Industrial Relations (Child Employment) Bill
Industrial Relations Further Amendment Bill
Workers Compensation Amendment (Permanent Impairment Benefits) Bill
INDUSTRIAL RELATIONS (CHILD EMPLOYMENT) BILL
INDUSTRIAL RELATIONS FURTHER AMENDMENT BILL
WORKERS COMPENSATION AMENDMENT (PERMANENT IMPAIRMENT BENEFITS) BILL
Page: 3826
Second Reading
Debate resumed from 24 October 2006.
Mr CHRIS HARTCHER (Gosford) [9.05 p.m.]: It is not without irony that we debate these bills tonight after the High Court today brought down its decision on the Federal Workplace Relations Amendment Act, known as WorkChoices. The New South Wales Government made much of its opposition to the Federal legislation and spent some $2 million of taxpayer's money in a futile and fruitless challenge to that legislation in the High Court. Dozens of barristers have been enriched by the Government's extravagance. It achieved nothing. It was an empty political gesture. The $2 million would have been far better spent on crumbling infrastructure in any number of areas in New South Wales—schools, hospitals, police and roads. The Government chose to spend that money for its own political purposes. I will deal with each of the bills in turn. The Industrial Relations (Child Employment) Bill was announced with great fanfare by the Government. This is a Government that runs on press releases and press conferences—nothing really happens apart from the press conference.
Mr Daryl Maguire: All spin and no substance.
Mr CHRIS HARTCHER: As the honourable member for Wagga Wagga so accurately puts it, the Government is all spin and no substance—or, to use that great American phrase, it is all sizzle and no steak. The Government learnt well from the lessons of the Hon. Bob Carr—he of unhappy memory—who was all about press conferences and not about serious governing at all. He never got beyond being Leader of the Opposition, and he never rose above being a journalist. He thought governing New South Wales was the same as writing articles for newspapers: that it was all about what spin could be put on the news, not what could be achieved. That is why nobody, but nobody, looking back on his ten years has any kind words to say about him. He was a failure, and the New South Wales community is suffering as a result.
In the great fanfare that accompanied the Industrial Relations (Child Employment) Bill we were told that all persons under the age of 18 years suddenly would be brought under the State system and that the Federal legislation would not apply to them. After much media spin and many press conferences and addresses, especially by the Minister for Industrial Relations, John Della Bosca in the Legislative Council, about what great things the Government was doing, we now have the Industrial Relations (Child Employment) Bill 2006. As was said by an eighteenth century philosopher: The mountain has conceived and brought forth a mouse.
This legislation seeks to exploit a so-called loophole in the Federal Workplace Relations Act that exempts State laws designed to protect children from the operation of the Federal Workplace Relationship Laws. This is a blatant political attempt by the New South Wales Government at getting some spin from this exemption in the Federal legislation. We will be interested to find out, and we will in time, just how constitutionally valid the New South Wales legislation is. Presumably it will be held to be invalid at some stage, but that does not worry the New South Wales Government, because it is only interested in spin. It does not care whether the legislation is enforced. It has achieved its objective of grabbing a newspaper headline. Given the events of the last few weeks, not just last week, that involved the Hon. Carl Scully, the Hon. Kerry Hickey and Mr Milton Orkopoulos, and John Della Bosca paying parking fines out of taxpayer revenue, not a lot of media attention is on the Government's stunts on workplace relations, and there will not be much publicity.
The bill supposedly imposes conditions on New South Wales corporations relating to the employment of persons under the age of 18; sets out minimum employment conditions, including rates of pay, loading, and penalty rates for workers under the age of 18; and generally seeks to bring all persons under the age of 18 employed by a corporation under the New South Wales industrial relations system. We will see how valid the legislation is and how much of a stunt it is. The High Court ruled by five votes to two that the Federal workplace laws are valid. The New South Wales Government expected that, but that did not stop it from spending $2 million of our money. We will see how far the stunt goes.
I think the people in New South Wales are a bit tired of the Government and its media stunts. They want the Government to do something about the water crisis and the drought. They want the Government to do something about the crumbling infrastructure in trains, electricity and roads. They want the Government to increase police numbers to provide an effective police presence. They want the Government to end the understaffing in our hospitals and the ongoing problems in emergency wards of our hospitals. They want the Government to fix up our schools and stop them from decaying any further, particularly the toilets, and to give proper support to our teachers.
They want the Government to govern! I know it is a surprise to the Government that the people of New South Wales are asking it to govern, to do what it was elected to do, and to fulfil its constitutional task and the oath of office, rather than engage in meaningless spin. The best example of spin was the great helicopter trip by the Premier yesterday, when he carefully avoided meeting any members from the Hunter. He would not even land the helicopter in the Hunter. He wanted the big bird's eye view before heading back and ensuring that he was shown on TV in the hope of convincing people that he was achieving something for the State—when all he did was promise a dam that will not be built for another 10 years. In another 10 years all will be solved! The Industrial Relations (Child Employment) Bill is part of ongoing spin.
The Industrial Relations Further Amendment Bill 2006 is designed to allow the New South Wales Industrial Relations Commission [IRC] to hear cases in which an employee claims to have been dismissed for reporting breaches of the Occupational Health and Safety Act. This is yet another attempt to exploit an exemption under the Federal legislation, which does not apply to occupational health and safety, but remains in force in the various States and Territories. The Iemma Government, Mr Della Bosca and his advisers thought that this was a chance to pull another media stunt and provide spin. They found a way for the Industrial Relations Commission to hear unfair dismissal cases: if an employee is unfairly dismissed for reporting a breach under the Occupational Health and Safety Act, the IRC will have jurisdiction and will take advantage of the exemption granted under Federal legislation.
This is another very obvious, very blatant attempt not to achieve anything for workers but to put a spin on what the New South Wales Government is doing so that when Ministers address union meetings and attend Labor Party branches they can talk about what a great job they are doing in circumventing the Federal legislation. They can put their hands on their hearts when addressing the annual conference of the Australian Labor Party and say how hard they fought the Federal legislation, knowing that this legislation can now be overridden by the Federal Parliament, should it so desire. It is yet another meaningless gesture.
The Industrial Relations Commission will have no jurisdiction over constitutional corporations and unfair dismissals. As a result of the High Court decision today, the commission's power over unfair dismissals will be confined to the very narrow band of cases in which people are employed by an individual employer or in which the corporation that employs them is not a constitutional corporation, that is, a financial trading or foreign corporation, or in which the employee is an employee by the Crown. They are the only cases in which the IRC will have jurisdiction.
This legislation is an attempt to open the door to give the IRC a little bit more power, in the hope that the IRC will open the crack wider until, by a series of judgments, the door is totally open. But if that does not happen the State Government does not care because it will have made yet another gesture to the union movement, which, in many respects, has had its day. Union membership in the private sector is now less than 16 per cent, which means that 84 per cent of people in the private sector choose not to belong to a union.
If we were to take away the coercive Construction, Forestry, Mining and Energy Union [CFMEU], particularly in the construction and mining industries, both of which form part of the private sector, and allow people in both those industries a free choice, that 16 per cent would drop to about 6 per cent. Unions in the private sector have had their day. They are part of ancient history because the public has lost faith in them.
It is not for members of Parliament to say whether the unions are past tense in the history of industrial relations in this country. The people have made that decision, and those who work in the private sector have decided not to join the union. Even in the public sector, only 48 per cent of employees belong to a union, be it the Public Service Association or any other union. Once again, the majority of people in the public sector choose not to belong to a union. The number of public sector employees in a union is inflated when one considers that almost every police officer joins the Police Association and almost every teacher joins the Teachers Federation. But even the majority of public sector employees, who have the right to choose whether to be in a union, choose not to be in one.
The Government's base of relying on trade union money and trade union manpower is shrinking. It does everything it can to prop up the trade union movement. It passes every piece of legislation it can. It makes every gesture it can to encourage trade union involvement and to allow union officials to feel important, but union officials know they are working and operating from a shrinking base. They will achieve very little if they continue to rely upon the Australian Labor Party. As everyone knows, the majority of workers in the State, including most unionists, vote for John Howard. The statistics are there for everyone to see: The majority of union members voted persistently for John Howard in 1996, 2001 and 2004. They did not vote for John Howard in 1998, but they did in 1996, 2001 and 2004. I am glad to note the presence in the Chamber of the Minister for Local Government. He was not previously a member of a union, but he is now. I would like to hear his views on parking fines and driving in this State, and the Opposition would welcome his contribution to the debate. But I digress.
This legislation is just another empty gesture and another nail in the coffin of this decaying Government. If ever a Government was rotten to the core, it is this Government. Everyone associated with this Government is part of a mere edifice that is falling down at a great rate. Let me examine the third cognate bill, the Workers Compensation Amendment (Permanent Impairment Benefits) Bill. The Government is always saying what a great job it is doing in relation to workers compensation. When this bill was announced we were told that that it would increase benefits to permanently impaired workers by 10 per cent, and that did sound good. However, let me examine the fine print of the bill. The bill applies only to injuries suffered after 1 January 2007. This legislation is a con trick. Not a single worker who is already injured or who will be injured between now and 1 January 2007 will derive any benefit from this bill.
As there is a lead time of between 18 months and two years before matters are determined by a commission, especially permanent impairment which takes a long while to determine, in the overwhelming majority of cases the legislation will not come into effect until 2008 or 2009. I received a letter from the Law Society of New South Wales relating to the so-called wonderful improvements for injured workers. Aside from the fact that workers have to wait to be injured until after 1 January 2007, workers compensation benefits are not indexed. By increasing benefits by 10 per cent, the Government is doing no more than catching up with the rate of inflation. This bill provides no sudden surge in benefits for workers at all. The letter written by the Law Society states:
However, limiting the application of the legislation to injuries after 1 January 2007 instead of claims after that date means that workers will not begin to benefit until their injuries stabilise to allow WPI assessments to be made. It usually takes about 18 months to two years for this to occur. Therefore the increased benefits will not begin to be paid until well into 2008 and in many cases 2009 and beyond.
Honourable members do not have to take my word for this. The Law Society spelled it out in its letter dated 25 October 2006. The letter goes on to state:
This is in stark contrast to the recent benefits to employers in terms of premium reductions, which have an immediate effect.
So the so-called premium rate deductions come into force at once, but the workers have to wait until 2009. The letter goes on to state:
The Law Society calls for the limitation in the Savings and transitional provisions of the Bill to be removed, so that all injured workers with pending claims and who are entitled to compensation for permanent impairment may benefit from the increase.
The compensation available to injured people has decreased in real terms under the Workers Compensation Legislation Amendment Bill introduced in 2002 as part of the Carr Government's draconian tort reforms because benefits paid under the current regime are not indexed by reference to movements in annual weekly earnings, as occurs for compensation paid under the Motor Accidents Act 1988 and the Motor Accidents Compensation Act 1999.
There is no indexation of workers compensation benefits. The actual benefits received by workers after injury have been decreased because they are not adjusted for inflation whereas other benefits, such as those paid under the Motor Accidents Compensation Act, are indexed to take account of inflation. This legislation is from the party that wants to protect workers in this State, so it says, especially workers who are tragically injured; yet it does nothing for them. With sleight of hand the Government states that benefits will increase by 10 per cent after 1 January 2007 for workers who were injured after 1 January 2007, but that 10 per cent makes no allowance for the factor of inflation since the Carr Government introduced legislation in 2002. It does not take account of the inflation of 2002, 2003, 2004, 2005 and 2006.
Moreover, workers will wait until 2007 and 2008, making a total of seven years of inflation at an average of 1.5 per cent or 2.5 per cent each year. The 10 per cent increase provided in the bill does not make up for inflation rate rises since 2002. Let the Labor Party and the Labor Government pretend that it is looking after workers in the face of a 10 per cent increase that does not even meet increases in inflation over the past seven years. So much for the party of the workers! So much for the party of the working class! The letter from the Law Society goes on to state:
The Bill adds insult to the 95% of people injured in workplace accidents and now unable to access compensation for their pain and suffering due to the harsh whole person impairment thresholds.
It is now time for urgent reform to the injury compensation legislation, and the introduction of some serious reforms, rather than the token response the Government has offered with this Bill.
They are not my words, or the words of the New South Wales Coalition. Those statements were made by the Law Society of New South Wales which represents 15,000 solicitors in this State. The Law Society has determined that this bill is a token response, and the letter to which I referred was signed by the President of the Law Society of New South Wales.
The House has before it tonight two industrial relations bills which are empty attempts at spin. They are empty attempts to win over the trade union movement and they represent this Government pretending to look after workers. The bill will achieve nothing at all for the workers. This bill represents an attempt by the Government to exploit exemptions granted under the Workplace Relationships Act for child employment and occupational health and safety. In a final act of spin, the bill purports to provide a 10 per cent increase for permanently impaired workers, but it does not even keep pace with inflation and will not come into effect until 2008 or 2009. So much for the claims of the Governments that it is looking after workers in New South Wales! So much for the claims of this Government that it is looking after permanently impaired and injured workers in New South Wales.
Mr NEVILLE NEWELL (Tweed—Parliamentary Secretary) [9.22 p.m.], in reply: The three bills before the House, the Industrial Relations (Child Employment) Bill, the Industrial Relations Further Amendment Bill, and the Workers Compensation Amendment (Permanent Impairment Benefits) Bill, are each, in their own way, an important part of this Government's vision for maintaining fair and equitable treatment for both employers and employees in this State. The New South Wales Government has proposed the Industrial Relations (Child Employment) Bill because it is becoming more and more apparent that WorkChoices is not just unfair but encourages employers to adopt poor industrial relations practices that inhibit productivity improvements. Children are particularly at risk in such an environment.
WorkChoices suggests that it is appropriate for employers to reduce wages and alter conditions of employment, such as overtime, shift and penalty rates. Employers cannot be blamed because WorkChoices encourages them to compete by reducing their labour costs. Under WorkChoices, young workers stand to risk losing a range of conditions and entitlements: Saturday penalty rates have gone, Sunday penalty rates have gone, overtime rates have gone, rest breaks have gone, ordinary hours have gone, annual leave loading has gone, roster protections have gone, first aid allowances have gone, meal allowances have gone, and the uniform allowance has gone. I ask the Opposition what type of odds it would give to a child successfully negotiating a positive outcome. What bargaining power does a child have? I have been appalled by what I have heard is happening to kids under WorkChoices. I will deal with that in more detail shortly.
The Opposition spokesman indicated that the State Government had spent over $2 million in a worthless campaign in the High Court. The $2 million claim is just not true, nor was the campaign worthless. The cost to the State Government today is some $380,000. With the awarding of costs, the bill will total no more than $1 million. The honourable member for Gosford may think that the Government undertook this as a media stunt, and may even think that the media is not interested. The Government did not undertake the challenge in the High Court for those reasons. No matter whether the media is interested or not, the Government was in court attempting to defend the workers. I commend the Minister for taking that action. The Government was protecting workers, their conditions and the future of Australian working conditions.
So far it has been kids working as trolley collectors who have been the lowest paid of all: some are paid just $3.50 an hour. The media has reported other kids working for as little as $4 an hour. One caller to the New South Wales Fair Go Advisory Service told how his 17-year-old son was paid just $6.75 an hour after tax by his incorporated landscaper employer, which is between one-half and two-thirds of what he would have been paid under the award's junior rates. Like the New South Wales Fair Go Advisory Service, other States have also seen a spike in calls and complaints: kids working for $6.50 an hour; a major fast food chain asking their young workers to pay a $30 deposit for their uniforms; other employers asking young workers to pay several weeks wages to buy their uniforms, or more than $10 for the name tags the staff are required to wear. There have been other horror stories too. Under WorkChoices employers have tried to make their young workers work for free! One well-known pizza franchise told its young workers that for every minute they were late for a shift they would have to work an extra five minutes without pay.
Mr John Turner: Point of order: The Parliamentary Secretary has been here long enough to know that he is supposed to reply to the debate, to reply to the contribution of the honourable member for Gosford. He has touched on that, but is now going into the realm of a second reading speech. A reply should be in response to what was said in the debate.
Madam ACTING-SPEAKER (Ms Marie Andrews): Order! I am sure the Parliamentary Secretary will confine his remarks to the bill.
Mr NEVILLE NEWELL: Indeed, I certainly will, and I will address the implications of the bill because that is what it is all about. In reply to a second reading debate, I will address what was said during debate regarding the conditions that apply or do not apply to employees, as suggested by members opposite. That deserves a reply, and I will certainly do that. Another young worker, desperate to get a job, managed to find work in a restaurant. He was asked to work an unpaid work trial, a practice that is illegal in New South Wales. He did a good job and was asked to come back. In fact, he spent five months going to work on an unpaid trial basis. But what takes the WorkChoices cake are the cheap, nasty and ugly Australian Workplace Agreements employers are offering young workers.
We all remember Amber Oswald, a 16-year-old worker from the northern beaches of Sydney, who was terminated from her job at a juice bar and rehired on an Australian Workplace Agreement [AWA]. Her hourly rate dropped from $9.52 to $8.57 and no penalty rates were payable. A recent Roy Morgan poll found young workers aged 14 to 17 are those most likely to be employed under an AWA. In the first two months of WorkChoices, 1,162 workers under 18 years signed AWAs approved by the Office of the Employment Advocate, and 675 of those AWAs, half of them, covered young workers in retail and hospitality, the industries where two-thirds of young workers in New South Wales are employed. With this bill those young workers' pay and conditions will now be at least equivalent to the State awards that cover those industries.
The New South Wales Government has heard a lot about AWAs through callers to the Fair Go Hotline. One AWA that a student called in about was meant to be better than the State award, according to the employer, yet it contained no penalties and a flat hourly rate less than the award. The really sad part is that even with this information the student did not want to approach the employer because of fear of losing the job. A mother called in, saying that her 16-year-old daughter had been asked to think about what she would like in her AWA as her restaurant employer had said he would negotiate new conditions, except that conditions such as penalty rates and loadings were off the bargaining table and not up for negotiation. Another young worker in Terrigal had been in her job for a year and had been working under an award.
Mr John Turner: Point of order: Clearly this is a second reading speech. The Parliamentary Secretary cannot get away from his prepared speech. He is supposed to be replying to contributions to the debate, to the comments of the honourable member for Gosford, yet he has a prepared speech. Either his staffers are very quick typists or he is giving another second reading speech. He has been here long enough to understand the rules of the House. He should reply to the debate.
Mr DEPUTY-SPEAKER: Order! I am sure the Parliamentary Secretary will respond to the debate in the appropriate way.
Mr NEVILLE NEWELL: I believe I am. I am responding on behalf of the young workers of the State and to the implications given in the contribution by the honourable member for Gosford. I intend to respond. The young worker in Terrigal was offered an AWA. All her workmates were made redundant and then reinterviewed. It was made clear that if they did not sign the AWA they would be out of a job as well. Between a rock and very hard place is where WorkChoices has put most young workers. They want to work, they like the work, and they like the money they earn. But as these stories show, their enthusiasm is not enough to see them paid well.
The best thing about this bill is that regardless of where employers sit in the WorkChoices-created landscape, and regardless of whether it is an AWA or any other arrangement, young workers now have enforceable and easily understood entitlements and conditions and they will be fairly paid for their efforts. If they question the pay they are receiving, or the way they are being treated, they will have the protection of an effective unfair dismissal system. A child at work is very vulnerable to exploitation because a child is unlikely to know all the rules that adults take for granted but that children have not experienced. What is the difference between a fair and an unfair direction? How long can I be required to work before I should be given a rest break? If I start at 5.00 a.m. should I be paid the morning shift rate for the whole day? If I finish after 8.00 p.m. should I get the night shift rate for all my hours? What do I do if I think that the workplace is unsafe or that there is a better way of getting the job done? What do I do? Whom do I speak to?
WorkChoices discourages employees from taking the initiative and suggesting more productive ways of performing their jobs. That is because WorkChoices permits employers to dismiss an employee for no proper reason at all. Employees live in silent fear that they may lose their jobs, so they are reticent to raise concerns that may jeopardise their employment. When it comes to children, this is particularly unreasonable. In fact, it is just plain unfair. From the belated letter I have received from the Federal Minister, Kevin Andrews, it appears that the same lobby groups who are unashamedly taking advantage of the harshest aspects of WorkChoices when it comes to children are turning up the heat on the Federal Government. Mr Andrews is now claiming that the States' laws to protect children will have no effect. If that is true, it will be because Mr Andrews' own laws deny children those protections.
When it comes to children at the workplace the Federal Government has shown a degree of neglect the Iemma Government cannot countenance. The removal of the concept of fairness, the safety net, the no-disadvantage test and the unfair dismissal protection is a dereliction of duty towards children who are left to deal directly with the might of a corporation. In a take-it-or-leave-it situation, the Federal Act leaves to a parent or guardian the invidious decision of jeopardising their child's prospect of employment if they act on their good conscience and refuse to consent to what an adult would consider to be an unfair AWA. Section 16 (3) (e) of the Workplace Relations Act preserves the capacity of the States to make laws about child labour and the Iemma Government has legal advice to that effect.
When it comes to children at the workplace it is incumbent on any responsible government to ensure that there is a real safety net to protect the vulnerable. WorkChoices has removed those protections for children so the Iemma Government must act, and it has. I remind the House that on 30 August this year, on the ABC's PM radio program, Minister Andrews, when referring to the Child Employment Bill, said, "All of these sorts of things have been preserved for the States and they're quite entitled to make laws".
Mr John Turner: Point of order: The Parliamentary Secretary, in his reply, is not even attempting to address issues that have been raised in debate. He is talking now about a radio interview that was not referred to earlier in debate. He had an opportunity to refer to that matter in his second reading speech, or he could have got someone else to do it. Clearly, he has written this speech. No way in the world could his associates have put that speech together in the past 10 minutes. This is a clear breach of the standing orders. The Parliamentary Secretary must be asked to reply to debate and not to read a second reading speech.
Mr DEPUTY-SPEAKER: Order! The honourable member for Myall Lakes is aware of the wide-ranging nature of debates that occur in this Chamber. We could go chapter and verse through the way members abuse the opportunity to speak to legislation. If the Parliamentary Secretary chooses to reply to the debate in a certain way and his reply relates to the bill, which it does, he can continue on that path.
Mr John Turner: Point of order—
Mr DEPUTY-SPEAKER: Order! Are you canvassing my ruling?
Mr John Turner: I am taking a point of order. If the matters to which the Parliamentary Secretary is referring come within the scope of the bill he can reply to them. Under the standing orders the Parliamentary Secretary is obliged to refer to what was said in debate and not read a second reading speech. Those issues should have been debated during debate on the second reading. Clearly the Parliamentary Secretary is flouting the standing orders.
Mr DEPUTY-SPEAKER: Order! For many years debates in this House have encompassed what the Parliamentary Secretary is doing on this occasion. As long as he confines his remarks to the bill and responds to matters that were raised during the debate, he may continue.
Mr NEVILLE NEWELL: As I indicated earlier, the Iemma Government is not prepared to stand by and watch while young workers conditions and rights at work are reduced in this way. It is taking action to provide balanced protection for young workers—action that the Federal Government refused to take. The New South Wales Government is reintroducing a fair minimum safety net for children employed by constitutional corporations entering into workplace agreements. That is not only economically responsible; it is a duty that the Government owes to children. I commend this bill to the House.
Mr Daryl Maguire: Point of order: I draw your attention to Standing Orders 74 and 75. Standing Order 74 states:
A Member who has moved a substantive motion or the second or third reading of a bill may speak in reply.
Standing Order 75 states:
The subject matter of a reply is confined to matters raised during the debate.
I do not wish to canvass your ruling, but the Parliamentary Secretary, during his reply, clearly introduced new material. After listening carefully to his contribution I realised that he failed to address matters that were raised in debate, which is contrary to standing orders.
Mr DEPUTY-SPEAKER: Order! Given the ruling I have made, I suggest that the Parliamentary Secretary complete his reply by responding to matters that were raised during the debate. I do not think there is a problem at this stage. The Parliamentary Secretary has the call.
Mr NEVILLE NEWELL: I deal now with the Industrial Relations Further Amendment Bill. The Iemma Government has pledged to do all it can to protect workers and businesses in New South Wales from the disruptive, costly WorkChoices legislation imposed on us in March this year. This bill will shore up protections for injured works by co-locating them with other provisions that together deal with rehabilitation and increase job security for workers dismissed or making an occupational health and safety complaint. It will also strengthen the powers of the Industrial Relations Commission to hear industrial cases of national importance and, importantly, authorise the Industrial Relations Commission of New South Wales to provide alternative dispute resolution services to parties to Federal workplace agreements. Not only are workers and employers being protected from dismissal when injured or expressing health and safety concerns under the Government's legislative proposals; seriously injured workers will also receive greater benefits in relation to their injuries.
Amendments in the Workers Compensation Amendment (Permanent Impairment Benefits) Bill provide for a 10 per cent increase in dollar terms to the lump sums paid to workers for permanent impairment under section 66 of the Workers Compensation Act 1987. A program of reform and sound management of the workers compensation scheme by this Government has enabled these increases in work injury benefits to be made at a time when employer premiums have been significantly reduced. I commend these bills to the House.
Motion agreed to.
Bills read a second time and passed through remaining stages.