive, and now's the right time. Let's not forget that hardworking Australians are also the same hardworking Australians that run small and family businesses. They go home and have to pay their bills as well. They have electricity bills for their business; they have electricity bills at home. They have fuel costs for their business equipment; they have fuel costs for the family car. Mr Burke himself has admitted that the new laws will increase costs for consumers for everyday services they have come to rely on. This is not something that we're just making up to be difficult; this is something that Mr Burke himself has admitted. That is that these laws will increase costs for consumers for everyday services that they have come to rely on.

Millions of Australians are already suffering under the crippling cost-of-living crisis that this government has created. Uber has said that its costs will go up by about 60 per cent. Uber Eats delivery fees will be up by about 85 per cent, and those numbers will only be compounded with penalty rates on weekends and public holidays. So what does that actually mean? Your $30 Uber home from the pub next Saturday night will start to look more like $50 or $60 after this bill has passed. On top of this, a surge after the cricket or the football means your Uber home is probably costing you more than your ticket to the game. So you decide you're going to walk or try to find a late-night bus. Guess what happens then? That Uber driver doesn't get the job. The additional cost to tech companies providing the services Australians rely on will be pushed on to consumers and the businesses that rely on their services. With the cost of living spiking, this will only discourage consumers from engaging with the economy through gig platforms. That means less money to businesses and fewer jobs. The gig economy was an innovation. This is effectively a tax on innovation. These proposed changes threaten the viability of Australia's vibrant platform economy that delivers essential goods and services from our business community to our consumers.

I think we know Tony Burke's real agenda here. He has previously referred to the gig economy as a cancer. These words are an insult to the numerous hardworking independent contractors across Australia, people who believe that they have a right to choose how they work. Consumers benefit from the innovative new services that gig platforms deliver, particularly the convenience, range of services and choice. There is a growing community appetite for the fast and convenient delivery of services that this economy facilitates, which in turn is helping Australians manage busy and changing lives, such as by having meals delivered or being able to rely on rideshare. As I've noted, workers are choosing to do gig work, often as a second job, as they and their family navigate this cost-of-living crisis or when they want to choose their own work arrangements which suit their requirements and their needs, particularly for students, parents and retirees. They aren't stupid. A mum with children at school isn't stupid if she wants to work casually while her kids are at school. She knows what works for her. They don't need unions and this government or any government dictating that to them.

Gig workers are themselves innovating along with changes to technology to best take advantage of work opportunities that platforms offer. Many log on to multiple apps simultaneously to access gig assignments that optimise their time and minimise their costs. These gig workers are self-managing when and how they work and gain both agency and new work opportunities from doing so. This form of work has grown. It is welcomed by workers, vendors and customers because it meets the needs of all.

Industrial relations reform is, without doubt, one of the most important of all the economic reforms required to make Australia more productive and competitive. The focus of IR reforms should be to make us more productive and to create more jobs, not to be more complicated and more costly, and not to put jobs at risk. These workplace relations changes will add uncertainty and complexity to the employment of millions of casuals and contractors, and this is not good for the economy.

The bill will amend the Fair Work Act to enable unions to exercise right of entry powers, without any notice, whenever it relates to wage underpayment. Let's think about that. To gain immediate entry, the union only need to assert that to the Fair Work Commission that they suspect a case of wage underpayment.

Andrew McLachlan (SA, Deputy-President) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Senator Kovacic, unfortunately I have to interrupt you. We've come to the hard marker, and you will be in continuance when the debate resumes.