After an independent report vindicated One Nation and casual coal miner’s accusations of unscrupulous malpractice, the pressure has been on the Coal Long Service Leave Scheme to give workers a fair go and on Government to clean up their agency. Coal LSL initially tried to refuse coming to Senate Estimates and over the course of many more sessions repeatedly denied anything was wrong. We now know that was a lie.
Transcript
Chair.
Okay, thank you. I will go to Senator Roberts.
Thank you chair, and thank you for attending again. And, my first question is going to the to the minister, and I note that the KPMG review of Coal LSL report came out today.
Yes.
I haven’t seen it, but it came out.
Yes, it’s out.
So we’re looking forward to reading that. Thank you very much for arranging that.
Thank you for working so constructively with government on it.
Well, it’s a big concern as you know, for us, the coal miners in Queensland and New South Wales. Now, I note that KPMG was engaged to undertake the review of Coal LSL, in relation to the underpayment and abuse of casual coal miners. KPMG has also conducted the audit of Coal LSL. Doesn’t that create a conflict of interest? And what did you do to manage this conflict? Because the audit could have influenced the review and the review could have influenced the audit.
Look, I don’t regard that as giving rise to a conflict of interest. There was no direct financial interest for KPMG to do anything other than act consistently, with its duties as an independent examiner there.
Senator, I’m aware there was an audit,
and commissioned by the corporations, it’s conducted by PWC.
During procurement processor. When we selected an independent review and a KPMG, we looked at any consultant and at the time with engaged to buy. The corporations may causing a perception of a conflict interest, we have exclude them. So at the time we engaged KPMG and the KPMG wasn’t working with the collective corporations or any other projects, but Miss Pearl Kumar may have given updates on. Are they been engaging KPMG on the consult?
You welcome, thank Senator. Thank you, Senator.
I can confirm that KPMG has not been engaged by Coal LSL to conduct any work. They’ve not been involved in our internal audit programmes. They’re not engaged by the ANAO to do our external audit. So, from, yeah, I think we’re confident to say that any conflict of interest certainly wouldn’t exist with KPMG conducting that work on us.
Now I’m going to leave out my second question because the report may, the review report may address that. So I’ll just go straight to my third. When will Coal LSL fix its broken system that disadvantages coal miners, casual coal miners everywhere? And when would you remove the biassed and conflicted members from the board, so workers get a fair go? I’m talking here specifically about what I see and what we’ve talked about for a long time now. The conflicts of interest with having significant, well 50/50 minerals council in New South Wales and CFMEU from New South Wales involved. When will that be addressed?
Senator Roberts, without wanting to spoil your reading, because you know, spoiler alerts are sometimes needed on these things. One of the recommendations in the report is that there’d be independent directors added to the board and the expectation that that would assist with dealing with the problem you raise.
Okay. Thank you. We’re pleased to hear that. Last question, Chair. The one key resources case where many casual coal miners missed out on their fair pay back pay conditions, seems to have been blatant phoenixing to us. Yet, this rip-off of workers was accepted by your government, the courts, labour and the CFMEU and Hunter Valley. More needs to be done to protect casual coal workers to get equal pay and entitlements and safety. One nation has proposed the equal pay for equal work bill to protect casual coal workers. What are you doing to make sure that this doesn’t happen again people have lost there.
The KPMG report and I’ll paraphrase somewhat here, acknowledges that there has been difficulties and confusion associated with a lack of clarity on what constitutes a black coal worker and also the changing environment and timetables on which people work. It plans out our ways in which that can be dealt with so that we don’t face that problem in future. It also provides some good recommendations for how to resolve those concerns as they have arisen in the past. I’m optimistic that as we implement the government’s response to those recommendations, we will have that in a more satisfactory place for everyone involved.
Because this is affecting tens of thousands of families who are significantly underpaid compared with permanent workers doing the same job. But it’s just one of a suite of issues. This is just, it’s very important to coal miners. And we’ve been relentless in this, and we’re pleased to see what you’re doing, but it’s a one tiny aspect of the bigger picture, which we can.
Look, I share your sincere concern for making sure that this works for everybody. And that’s why I’m really optimistic that what’s come to us through the KPMG report, and all the recommendations to government have been accepted, in, you know one form or another. And I’m really pleased to say that we’ll be working to do what’s necessary to make all of that much more functional for the future.
I look forward to reading the report and thank you chair.
Australians have had their workplaces wrecked by the Government’s COVID mismanagement. Casual Coal miners have also been let down for years. I asked the Attorney General about this and more at Senate Estimates.
Transcript
Thank you, chair. And thank you all for attending today.
Nice to see you again, Mr. Hehir, it’s always a pleasure. I mean that sincerely. Minister, I’ll just read 11 points from my additional comments to the job insecurity inquiry report. These are the things that we see in addition to exploitation of casual coal miners which we’re gonna have a further discussion about tomorrow.
[Michaelia] Yes, you and I, yes we are.
Yes. And which we’ve been trying to make progress for a couple of years now, in addition to the exploitation of casual coal minors, Australians are suffering right now from what I consider to be COVID mismanagement both federal and state, due to capricious lockdowns and mandates. People are uncertain. The second thing is the phasing out of the coal industry and jobs under the part under the policies of all four major parties, the erosion of people’s rights and freedoms, especially workplace rights and freedoms in this context. Increasing energy prices which are decimating manufacturing and hurting agriculture. The killing of manufacturing as a consequence. The lack of much needed tax reform. The lack of much needed economic reform. Increasing debt. Workplace health and safety systems being bypassed. Australia’s productive capacity being destroyed. And this is the one I want to ask questions about, the failure around industrial relations systems and more. There’s a lot that’s hanging over workers heads. And small business in particular.
Okay.
Would you agree? And I think the solution in many cases is to come back to the basics of employer-employee relationship, the fundamental workplace relationship. So with regard to the coal miners in Queensland and especially the Hunter Valley, we’ve seen workplace safety and health jeopardised, bypassed, people threatened with firing, being fired if they raise safety issues, made a submission to the Grosvenor mining inquiry. The issue of Simon Turner, no worker’s compensation, no accident pay for injury, sacked while being injured, injuries and incidents not being reported, pay rates for casuals being 40% less than people on permanent employed by the mine owner, right next to them doing the same job and the same roster. Coal LSL, which I commend you for the report that’s come down today.
Thank you. And I think they’re coming later on to-
Yeah, we’ll be there.
Yeah, no, that’s what I thought. Yeah, you’ll be asking the questions, yes.
Yes. As we have been in every session for the last two years. The loss of coal miners, basic leave and other entitlements and the threats of dismissal. So these remain outstanding and still to be addressed. And we’ll be talking more about that tomorrow.
Yes.
What I see, minister… I’ll let you finish.
[Michaelia] No, I’m just having a look at something you’ve written, just to make sure I’m all over it. Yep.
My question is basically the exploitation of casuals, is I believe a symptom of a highly complex, needlessly complex industrial relations system that is not serving workers, not serving small business, and not serving some employees, and families and workers are getting jammed in the middle.
[Man] Does the report correctly address?
We see large companies, multinationals in particular, using casuals to bypass industrial relations systems instead of sitting down and negotiating with their workers and with the union we just see a bypassing through casuals. So what I’m asking you is, is there any understanding in your department that the exploitation of casuals is a signal or a symptom of the fractures in the industrial relation system?
Okay, there was a lot of commentary there but what I might do is hand over to Mr. Hehir, who obviously has looked at the job security report, and get him to take that question.
Thank you, Senator, for the question. In terms of the the casuals, it’s probably just worthwhile clarifying. So where casuals are employed by the company themselves they are still subject to the same industrial instruments that the company has either negotiated or the Fair Work Commission has made. So in terms of where the company itself is the employer, there is the negotiation and discussion process that you talked around the company having with its employee, where there’s an EA, should have occurred. So certainly there should be clear processes within any enterprise agreement around how the various employees will be treated and what they’re entitled to. I think in part, you are referring to the combination of casuals and labour hire?
[Roberts] Yep, thank you for picking that up.
So that does make for a more complex situation recognising that labour high would regard as less than 2% of the workforce traditionally, but it is an important mechanism that is used by both host employers for short term work when they need it. And as part of when the need arises. So recognising that it’s an important and valuable part of the economy. It’s clear that when it leads to different rates of pay it does cause some level of confusion. In terms of-
And beyond that it causes some kind of angst as well, and is not very helpful for safety.
I accept that. And I know that there’s been a number of comments within the report itself around that broad issue. It’s certainly something that the department will look at very carefully. It has been raised both within the main body of the report, as well as within your comments, in terms of how does that work? The reality is The Fair Work Act and the framework upon which it sits was designed around an employer being the legal entity that actually employs the person rather than necessarily the location where they work. So that’s the nature. And the Fair Work Act is clear that we have minimum rates of pay. But what we actually wanna see is higher rates of pay than the minimum, being negotiated by employers and employees. So that’s, I think one of the very clear principles within the bargaining provisions within the Fair Work Act, that we actually want to do that. The only mechanism that… and the mechanism is focused on the individual businesses. And in this case where you’ve got two businesses working, or the employees of two businesses working in the one location. I agree that can cause angst and confusion but it’s certainly something that we need to have a look at in response to the work. And that’s something that we’ll provide advice to the government on once we’ve had the opportunity to finalise our analysis of the report. But I having said that, the very important focus within the Fair Work Act is that we do want people to bargain. We do want businesses and employees to get together and to think about how they can increase productivity and then share that productivity in the form of increased profits and in increase wages. So, and the clearest mechanism to do that we feel at this point is on an individual business basis.
Thank you. You gave us a comprehensive understanding of, and I know you’ve got that, of the casual work situation and the abuse of that. And I’m certainly validating that some casuals want casual work, and I’m not just talking about the coal industry here, but even in the coal industry some casuals do want casual work. They prefer to have that option but there has been some abuse of that. And I believe that the complexities of the industrial relations system in this country right now make it as such that some employers, rather than facing up to negotiation they will bypass that and establish a labour hire relationship. Some labour hire companies are good employers, some are not and some rely upon basically cutting wages so that they can make a profit by getting the margin and still leaving the business owner with superior profits. So that’s definitely a strategy that we can see. So my question that I don’t feel was answered was that do you consider that the complexities… And the Act is what, this high? 600 odd pages? the complexities of that Act lead to workers, small businesses in particular, and even some big businesses, not having clear understanding of the employer-employee relationship. And so we dive into all kinds of other arrangements.
Senator, the Fair Work Act is a substantial piece of legislation. It does have a number of parts. But we’ve certainly heard commentary in the past that it’s complex and difficult, and we acknowledge that commentary. At the same time, and we do understand the importance of this as well. There are important workers protection, in terms of the bargaining process and other things in terms of making sure that the bargaining is done fairly. And certainly there is some concern that those procedures inhibit the bargaining but they’re also really important in terms of the principle of making sure that the bargain is fair. So getting that balance right is something that we continue to think about. We as a department, we honestly really engage in the discussion around productivity growth. We think it’s a significant issue for Australia and large parts of the Western world that productivity growth is low. And we would certainly encourage parties to bargain. But the reality is that the Act is based on both providing the opportunity to bargain but also making sure that those bargains are fair. And I think that’s sometimes where we see the complaints about complexity always happy to have a look and say, how can we attain that fairness in a more simplified fashion? And that’s where we-
And Senator Roberts, I mean, you often come with the Fair Work Act and the various iterations of it in terms of just to demonstrate how big it is and how much both employers and employees have to navigate. Because it’s both parties understanding their rights and obligations. And certainly without a doubt, it is a complex Act. And it was one of the reasons, you and I discussed this. It was last year now, I think, the stimulation to the reforms to casual employment providing a definition, to provide clarity, as to what a casual is. Offering the ability to convert to permanent work, clarifying the Rossato decision, the devastating 39 billion impact on the double dipping and what that would’ve done to business. So I do agree with you and we certainly have been able to make some headway in relation to parts of it, but obviously the other parts of the omnibus bill didn’t get the support, but they are, I think, some concrete examples of where you can actually put in place. So for example, an actual definition, give the ability to convert, clean up a court decision and actually give certainty to employers. But I certainly acknowledge that this is something that you raise time and time again.
Yeah, and the fundamental-
Can I just check how long we have to go? I usually like to rotate the call every 15 minutes,
Another 10 minutes.
That’s absolutely fine.
What I’m getting at, minister, is that the fundamental problem is that despite the intentions of everyone involved the Fair Work Act, the previous work choices attempt the marren complexity, lack of understanding the fundamentals. And what’s happening with the Fair Work Act is that the workers and some small businesses and even some large employers are sidelined in favour of the industrial relations club. Lawyers, consultants, HR practitioners, large union bosses, large industry groups and the worker is sidelined. And so do you see any need then for restoring the primacy of the workplace relationship, the employer-employee relationship, and I know that the fair work Act, Mr. Hehir, does have protections in it, but when it’s so complex, the protections get lost. And so making it clear on workers’ rights, entitlements, protections, safety, which I know assist productivity. So instead of these things being bypassed they’re actually entrenched and allowing for flexibility because more and more workers today see alternative structures of work and work times in particular whether it be uni students or small businesses or casual coal miners, they want that.
And I think you make an important point in terms of the ability for, in particular employees, to choose the type of work that they want to want to undertake. And that is why you’ll never find the coalition government in any way, demonising casual employment as so often happens. And in particular, in this committee it is a valid form of work that so many choose. And when we can take you through the statistics in relation to casual employment. But also that landmark reform that we did pass in terms of that ability to actually convert should you wish subject to certain conditions. Again, it’s about giving both the employer and the worker, the employee, the choice to do that. Just in terms though of people actually understanding their rights, very important obligations, very important under the Fair Work Act. I think a lot of the work that The Fair Work Ombudsman does and in particular, that investment in its educative role is so important, working with small businesses, because there’s often the small businesses that don’t have that capacity to understand the Fair Work Act. And they’ll be on later on today, if you want to come back and ask them questions in terms of what is the educative role of The Fair Work Ombudsman.
We asked that at the last estimates.
We can get an update then of these estimates. But that’s a really good point because it’s not just about the Fair Work Act itself, as you’ve acknowledged, there are other ways and means, and one of them is ensuring that The Fair Work Ombudsman is able to get out there, talk to employees, talk to employers, and actually educate them on what their rights and responsibilities are.
I know that I’ve had a very positive response and fact agreement that David Newman from the CFMEU, Michael Raba from the CFMEU and from Queensland, from the Business Council, Australia, from Small Business Associations, that they’d be willing to sit down in a process to explore a much simpler and better and more effective industrial relations frame work. So I know an election is coming so I’m not expecting you to make any commitment and this is a touchy area but is there any appetite for that if it’s done properly?
Oh, well, I think when you look at the work that the coalition government has done you look at the omnibus bill that we brought forward. I mean, that was certainly done in a period of over 12 months, I believe. In terms of the consultations amongst different stakeholders. Unfortunately, when we brought it to the floor of the parliament, it wasn’t supported by the Australian Labor Party. But I think our appetite for making things simpler and in particular, as I said, the coalition reforms through casual employment and in particular cleaning up the issue of double dipping and the potential devastating impact of the $39 billion impost on business, I think does show a genuine commitment to working with all stakeholders to improve the system.
And with due respect, I just wanna finish with this point. I think that that casuals conversion was needed and essential. The shame was bogged down in so much misrepresentations by a lot of people, but quite frankly, I think that was tinkering and not reform. It was reform of casuals, but not reform of industrial relations.
[Michaelia] Understood.
Thank you, Senator.
Thank you, chair.
[Michaelia] A lot of .
I’d like to say one thing. As the minister indicated the casual amendments, the bill, that does introduce the national employment standards casual conversion and national employment standards. And does simplify assistance prior to that introduction into the NAS, you got a different conversions in the awards in the enterprise agreement, in the particularly black coal mining industries, there are confusion about whether the peoples are eligible for conversion or not. There are peoples who may not have a conversion, there was a gap. So by introducing it into the Fair Work Act as a national employment standards that provides a universal right to all the employees and in certain ways also simplified the systems.
And I accept that and appreciate what you said, Ms. Yang. The fact that the black coal mine award prevented, excluded casuals yet there was still casuals under various types of enterprise agreements, which were not, I don’t believe they complied with the law, indicates that the industrial relation system is a mess. But that’s why we supported the introduction of casual conversion because it does clarify things for people. But there’s a long, long way to go to fix this mess.
Yes, and the casual conversion does now apply to the people’s covered by the Black Coal Mining Award.
Despite possibly tipping more into their entitlements from working more hours, casual miners pull out less on the other end from the entitlements pool at Coal LSL. I also queried $33 million dollars that has been paid out at Coal LSL with no description of why.
If that wasn’t enough, we also believe there are money laundering risks due to insufficient record keeping and the amount of money being held by Coal LSL. The entire model and governance needs a root and branch review as it is totally inadequate.
Transcript
[Chair]
Senator Roberts.
[Malcolm Roberts]
Thank you, Chair. And thank you for coming again. First of all, The Coal LSL Scheme. The Coal Long Service Leave Scheme was established specifically for the Coal Mining Sector. Is that correct?
[Witness]
That’s correct. Back in 1949, The portable long service leave scheme was established.
[Malcolm Roberts]
Thank you. The objective of this scheme is to provide long service leave for employees in the Coal Mining Sector. Is that correct?
[Witness]
For eligible employees who are defined under the Admin Act? Yes.
[Malcolm Roberts]
The scheme provides the ability for employees to request to be paid extra amounts directly rather than contributing into the scheme. If they do this, it immediately becomes their money rather than going into the pool funded Coal LSL. Is that correct?
[Witness]
You’re referring to the clause on Waiver Agreements,
[Malcolm Roberts]
Yes
[Witness]
Senator, I believe and that is underpinned by a separate regulation, but yes Waiver Agreements are enabled under the legislation.
[Malcolm Roberts]
Thank you. Coal LSL has a guidance note explaining how it calculates the “levies” on the eligible wages for coal employees. It provides two formulas; one for casual employees and one for permanent employees. Casual employees are required to pay the levy on all hours worked. Whereas permanent employees contribute based on a maximum of 35 hours per week. Is that correct?
[Witness]
It’s the employers who are paying Senator, but 3B under the Payroll Levy Collection Act does outline how the different calculations are to be performed by the employer. And they are linked to the employees classification, employment classification but the employer is paying that payroll levy.
[Malcolm Roberts]
So, a casual employee though, accept that so casual employee working the same weekly shifts as a permanent employee pays in more because they contribute on all hours worked whereas a permanent pays not more than for 35 hours. Is that correct?
[Witness]
No, the employer is paying the levy and it is a different calculation. So it is linked to different assessment of hours. That’s correct, but the formula is different between the two classifications.
[Malcolm Roberts]
When it comes to a crowing and taking long service leave casuals and permanents are treated differently again. Permanents automatically get long service leave accrued for the maximum of 35 hours , regardless of the hours worked in that week. But the casual only gets it for the actual hours worked in a week. If the roster patterns of a casual don’t fall neatly in a week, there is the potential for them to work the same shift pattern as a permanent employee yet accrue less entitlement than a permanent on the same shift. Is that correct?
[Witness]
Correct. In the sense we’re relying on the hours reported for the employees working week to inform the accrual calculation for the casual employee. That’s correct.
[Malcolm Roberts]
So casual employees working in the coal mining sector can work the same weekly shifts as a permanent employee, but pay more in levies to Coal LSL through their employer and get a lower accrual of long service leave than a permanent employee. This is despite working the same shifts. They pay in more, their employer pays in more on their behalf but they get less out of it. Is that a fair outcome?
[Witness]
I don’t agree that the employers paying more in that scenario Senator, because they are very different formulas that are linked to the wages that are paid for each in different employee. So I don’t agree that is as simple as the way it’s been described. And I’d also say for the casual who is working the 35 hour week, they will accrue the same entitlement as the full-time equivalent. So if they are working the 35 hour week and the employer reports those hours they’ll accrue that full-time equivalent.
[Malcolm Roberts]
A lot of them are not working that 35 hour week, if they’re on production, they’re on a roster.
[Witness]
We’re relying on the hours and yeah
[Malcolm Roberts]
Yeah, we’ve seen what happens with that relying on employers hours. This is in the past, this is all based on a Coal LSL guidance note, which interprets the act. Given the potential for such an inequitable outcome, is it possible that your interpretation is wrong?
[Witness]
No, I’m confident our interpretations right. It’s been through legal channels over the years and that guidance note is verified. It has not been tested in a court as such but it has been formulated based on legal interpretation.
[Malcolm Roberts]
When the coal, this is the last question on this thread. I’ve got some more on others. When the coal long service leave system was established for coal mine workers. Do you think that it was intended to make one employee through their employer pay so much more and get less?
[Witness]
I don’t agree, that it’s as simple as that Senator.
[Malcolm Roberts]
Sorry.
[Witness]
Okay. The intent of the scheme coming back to the intent of a long service leave scheme is for the employee to access a benefit when they meet certain milestones. So i think the intent of the scheme is structured correctly and that all workers should be able to access an equivalent entitlement when they meet the AES qualifying service milestone.
[Malcolm Roberts]
Okay. So moving on to another topic, do you ensure that casuals are made aware that they do not have to pay contributions paid to coal LSL and that they may be able to X to be paid the approximate 2% cash in hand, so they can elect to take the cash instead of having it accumulated.
[Witness]
Colleague will talk to the detail their regs of a Waiver Agreement.
So Peter Kembrey, General Manager legal calls Hill. Senator there is information on our website in regard to the Waiver Agreements. I think it is important to point out that Waiver Agreements are only available for a small category of employees. So they’ve targeted. The intent of that is for people coming to either on high incomes or coming to the end of over 55 that already have the 8 years qualifying service or have no qualifying service to be able to redirect those contributions as you say, to other forms of savings whether that be superannuation, which is the commonly what we see is, is the conversation that we have with people that are interested in that. So most people in this game, can’t quote don’t count
[Malcolm Roberts]
But those who are eligible for the Waiver, are they notified?
[Witness]
Well, they are not notified individually but there is information in respect of
[Malcolm Roberts]
So they’re not notified. They could have to go to a website, which they might not know about.
[Witness]
Senator. We don’t know the ages of people necessarily who are in the fund.
[Malcolm Roberts]
No, but no employers do it either. Is that right?
[Witness]
I can’t speak for what employers do, but
[Malcolm Roberts]
Do you tell the employers that they need to do it?
[Witness]
Well, we don’t instruct the employers to do it but we certainly make it clear to employees that information in regard to aspects of the fund are contained on the website. There is information in regard to Waiver Agreements, better than say the waiver Agreements. There’s no many people in the fund or a significant minority of people in the fund can actually apply for these.
[Malcolm Roberts]
From the research we’ve done into Coal LSL it would seem that when an employer registers an employee with Coal LSL, that Coal LSL just asks for a name and a date of birth. Does this mean that because you did not take a Tax file number that you are not able to verify that people named are indeed real people that they exist. What do you do to verify they are real people and provide me with a summary of the last three occasions when this was done.
[Witness]
Sorry. The last three occasions we verified people
[Malcolm Roberts]
When you verified someone was done.What was real?
[Witness]
My understanding of the process is when a new entrant comes. Firstly, I say, we are not authorised to collect tax file numbers. That would mean amendments in legislations. So it’s not it.
[Malcolm Roberts]
Is anyone raised that with the government?
[Witness]
It’s been raised, but like, it’s there’s very few entities that can do that. But, so we don’t collect tax file numbers at this point in time.
[Malcolm Roberts]
But you collect names and dates?
[Witness]
We collect names and dates of birth.
[Malcolm Roberts]
And you collect money
[Witness]
And we collect money, Yes. We collect money and we keep records of entitlements but we write to those new entrants into the scheme at the time that they appear on it. So we get their addresses, we contact them and we follow them up in regard to this is what we’ve been told, are these details correct? Particularly in cases where there might be employers registering them in registering them in regard to historical service. So we asked, we say this is what the records we’ve been given. Can you verify these are correct.
[Malcolm Roberts]
So let me continue then. Also from the research we have done, I was concerned to see reference to approximately $33 million in levy reimbursements made to entities with a statement beside it saying, “not readily available”. This is a lot of money to have no detail attached to it. Can you explain what’s happening. And I can give you a reference in the report, given last Senate estimates. The report was EEC-BE20-82, pages 121-144. As you provided to me.
[Witness]
Senator, the further detail that we provided in that written response to the question on notice was to explain why that reference was associated to a number of the transactions. So in the Excel spreadsheet that were provided to you which was data from July 17 to June, 2020 had 5,594 lines. And there was a 100 or 407 odd lines, which had that category. The reason being we insourced our operations in 2017. So when we took over the administration from the previous administrator that resulted in us implementing a new financial system. So all the records live in the administration system going back to day one. So all the historical records reside there which is the employees entitlements, the money in and the money out. We, and in our response to we said it would be an unreasonable division of resources to be able to extract that data because we were only migrating it to our new finance system from 2017 where we’re able to readily access the data through reporting frameworks that had been established. So the period of three months where we had that description that we explained in our response to the QON that was that migration stage. And all of the detail, I’ll say migration hadn’t been established but I do assure you, it will always residing in the administration system but it would be unreasonable allocation of time and money to be able to put a reporting framework around that, to extract that data, as you requested.
[Malcolm Roberts]
So you don’t know about it then. You don’t know
[Witness]
No, we do know about it
[Malcolm Roberts]
But you know about it but you don’t know the identities.
[Witness]
No, we do. It lives in the administration system and should we receive inquiries at a transactional level, We will investigate or access that transaction to pay but to pull thousands, hundreds of thousands of lines of records out of that system, establish the reporting framework to extract that in the timeframe that was needed. It was an unreasonable allocation of resources to extract that. And we’ve provided you with the information that was readily available.
[Malcolm Roberts]
Thank you. I note from records provided that registered and unregistered employers, make long service leave contributions. And then in some instances they claim the funds back. Yet I’ve seen no evidence whether these bulk refunds made by Coal LSL are linked to a list of employees or that if employees are referred to that, they are real people. To me, this leaves open the question as to whether the coal LSL could leave themselves open to claims of potential money laundering. Do you ensure that the money laundering does not happen? And if so, how, how do you do it?
[Witness]
It would be highly unlikely for money laundering to be existing in the fund. For an employer to come into this scheme, through a registration project process, we verify their details through ASIC, ABN and verify their bank banking details. So their, the source information that we rely on to ascertain that the employer or the entity is a found entity. The employer would then need to have an employee in their records for years of years of service and paying a levy for that period in order to see that that employee meets the qualifying service provisions and then ultimately access any reimbursement from the fund should that employee access their long service leave. So it is, there are many hurdles that an employer would need to jump through over a very extended timeline in order to launder money through our fund. So first up, Senator Roberts look at the time, we’ve got a minute left. So the one very quick question or we have to ask you to put the rest on notice, please.
[Malcolm Roberts]
How many board members or members of the bodies they represent have been on either registered or unregistered companies that made contributions and or received reimbursements from Coal LSL? Could you please provide a list of them and the entity names and the dollar value of all the transactions.
