Labor are Not the Party of the Workers

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Today the Labor government will vote AGAINST my amendment that would award back pay to casual miners who had more than $30,000 a year stolen from them under union negotiated agreements.

Nothing in Labor’s bill will compensate these ripped off casual workers and now they will vote down my amendment that would pay them back.

So much for Labor being the party of the workers.

This amendment was voted down by Labor and the major parties

Transcript (click here)

Casual miners—so-called casual miners—working in Central Queensland and the Hunter Valley are each owed an average, due to wage theft, back pay of around $33,000 per year for every year of service. If you’re a casual, you are likely owed $33,000 per year that you have worked. My amendment aims to get these miners their back pay. Before getting to that, I note that the Senate has yet again been hijacked with a guillotine this afternoon, when almost half the Senate want more debate. This is a grotesque abuse of power. It’s a grotesque abuse of democracy. It’s a grotesque abuse of process in this Senate—the people’s Senate. These are serious guillotines. We know that sometimes guillotines are arranged, and that’s fine, with the consent of just about everyone. Regarding serious guillotines, where there’s a genuine disagreement between Labor and the LNP and a need for more debate, here are the figures: in the 45th Parliament, there were two; in the 46th Parliament, there were 24; and, in the 47th Parliament, under Labor, the Greens, Teals and the coalition, we’re halfway through and there have been 39 already. Almost all guillotines involve a Labor-Greens-Teal-Senator Pocock coalition. This morning we have Senator Thorpe and Senator Pocock amending significant industrial relations legislation affecting many employees, small businesses and employers around the country. Yet we have limited time to assess and almost no time to debate.

Minister, last night in my second reading speech, I explained, in great detail, what I believe is the largest systemic wage theft in Australia. It’s explained in the independent report that One Nation commissioned. I foreshadowed an amendment to pay casuals working in the black coal mining industry. It’s been tabled. Casual coalminers are being ripped off to the tune of around $33,000 each and every year.

Labor’s bill would put more power with union bosses. After what I unveiled last night, that’s putting the fox in charge of henhouse. The CFMMEU, the Construction Forestry, Maritime, Mining and Energy Union, enabled and supported wage theft from casual coalminers. The CFMMEU negotiated and endorsed enterprise agreements that pay casual coalminers less per hour than the award combined with a 25 per cent casual loading. Some enterprise agreements in the coal sector paid and still pay paid casual workers less than a full-time worker receives per hour under the award. Ignore the loading; it is less than the award. That’s a casual being paid less than a full-time worker. How? CFMEU union bosses negotiated and approved this wage theft. Minister, union bosses negotiated and approved these agreements that pay casuals less than full-time workers, yet your bill places more power with those union bosses, who failed to protect workers and who betrayed workers— union bosses who enabled theft from mineworkers. The Fair Work Commission failed. They failed to properly assess these agreements and let them sail through. They approved them. When I asked the Fair Work Commission at Senate estimates to provide me with a copy of the better off overall test, the BOOT, that they had conducted for just one of these agreements, they could not hand over a single document or spreadsheet—not one. This is a wage theft resulting from a cosy collusion between the labour hire companies, including the world’s largest labour hire company, which is owned by a Japanese parent company; union bosses who betrayed workers; and the Fair Work Commission. All three are culpable.

My amendment on sheet 2339 will trigger a review of those coal enterprise agreements to ensure they meet all relevant entitlements. It would ensure any underpaid casual coalminers are compensated for the wage theft they have suffered and would pay them the $33,000 each per annum that they’re entitled to. This cost would be apportioned between the offending labour hire company—the employer—the union and the Commonwealth, through the Fair Work Commission, for their culpability in the wage theft. Senators who vote for Labor’s legislation without voting for my amendment are endorsing massive wage theft—Australia’s largest ever wage theft. Legislation must not just attempt to fix it for the future; it must right the wage theft and get the back pay.

Minister, why doesn’t the government support my amendments on sheet 2339 to pay back entitlements for casual coalminers that have had wages stolen from them—$33,000, on average, per year?

Senator WATT (Minister for Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry and Minister for Emergency Management): Senator Roberts, thanks for providing a copy of this amendment to me before the debate started. The government does not support your proposed amendment. We consider that the bill as it stands, which we’re introducing here, provides a considered and balanced framework for defining casual employment and supporting casual employees to convert to permanent employment. The government has consulted with a wide range of stakeholders to reach a position that addresses both employees’ and employers’ needs. The government’s reforms that were passed last year also give labour hire employees the right to seek orders from the Fair Work Commission that provide entitlements to the same pay under a host business’s enterprise agreement. Casual labour hire employees in the black-coal-mining industry can also seek these orders. So, Senator Roberts, the bill as we are presenting it already addresses the needs that casual workers, whether they be miners or others, undoubtedly have. The reforms that we made in our amendments last year, around the labour hire loophole, were also designed to address the rights of casual coalminers in particular. Senator Roberts, I’ve obviously been in a number of estimates hearings where you’ve raised these issues. It is my observation that you have been given answers to these questions by officials on a number of occasions. You haven’t accepted those answers, and you continue to ask the same questions. It’s your right to do so, but I think it’s pretty clear that whatever answer you’re provided with won’t satisfy you. It’s your right to continue campaigning on this issue, but I would remind you, Senator Roberts, that last year, when we did introduce changes to benefit labour hire casual employees to ensure that they are paid at least the same as the permanent workers they work alongside, it was unfortunate and surprising that you voted against that change. I would have thought that, if you were as committed to the rights of casual coalminers as you say you are, you would have voted with the government for those reforms that we implemented last year. I was surprised that, after a number of years of you campaigning on this issue, you voted with the coalition against the interests of those labour hire casual coalminers who you say you represent.

Senator ROBERTS: Minister, let’s have the full truth. We voted against that because it didn’t address the core issue. There is no casual permanent rort loophole at all other than the one I’ve just discussed. The simple solution is that the Fair Work Act needs to be enforced. Your bill covers the future. Your previous bill covers the future. It shuts the door to backpay of these miners who are owed, on average, $33,000 per year for the breach of the Fair Work Act. Way you covering up union bosses’ culpability? That is what you are doing. That’s what Minister Burke is doing. Minister Burke has received two letters from me on this issue. We get a polite, ‘Nothing to see here; move on.’ I’ve written letters. Miners have been in touch through personal meetings and provided solid, written evidence to the department’s senior advisers. Nothing has happened. With the minister’s office’s senior advisers, nothing has happened. With the Fair Work Commission, nothing has happened. The Fair Work Ombudsman used a fraudulent document to deny any case for the miners, despite the miners having five documents, including court hearing transcripts, that say their documents are correct. Why you continuing to cover this up against miners in the Hunter Valley and Central Queensland? Why are you continuing to cover it up? Is it because union bosses in the CFMEU are culpable because they have engineered this? Is it because union bosses in the CFMEU are the ones who started labour hire in the coalmining industry? Is it because they were actually employers and they had some commercial agreements that we’ve got wind of? Minister, these people are entitled to their back pay. That’s what I want, and that’s what this amendment covers. It covers their back pay. We don’t want this bill to go through and simply bury the issue. That’s what Minister Burke is doing. Why are you covering up for union bosses? Is it because they funnel millions of dollars into Labor Party campaign coffers? Why are you not doing this after almost five years of me bringing this to your attention?

Senator WATT: As Senator Roberts has just made clear, he has been raising these issues for five years. The questions have been answered for five years, and I don’t propose to add to any of them, but again I point out that Senator Roberts and Senator Hanson did have an opportunity late last year to vote with the government to ensure that the rights of labour hire workers in coalmines were protected. Unfortunately, Senator Roberts decided to vote with the coalition.

Senator ROBERTS: I will repeat myself. We are not voting for legislation that covers up, endorses and prevents miners from getting their back pay. When this Labor government stops covering up for CFMEU bosses who’ve done dodgy deals, stops covering up for the Fair Work Commission and the Fair Work Ombudsman, which are not doing their job; and stops covering up for labour hire companies—we will not vote for
legislation that prevents miners getting their back pay and covers it up.

See all the material on this issue

Casual Coal Wage Theft

News Article and Related Parliamentary Speech

The Decade-Long Scam Robbing Some of Our Miners
Exposing the Permanent-Casual Rort
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Exposing the Permanent-Casual Rort

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I detailed one of the most outrageous wage thefts in the country last night in the Senate. Despite having all of this information, the Labor party continues to cover it up, voting down my amendment that would give back-pay to victims.

Casual coal mine workers are being individually underpaid up to $33,000 per year under union-negotiated deals. Minister Tony Burke is aware of this yet he does nothing about it.

The so-called ‘Loopholes’ Bill will only protect the union bosses at the Construction, Forestry and Maritime Employees Union (CFMEU) and give them more power. It will protect labour-hire companies including the big, foreign-owned ones, and it will protect the government’s Fair Work Commission who is failing Australian workers.

The only loopholes I see are the ones protecting big business and the government and there’s nothing ‘fair’ about it.

Labor has abandoned the workers. One Nation will not stop fighting for ripped off casual coal miners to receive what they’re owed.

Transcript (click here)

As a servant to the people of Queensland and Australia, I rise to speak on the Fair Work Legislation Amendment (Closing Loopholes No. 2) Bill 2023. In doing that, I will illustrate why this bill is a sham that does not protect workers like the name implies.

Nothing in this bill will fix the absolute scandal that One Nation has uncovered. The Labor government is giving more power to union bosses, which is putting the fox in charge of the henhouse. As I will explain, union bosses are the ones that have been ripping off workers, and the government regulator, the Fair Work Commission, has endorsed it. I challenge anyone to explain to me in detail how the closing loopholes No. 2 bill will fix the cases I’m about to explain.

An independent report details the largest wage theft scandal Australia has ever seen. Coalmine workers have each had tens of thousands of dollars stolen from them every year. Labour hire companies, union bosses and governments have been covering it up for a decade or more. The culprits are labour hire companies supplying casual workers to some Central Queensland and Hunter Valley coalmines. The CFMEU—the Construction, Forestry, Mining and Energy Union—enabled and supported the wage theft. The Fair Work Commission signed off and endorsed the enterprise agreements, enabling the wage theft.

One Nation commissioned an independent analysis which shows that hardworking, casual coalminers are each being shafted on 2023 pay rates by an average of around $33,000 every year. This is systemic wage theft resulting from collusion between labour hire companies—including major foreign multinationals—the CFMEU and the Fair Work Commission. My grave and disturbing allegations are based on solid facts and hard data.

A quirk in the Black Coal Mining Industry Award makes this scam possible. Under that award it’s illegal for mine employers to have casual employees. Yet, if casuals were legal, everyone in Australia knows that the employer would have to pay casuals 25 per cent more than the award full-time rate, as a 25 per cent casual loading for loss of basic entitlements like leave, sick leave and others. While the award prohibits casuals, labour hire companies—with the CFMEU—created enterprise agreements to employ casuals without any loading. The CFMEU negotiated, approved or sought to become a party to these agreements.

The closing loopholes No. 2 bill claims that all of these problems in industrial relations can be solved if we get the union bosses more involved and give them more power. What is the use of giving the CFMEU bosses more power when they negotiated and approved agreements that have ripped off casual workers for more than a decade? The Fair Work Commission should be policing and rejecting these agreements, yet it approved them. The rates under the agreements were less than the award with a 25 per cent loading. This means that the enterprise agreements are paying much less than what should be paid under the award if it allowed casuals. Some casuals were paid even less than the full-time award through technical legal trickery. All parties claim these agreements are legal, yet everyone knows a casual gets a 25 per cent loading on the hourly rate of a full-time worker. Paying them any less is wage theft. It appears that, once the Fair Work Commission approves an enterprise agreement that pays less than what should be paid under the award, the underpayment then becomes legal.

Yet One Nation is awake. All Australians deserve honest pay for an honest day’s work. We have spent nearly five years investigating wage theft. Nothing in this bill will fix up the absolute scandal One Nation has uncovered. Tonight I launch our major report detailing the extent of the wage theft scam. In 2019, after the CFMEU brushed off many years of casual coalminers’ complaints, the miners brought their underpayment complaints to us in One Nation. We took action. I’ve been holding the Fair Work Commission accountable for nearly five years. We asked the Fair Work Commission to provide their copy of the better-off-overall test—the BOOT—they’ve done on relevant enterprise agreements. The BOOT is supposed to be a safety net that rejects underpaying agreements and protects workers from underpayment. Yet the commission handed us no documents. There are no spreadsheets, no tables comparing conditions and benefits and no real assurance that they’d properly weighed it up. The response was along the lines of, ‘Trust us; it passes.’

The CFMEU has been signing off on dodgy agreements for more than a decade, and the Fair Work Commission is either asleep at the wheel or complicit. Either way, both enable or are responsible for massive wage theft. Last year we raised this issue with the Fair Work Ombudsman and with Minister Burke and his department. Responses from all three have been like that of the Fair Work Commission. ‘Trust us,’ they say, yet they provide no hard evidence.

One Nation then commissioned independent research, with the results in the report. The first part presents the facts of coalmining casual work patterns. It marries those patterns against what the award would require if casual employment were possible under the award. The second part exposes how this scam has been allowed to continue in breach of proper, commonsense application of the law. The report details that coalminers are required to work any time, 24 hours a day, seven days a week, close to a 44-hour week—Saturdays, Sundays, public holidays, days and nights. It’s long, hard work that can be dangerous. The report shows that, according to the award, for example, a full-time mine worker doing 12-hour shifts will earn about $120,849 per year or $53.84 an hour. Taking what a full-time mine worker should earn under the award and adding a casual loading, a casual mine worker doing the same hours should earn $151,061 a year, or a flat rate of $66.40 an hour, regardless of hours worked.

The independent analysis One Nation commissioned looked in detail at mine workers’ hourly rates under the five most common enterprise agreements covering casuals in coalmining. We found that none of the enterprise agreements were paying casual workers anywhere near the $66.40 an hour they should be receiving. Some were even paying casuals less than the hourly rate a full-time worker gets under the award. The fact that a casual worker could be paid less than the hourly rate of a full-time worker under some of the agreements should have set of alarm bells at the Fair Work Commission. Every single enterprise agreement—all five—has the CFMEU’s fingerprints on it, and the Fair Work Commission signed off every single agreement.

The research assessed five of the major enterprise agreements in consultation with independent analysis, lawyers and coalminers. Let’s go through them. The CoreStaff NSW Black Coal Enterprise Agreement 2018 pays casual mine workers $56.16 an hour, much less than the $66.40 a casual should be paid. The CFMEU is recognised under the agreement. The Fair Work Commission approved the agreement. The underpayment of each casual coalminer each year is $22,623. For FES, in Rockhampton, at a hearing of the inquiry into Labor’s closing loopholes bill we received evidence that the FES agreement 2018 pays casual employee Dwayne Arnold $54 an hour, well short of the $66.40 a casual should be paid. This agreement was made with the CFMEU. The Fair Work Commission signed off on the agreement. The underpayment of each casual coalminer each year is $27,563.

The WorkPac Coal Mining Agreement 2019 provides four different pay rates for a casual mine worker: between $42.99 and $51.38 an hour, depending on the day—all less than the hourly rate of a permanent worker. Calculations use the highest weekend rate even though this is more than what an average mine worker will get. It’s far short of the $66.40 that should be paid. The CFMEU negotiated and approved the agreement. The Fair Work Commission signed it. The yearly underpayment for a casual coalminer is $33,555. The Chandler Macleod agreement in 2020 pays a casual $48.85 an hour, far below the $66.40 that should be paid and less than the hourly rate of a permanent worker on the award. The CFMEU was a bargaining representative for the 2015 agreement, supported its approval and is a party to the 2020 agreement. The Fair Work Commission approved the agreement. The yearly underpayment per mine worker is $39,341.

Let’s go to the TESA group. The agreement in 2022 pays a casual $48.28 an hour, far below the $66.40 that should be paid and less than the hourly rate of a permanent worker on the award. The CFMEU is a party to the agreement. The Fair Work Commission approved it. The yearly underpayment per worker is $40,645. That’s almost $41,000 per year underpaid. Across these agreements a casual mineworker loses on average almost $33,000 every year compared to what they should be paid on the standard casual loading on the award rate.

One Nation challenges each of the parties in this scam. To the labour hire companies, the CFMEU union bosses and the Fair Work Commission, One Nation says: prove to us that our report is wrong. Don’t give us the excuse of the legal construct that you have created to enable and endorse the wage theft. Prove to us that the payments to the coal workers is higher than would be paid if the award allowed casual workers. Prove to us casuals are paid a loading. You will fail. Casuals are not paid a casual loading. It’s wage theft. It’s masterful wage theft. It’s hideous wage theft.

There are potentially tens of thousands of victim mineworkers in the history of dodgy agreements we can track over a decade. The total wage theft is massive. The failure of the Fair Work Commission and the Fair Work Ombudsman is shocking institutional failure. The fact they covered it up after we informed them is a disgraceful failure. It calls into question the entire structure, promise and integrity of the system in Australia that is supposed to protect Australian workers from underpayment, from wage theft.

Nothing in this bill will fix the absolute scandal One Nation has uncovered. Minister Burke’s bill aims to hide those responsible. Failure of the CFMEU bosses is even more obvious. We have a signed letter from the Hunter Valley CFMEU and labour hire company Chandler Macleod. In that letter, the CFMEU promises to never take action against Chandler Macleod for any breaches of worker entitlements. Our report details that the CFMEU has had commercial business dealings in the coal sector for decades. The CFMEU pretends to be a union. In fact, it is one of the employers, the bosses. It started labour hire casuals in the Hunter. It employed labour hire casuals. It started it. This theft must stop. CFMEU union bosses must be held to account for failing to represent workers, for betraying workers. The Fair Work Commission must be held to account for failing to stop dodgy enterprise agreements.

My amendment that I will be moving in the committee of the whole will ensure that those workers underpaid in the black coal industry will receive their fair pay entitlements in full. It adds transparency missing from the Fair Work Act and will ensure that the Fair Work Commission does its job, while the overprescriptive provisions of the Fair Work Act hide or ignore basic protections for workers. The Fair Work Commission has previously admitted that the Fair Work Act does not provide sufficient oversight of the Fair Work Commission when it fails to do its job.

One thrust of Minister Burke’s appalling bill is to cover up and bury Australia’s largest ever wage theft. Thousands of coalminers have each been underpaid on average around $33,000 per year because their union bosses did a shady deal with their employer. I have detailed proof of this. My amendment will put an end to these dodgy deals and enterprise agreements that pay much less than the award and it will ensure workers are reimbursed their stolen wages. Nothing in the closing loopholes No. 2 bill will hold the unions or the Fair Work Commission to account. Instead, Anthony Albanese’s solution is to give union bosses even more power with no accountability and no scrutiny. With what I have detailed in this speech, it’s obvious that that would be simply putting the fox in charge of the henhouse.

The changes contained in the so-called closing loopholes No. 2 bill will be far-reaching and have devastating impacts on the way almost every operation in Australia is forced to do business. We have had countless meetings with unions, small businesses, employees, workers, industry associations, law groups and more. The overarching message that all of them could agree with me on was that the Fair Work Act is simply too complicated for any worker or business to understand. The act is already a bulky 1,341 pages. It’s a sledgehammer that’s killing our economy. It’s so big it has to be split into three volumes so they can print it. It started 15 years ago as just a 652-page act. In the last five years alone, the Fair Work Act has increased by over 300 pages. What hope has someone who runs a bakery? What hope has an individual worker? The only ones who can keep up with all of the legislation changes and the complicated legal sections and find the loopholes are big corporations and big union bosses. They make the loopholes. I call them the industrial relations club. It includes big corporations, industrial relations consultants, lawyers and big union bosses.

Big corporations love a complex Fair Work Act because it stops small businesses who can’t figure out all the red tape from competing with them. Industrial relations lawyers love it because it keeps them in a job. Union bosses love it because it forces them into the conversation, whether the employees want them there or not. That’s why you hear so much support for this bill from the big money players. Genuine small-business owners who are too busy trying to run small operations and to pay their staff don’t have time to write parliamentary submissions or understand some amendments that may come into law. If this bill is passed, the 1,341-page Fair Work Act won’t get smaller and easier to understand. It will make the act longer, more complex, more prescriptive—the opposite of everything we need to fix industrial relations in this country. As a servant to the people of Queensland and Australia, I know only One Nation will fight to make sure workers receive their entitlements, and my amendment will do exactly that. We don’t need a so-called loopholes bill; we need enforcement of the award.

See all related material

Casual Coal Wage Theft

Related Parliamentary Speech and News Article

Labor are Not the Party of the Workers
The Decade-Long Scam Robbing Some of Our Miners
/1 Comment/by

Vaccine Anti-Discrimination Amendment moved on Industrial Relations Bill

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Vaccine mandates are still in effect across the private sector even though we know they do not stop transmission.

While Labor’s Industrial Relations Bill is a rushed dog’s breakfast, I’m hoping to give it some redemption by including a clause that would stop companies from discriminating based on vaccination status.

There’s no reason for blanket mandates in workplaces given it will not protect workers or customers from infection. The IR Bill and my amendment are due to be voted on today.

Transcript

Minister, you look like you need a break, so I will give you a break from your legal jousting and setting up definitions of terms for the future. In proposing this bill, the government says the bill aims to secure jobs. My amendment on sheet 1768 goes to the heart of ensuring job security and protecting workers’ rights. To ensure job security, my amendment on sheet 1768 ensures that unjustified vaccine discrimination is stamped out in employment. The original bill inserts breastfeeding, intersex status and gender identity as attributes that the Fair Work Act protects from discrimination. This amendment copies that approach and simply adds COVID-19 vaccination status as an attribute protected from discrimination. The protection is still subject to the limits imposed on the other discrimination grounds in the Fair Work Act. An employer will not be in breach of the antidiscrimination grounds where the employer can prove, as they should have to, that it is a genuine and reasonable requirement of the position. This amendment is reasonable in its approach. It is not radical, because it uses and simply extends the existing mechanisms in the Fair Work Act.

We’ve long known that COVID vaccines do not stop transmission. Before this came apparent, however, getting vaccinated to ‘protect others’ was the justification many businesses used to roll out vaccine mandates. As a condition of keeping their job, many employees were coerced and still are being coerced into receiving COVID injections and boosters they do not want. The vaccine mandates cannot be justified, given the fact that vaccines do not guarantee protection from transmission.

The New South Wales Personal Injury Commission agrees with this view, with workers compensation being awarded for psychological distress stemming from mandates in the determination of Dawking and the Secretary of the Department of Education, handed down on 3 November. Sometimes the wheels of justice turn slowly, yet we are happy that judicial bodies are taking up this self-evident position that broad vaccine mandates cannot be justified.

Despite this, mandates are still in effect across much of the private sector. It’s clear that further legislative action must be taken. Businesses are simply ignoring the evidence against unjustified vaccine mandates. A clear message needs to be sent that unreasonable directions that infringe on workers’ rights have no place in Australian workplaces.

Often mandates do not even account for Australians that have accepted medical contra-indications to vaccination. The Australian newspaper reports that Qantas sacked a pilot for failing to comply with a vaccination mandate while he was off work in a serious health condition: being treated for bowel cancer. Separately, I’ve met a Qantas employee who, after being injected with the first COVID injection, was rushed to hospital with severe disability—possibly life-threatening—due to the COVID injection. After hospital care and partial recovery, he returned to work, where Qantas insisted he get the second injection. He contested it and is on a vastly reduced pay on workers’ compensation. He fears his career with Qantas is finished. How can this be in this country?

This amendment seeks to reinforce workers’ rights to refuse a workplace direction where it is not a reasonable and justified requirement of the job. It leaves no doubt for employees and employers that vaccine mandates must not be in place unless there is a reasonable and justifiable need for them. Minister, given that businesses continue to ignore workers’ rights in this area, will the government support this amendment to reinforce the decisions of the Fair Work Commission and codify protections for workers against unreasonable workplace directions?

/24 Comments/by

Labor ignores One Nation’s Industrial Relations Fix

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For many years I have been pointing out the exploitation of casual workers who are paid less than workers doing the same job next to them. Despite Labor’s promises, they have failed to do anything to fix this problem.

My Equal Pay for Equal Work Bill prevents the exploitation of workers through the use of casual labour hire contracts in 7 industries where the award mandates full time employment, including the Black Coal Industry.

My bill targets large labour hire companies who are using enterprise agreements to allow mine owners to move full time employees over to casual employment, on rates of pay that are up to 40% less than the directly-employed mine employee working next to them.

Half of the workers in the Black Coal industry are now employed on these contracts.

The ALP have been promising to fix this problem since 2018 and have done nothing. This may be because the CMFEU has signed off on these enterprise agreements in return for union dues, superannuation contributions and a fee from the Mining Companies for each contract adopted.

Nationals Senator Perin Davey spoke against my bill today because in her words, the wording of the bill may allow the Minister to extend the provisions to agriculture.

The Nationals are giving half the picture. Any extension requires the consent of the Parliament by way of a Disallowable Instrument. If the Minister has the numbers for an instrument to pass, this would also mean the Minister has the numbers to amend the Fair Work Act 2009 on their own accord.

The Fair Work Amendment (Equal Pay for Equal Pay) Bill 2022 will not impact on rural or small businesses.

In opposing my bill the Nationals are using a dishonest argument to align themselves with labour hire companies against the interests of coal miners and coal mining communities.

With State elections coming up in NSW and Queensland, it is clear a vote for the Nationals, Liberals or the ALP is a vote for corporate interests over coal mining communities.

One Nation is proud to stand for coal miners, and with the workers affected by labour hire exploitation including airline air and ground crew.

Labor has also indicated they will not support the bill. So much for the party of the workers.

Transcript

As a servant to the people of Queensland and Australia, my Fair Work Amendment (Equal Pay for Equal Work) Bill 2022 was drafted in response to exploitation of casual coalminers in central Queensland and the Hunter Valley. It’s since been widened. My bill was referred to the Education and Employment Legislation Committee for inquiry, and I thank the committee for organising a public hearing so miners could testify about their exploitation personally. The committee found there was a need for my bell yet then recommended waiting for the government’s version. Labor announced its hollow ‘fair work for fair pay’ idea back in 2018, four years ago. Labor and the unions campaigned on their bill in the 2019 state election in New South Wales and the 2019 federal election.

The problem is that Labor’s bill did not exist. I confirmed that and began drafting my bill in April 2021. Labor’s bill was not introduced into parliament until December 2021, a month after my bill was completed and three years after Labor first promised it. If the Labor Party were serious about fixing this issue, their bill would have appeared in 2018, not four years later after One Nation repeatedly called them out.

Labor’s bill was a dog’s breakfast, so the government has chosen to start over. Now, I accept the government saying it’s just started meeting with stakeholders, yet a briefing with the minister’s advisers last week revealed that consultation has only been with the companies and union bosses that perpetrated this scandal. The miners, air crew, ground crew and other workers ripped off for tens of millions in wages have not yet been consulted after six months, which of course means the Labor Party, the CFMMEU and the industry are trying to find a way to keep these labour-hire contracts going. I’ll explain why in a minute. And so I’m advancing my bill, preparing for a vote early next year. I thank Senator Babet for allowing me to use his bills time today.

Early in my career, I spent three years in the union as an underground coalface miner, including in the Hunter and Queensland. My father was an underground coalface miner, senior executive and later Queensland Chief Inspector of Coal Mines. He was awarded an Order of Australia for eliminating black lung in our state’s coal industry. Having completed an honours degree in engineering, I returned to manage coalmines, which involved daily interaction with the CFMEU in the Hunter and in Queensland. This issue is very personal to me because the CFMEU and its predecessor, the Miners Federation, were once strong unions that looked after and served their members. The reports I received in my Senate office in 2019 from Queensland and the Hunter have shocked me. After visiting these areas repeatedly and listening to miners, I was no longer shocked. I am outraged at the injustice.

The big picture is this. Labour hire companies were employing casuals in black coal industry production despite the award not allowing it. It was illegal. Exclusion of casuals extends beyond the black coal industry. It includes airline flight crew and other awards, which I will speak to in a moment. Back to the black coal award. Casuals are excluded for a good reason. Coal mining can be dangerous. It requires training and constant skilling to improve productivity and, most importantly, for safety—safety of an individual miner and safety of the whole mine and everyone in it.

Underground miners typically retire ahead of most other industries, when they can no longer do the physical work. That’s why proper unions like the old Miners’ Federation negotiated high rates of pay. The modern award is much lower than negotiated rates because it assumes miners can be reskilled and redeployed into other industries after they exit from mining, allowing for a full working life. That’s a fairytale. That simply ignores the reality of life in the coal industry. Labour hire contracts are used to cut miners’ wages. This represents a 40 per cent cut in wages against the pay a permanent miner earns in a mine’s direct employ, doing the same job, side by side. Two Australians working side by side doing the same job on the same shift, and one is getting 40 per cent less than the other. That is wrong.

This has been going on for ten years under the Hunter CFMEU, working with some mining companies and with protection from the local Labor members, Joel Fitzgibbon and now Dan Repacholi. Casual coal workers on labour hire contracts supposedly receive a loading for loss of holiday and sick pay; yet their pay packets are still 40 per cent less. What caused this large reduction in pay was not the absence of loading, because that was supposedly paid. It was the very low base rate that the CFMEU installed.

In 2021 One Nation supported the concept of not enabling workers paid for casual loading because that was paid. What we did was to ensure that workers retained their rights under industrial laws to take legal action for illegal pay rates. Yet the CFMEU then lied, shouting that One Nation stopped workers from getting what was theirs. No, we upheld miners’ rights to pay and entitlements while at the same time protecting small business from being forced to pay casual loading twice, as some union bosses dishonestly demanded. It was the union that signed up on these enterprise agreements that robbed workers of 40 per cent of their pay. The Hunter CFMEU pocketed union dues from labour hire casuals and money from labour hire employers for dodgy enterprise agreements with low pay rates. It was the Hunter CFMEU that jointly directed coal long-service leave funds that under-accrued and avoided paying employer contributions to labour hire casuals. I exposed that, and a government review later confirmed me as correct. It was originally a Hunter CFMEU owned labour hire company that collected fees from the mines for supplying labour under a labour hire contract. The CFMEU is clearly directing labour to protect their nice little earner, even at the expense of the workers that the Hunter CFMEU supposedly pretends to represent, while hypocritically and deceitfully speaking badly of casual employment and workers.

The committee report accurately describes the effects on communities of the reduction in local spending due to taking wages out of the community. I was lucky enough to find a lawyer who drew these agreements up on behalf of Hunter labour hire companies and who has since seen the error of his ways. His advice informed my bill. Many exploited workers contributed to my bill. I have the most knowledgeable legal minds on labour hire contracts in the coal industry contributing to my bill, and I have generations of personal experience in the coal industry. What confuses my critics is that I’m not lining the IR club pockets with overly complex wishy-washy nonsense that opens more loopholes than it closes, as Labor’s short-lived dog’s breakfast did.

My bill will fix this mess. My bill sets an additional provision for Fair Work Australia to require an enterprise agreement to pass before being approved. It allows an employee to appeal an existing enterprise agreement to Fair Work if an enterprise agreement breaches this new provision. The provision is simple: a worker on a labour hire contract must be paid the same rate of pay, including allowances, as a worker who is directly employed doing the same job on the same shift roster. That is clear. If the whole crew is labour hire, then the commissioner must make a judgement on what the rate of pay should have been based on historical information and a comparison with similar mines in similar conditions. That is clear. The cost of using labour hire contractors will now fall on the employer rather than the worker. The intention is to require the employer to project their labour requirements, employ, train and nurture their people—like employers used to.

One complication is that some workers are on day shift and others on rotating shift. My bill takes that into consideration. Clause 3(b) of the bill expressly provides that the roster the employee is working must be considered in the assessment of equal pay for equal work. The committee report correctly identifies when labour hire contracts subvert the black coal mining industry award 2010 and the aircraft cabin crew award 2020. I’ve circulated an amendment to this bill to include the airline operations ground staff award 2020 which makes provisions for casuals that foreign companies bypass to exploit workers through labour hire contracts. I know Senator Sheldon is leading a fight against that exploitation. My bill will give him the ammunition to drag the whole situation back to Fair Work. I urge Senator Sheldon and Labor to adopt it.

My bill’s simplicity will prevent lawyers feasting because it allows Fair Work commissioners discretion to make value judgements. I reckon they’re up to it. The remaining awards are excluded in the Fair Work Amendment (Equal Pay for Equal Work) Bill 2022 as a line in the sand. While labour hire agreements are not being abused in these industries, explicitly including those awards in this legislation was designed to ensure labour hire firms do not treat these awards as a new profit centre once the opportunity for exploitation is removed from coalmining and aircraft operations.

Witnesses who discussed their treatment under labour hire contracts were pleased to have the opportunity to publicly testify, and I thank the committee. These workers were not always afforded that opportunity. Stuart Bonds, from the Hunter, listed case after case after case where miners have been employed under labour hire agreements with a 40 per cent reduction in pay rate. More troubling were the stories of exploitation and victimisation these workers received, especially following a safety report or physical harm.

Simon Turner testified to the committee on his inhumane experiences as an injured worker. He’s one of many, sadly. Workers like Simon tried for years to get justice. The mine owner and the labour hire company completely ignored him—tossed him on the scrap heap. The Hunter CFMMEU betrayed workers. Local Labor MPs let them down. Only when workers came to One Nation was progress made.

Another worker on a labour hire contract saw a safety issue—water trucks laying down too much water, creating slippery conditions—and reported it. This worker was required to report that safety issue. Her contract was terminated the next week. There’s no job security in labour hire contract arrangements. Workers injured at work were refused medical treatment and not paid workers compensation or accident pay as legally required. Workers were afraid of reporting safety issues for fear of being sacked.

Workers were rostered two years in advance to work 52 weeks of the year straight—no holidays. If you’re working a full-time 12-hour shift and being given these shifts two years ahead then you’re not casual. You are a permanent worker. Despite being, in effect, permanent these workers are unable to get home loans, car loans and provide a future for themselves and their families because banks won’t lend to casual labour hire employees. When I say exploitation I mean exploitation!

All this happened with the Hunter CFMMEU doing deals enabling mining companies more interested in profits than basic human decency. Labour hire deals and contracts are used to lower wages across an entire industry. Qantas pulled this stunt on their ground crew. They fired thousands of workers and re-employed them through labour hire companies at the lowest rate of pay. What’s a worker to do? Refuse the deal and have no job or take the deal and try to get by on 40 per cent less? Qantas are using these tricks on flight crew and pilots as well. Senator Sheldon can speak to this, so I won’t. Correct loading on a plane is vital to flight safety and people on the ground.

In my meeting with Qantas, their executives defended their behaviour as being ‘necessary to maintain viability’. Qantas have run their staff into the ground, cut staff pay to the bone, moved staff from full-time secure jobs to casual junk jobs, worked staff on shifts with not enough time to recover, provided insufficient training and supervision—and now things are going wrong. What a surprise! And they belted loyal, long-serving employees with COVID injection mandates. One Nation’s Fair Work Amendment (Equal Pay for Equal Work) Bill 2022 remains the only legislation before parliament designed to correct this unfair and dishonest corporate behaviour. It should have been in the government’s Fair Work Legislation Amendment (Secure Jobs, Better Pay) Bill 2022, but it’s not. Yet it’s not too late. Here it is.

I’ll now discuss the specific topics in the committee report. Firstly, the bill does not act widely enough. My bill allows the minister to add more than the seven awards this bill currently covers by using a disallowable instrument where exploitation occurs. It allows the minister to remove that listing should an industry stop exploiting. This is surely best practice? Only act where there’s a problem, and only for as long as the problem exists. Adding 700-plus awards ‘just in case’ will needlessly add to the cost and complexity of our industrial relations system.

Secondly, definitions of key concepts. The definitions enabled every submitter to correctly understand my bill’s intent, yet some of them went on to say the definitions were incomplete after correctly identifying the meaning of the words used. The wording was chosen carefully because once a term is given a specific meaning, that meaning is considered the term’s full meaning. Cunning lawyers use detailed definitions to limit a term’s application. This allows for deficiencies in definitions to be exploited as loopholes. I will not play the industrial relations club’s game. It’s up to the Fair Work Commissioner to decide if a labour hire agreement falls under this bill’s provisions. Should the Fair Work Commission fail to honour this legislation’s intent, then and only then should we wander into the legal minefield of definitions that become exclusionary rather than inclusionary. It’s time to start using clear language expressing clear principles and rely on the Fair work Commissioner to exercise their wisdom and knowledge and to follow these principles in their judgements.

My bill’s intention and action: my bill provides a provision to existing provisions that enterprise agreements must pass to meet the Fair Work Commission’s approval. This test is in section 321 of the Fair Work Act 2009 to show this equal pay for equal work provision is separate and additional to the better off overall test—the BOOT test. Section 321 is exactly where this provision belongs.

In conclusion, the supposed downside that some vested interests attribute in broad terms comes from the same entities who turned industrial relations into a club for their own profit and power at the workers’ expense. These entities do very well from complexity. Workers pay the price in so many ways. This must stop. If the government is serious about equal pay for equal work, get on with it. I thank senators contributing to this debate and look forward to bringing the bill to a vote at the next opportunity.

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Rushed Industrial Relations Reforms risk wrecking workplaces

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Labor’s Industrial Relations reforms have been rushed through the Parliament. The entire crossbench had previously agreed to hold off on passing the changes until the 273 page bill filled with technical changes could be properly analysed and understood.

Unfortunately, Labor has secured support after horse trading with Senator David Pocock. Senator Pocock caving in means that the rushed legislation (which is still being significantly amended up to the final hour) will sail through Parliament before anyone can understand any of the unintended consequences.

This is not how we should run the country.

Transcript

As a servant to the people of Queensland and Australia and to the workers and small businesses of our nation, I want to firstly thank the minister’s staff and the departmental staff for their briefings. I want to thank the many companies, unions, employer entities and workers. We listened.

The Hawke-Keating years broke the previous harsh, adversarial, mutually assured destruction policy in industrial relations in this country. Then we went back with the Fair Work Act from Julia Gillard in 2009—complex, prescriptive. The creators of this act do not understand industrial relations. A senior practical Labor MP whom I regard very highly said that Gillard’s Fair Work Act was a ‘backward step’, damaging Australia. It’s failed. Many want it changed. I know that union bosses like David Noonan and Michael Ravbar, for whom I have some regard, and Alex Bukarica and the ETU’s Michael Wright say that we need to change, that we need to get back to basics. Employer and industry groups say the same. Parliamentarians in this chamber say the same. How hard is it for workers to know their entitlements with this? It’s impossible. How hard is it to run a small business these days? It’s very difficult. This thing justifies the industrial relations club’s existence. Workers now kowtow to the industrial relations club.

Let’s go back to basics. Unions were formed in the 19th century to protect workplace basics; to protect pay, safety, entitlements, job security, retirement; to ensure fairness; and to strengthen workers’ bargaining power. Then we got laws to protect state and federal workers. Unions were doing a vital job. Politically they were omitted from being held accountable the way other organisations and company directors were. After successful union campaigns, governments legislated worker protections in employment, safety, industry and health legislation. Unions were no longer needed for those basic protections because they were enshrined in legislation, yet they had immunity from many provisions under the law and were effectively monopolies, with no competition among unions within industries. As with all monopolies, this was the result of government legislation. As with all monopolies, they faced no accountability from competitors. As with all monopolies, some union bosses abused this privilege.

In recent years, in this cosy life with no competition and no accountability, we saw abuses in the HSU, the SDA, the AWU and the CFMMEU in which union bosses stole workers’ money for personal, financial and other benefits, including brothels. In the 1990s I was good friends with Jim Lambley, the then CFMEU vice-president. He shared with me his thoughts that the union, which was once strong and powerful and genuinely committed to miners, was sloppy and not providing a service to its members. Times had changed; it needed to lift its game because traditional services were already legislated. As a result of neglect of union members, union membership in the private sector outside the Public Service is just nine per cent and falling.

Not all large unions have a monopoly or bosses that want to exploit them. I single out and compliment the TWU. They’ve had turmoil, just like every entity, but they’ve sorted themselves out. They’re represented here by Senator Sheldon and Senator Sterle—excellent advocates for the trade union movement, excellent advocates for workers, excellent advocates for Australians. One of the reasons is that the TWU contains not only employees and truck drivers but small businesses. The TWU is the largest entity with the largest membership of small businesses in this country. They work together to provide a service.

I was going to discuss the sheer abuse and exploitation of people in the Hunter Valley at the hands of the CFMMEU, combined with BHP, combined with Chandler Macleod, which is part of Recruit Holdings from Japan, the largest labour hire company in the world. Instead, I will ask a few questions of anyone watching today.

Labor titles its bill the Fair Work Legislation Amendment (Secure Jobs, Better Pay) Bill. Let me give you facts and ask you what you think. Firstly, the new bill omits any hint at the Fair Work Amendment (Equal Pay for Equal Work) Bill, my bill that has been pushed for months now and which aims to lift casual pay rates. Why? The Senate committee of inquiry agreed on the need for my bill. They said, ‘Let’s wait for Labor’s version,’ but it’s not in the bill that we see before us. My bill is ready to go, with certain awards that found no issues with it. How long do abused miners and airline staff need to wait? Let’s get the experience before widening it. Why not include my bill in this? We’ve researched it thoroughly. I asked last week and the minister’s staff said, ‘They’ve barely started consultation.’ Then they did so with the perpetrators of the heinous acts in the Hunter Valley and Central Queensland. They’re not interested in better pay. They’re not interested, and they’ve done nothing to include it.

Let’s look at job security. Well, look at COVID mismanagement; the phasing out of the coal industry and jobs under the Liberals, Nationals and Labor; the erosion of our rights and freedoms under COVID mismanagement; increasing energy prices; killing manufacturing and hurting agriculture; the lack of much-needed tax reform and much-needed economic reform; increasing debt; work health and safety systems being bypassed; Australia’s productive capacity being destroyed; the failure of our industrial relations systems and more; tax reform; high immigration flooding in and putting downward pressure on wages; and inflation. They’re not interested in job security at all.

Then let’s have a look at the summit. It was a sham. It was not a genuine, Paul Keating-style consultation. The government knew beforehand what they were going to do after the summit. The key items in this bill that they’ve now got in front of us in the chamber were not even raised in the summit topics. I wrote to Joel Fitzgibbon, the previous member for Hunter, on the abuses in the Hunter valley, and he refused to reply to me. It was the same with his replacement, Dan Repacholi, and the same with Minister Burke. They are not interested in job security, fairness or the law.

Now we’ve got a bill before us that is another 249 pages plus government amendments—150 amendments to their own bill in the lower house. That’s another 34 pages. They’re going to add more complexity, make it thicker, make it more difficult for people to understand. These 150 amendments confirm that the bill was hastily introduced and not thought through. If there are so many amendments needed and so many flaws can be identified in such a short time, how many will implementation in the real world expose, and who will pay for that? Workers will pay for that. Small business will pay for that. This is so flawed the government is making amendments to its own amendments!

This is a spit-and-hope bill. When the Australian Building and Construction Commission was introduced, there were months of consultation. When it was abolished, there was none. The same should apply to the whole bill. It needs debate. It needs to be deferred and considered properly. Who pays for this mess? The people: union members, small businesses, workers, communities and the nation.

Let’s have a look at the bill now. There are 27 parts, 13 substantive. Some are simply tidying, and that is good. Some are worthy improvements—minor but worthy—and that is good. Some big issues are not thought through. Some big issues have been thought through yet deceptively hidden because they don’t want the people to see them. Some issues were designed deliberately to confuse and to obfuscate. All is slapped behind the false labelling of enabling a pay rise and more secure jobs. This is what you get out of the south end of a north-facing bull. There is no mandate for stuff that’s been hidden—no mandate at all.

On 22 November 2022, Minister for Small Business Julie Collins failed to answer two core questions: how many small businesses will be drawn into wage bargaining and how much it will cost. They added another definition to the already 140 definitions of ‘small business’ across government departments. The government tells the people of Australia that the whole rationale behind this bill is to get wages moving, yet there’s no specific detail: how, when, who? There is nothing concrete, just broad, fluffy statements, typical of the Labor-Greens-teal coalition governing the Senate. Labor claims it will improve the bargaining position of small business and workers, so why do thousands of small businesses oppose it? Could it be due to this?

Why are union bosses given the power of veto to frustrate the bargaining process? Even if employees agree with the employer, they still can be vetoed by remote union bosses. Why are smaller employers locked into a process they do not support if they have a head count of more than 19 people, including those who choose to work only a few hours a week? Why isn’t the full-time equivalent used? As a result, large businesses can negotiate conditions smaller businesses cannot compete with. That aids large businesses to kill off smaller competitors, leading to fewer jobs, plus small businesses lack the resources to deal with the red tape.

The abolition of the Australian Building and Construction Commission illustrates the government’s aims and intent: rewarding union bosses with power. That’s what’s behind this bill. It means a return to the damaging days of industrial thuggery. Remember the BLF? The Dyson Heydon royal commission revealed so much thuggery in the CFMEU. There were court cases and criminal convictions. The ABCC worked. Labor abolished it. The coalition reintroduced it. Labor is now abolishing it. There were millions of dollars in fines. What will happen to them? There was violent behaviour, industrial blackmail, killing small businesses and restrictive work practices that cost taxpayers an additional 30 per cent on building costs. Who’s going to enforce the law now?

This bill will in the long run harm unions. It gives more power to union bosses over members and industry and generally in the community. Monopolies discourage responsibility and competitiveness of service and they reduce accountability. This bill entrenches the monopoly and makes it stronger.

Unions may receive a short-term boost, yet, long term, it will accelerate, sadly, the slide of declining union membership. Look in Queensland. Premier Palaszczuk aims to kill the Red Union. She is protecting the Queensland nursing union, who are big donors to Labor. She is trying to kill the Red Union, which is starting freely, because she wants to kill any competition to her union bosses that donate. This is not about higher pay and job security; it’s about giving union bosses power over industries, over companies and employers and over workers. Instead of returning to the pre-Hawke days, we need the reverse. We need to restore the primacy of the workplace, the employer/employee relationship, with employees free to bring in unions when they choose.

The big picture is that industrial relations needs comprehensive reform. We need to get away from the industrial relations adversarial approach that has plagued this country. It locks managements, executives, union bosses, consultants and lawyers into industrial relations games and not into improving businesses. Instead of having the brightest and best lawyers and accountants focused on how we can smash the opposition in this country, we need to focus on how we can smash the opposition in South Korea and Japan and China. They are our overseas competitors.

Industrial relations reform needs to be comprehensive, focus on the primacy of the employer/employee relationship and return to the days of Hawke-Keating, at least for a start. People need to focus on their business, not the corporation. Always around the world in workplaces people are focused on their workplace—that’s what people love. We need industrial relations reform that develops responsibility for the business. We need a short bill, instead of this monstrosity. We need about 20 pages of basic entitlements, and, instead of getting off the hook through lawyers with this monstrosity, we need clear provisions so that, if these basic provisions are violated, people go to jail. Workers are getting abused in this country. Small businesses are getting abused in this country. We need simple provisions and severe penalties.

Let’s consider the teals—David Pocock as a teal and the Labor-Greens-teal governing coalition. The governing coalition in this Senate is Labor-Greens-teal. Fifteen amendments he announced on Sunday. The government was going to do nine anyway! Four are corrections and another four are corrections to government oversights in the bill! The JobSeeker rate is irrelevant to the bill—horse trading! That leaves one amendment that Senator Pocock initiated. Union bosses will still be able to drag small business into multi-employer bargaining, and to get out of multi-employer bargaining those businesses will have to engage in expensive litigation. Welcome to the new Labor-Greens-teal coalition running this country, where the love of power is more important!

In conclusion, instead of the lies and pretence of this bill, we need honesty. Instead of boosting union bosses’ power, we need to make the employer/employee workplace relationship the focus to get Australia’s talent to the fore and to make us competitive again. Instead of adding more complexity and regulations, we need comprehensive industrial relations reform—simplicity, honesty, efficiency and real protection. This mess bypasses protections and leaves workers vulnerable and exposed. Above this building, we have one flag. We are one community, we are one nation and we work like hell to protect workers, protect small business and restore honesty in governance.

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