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The Hon. PETER PRIMROSE [6.05 p.m.]: On Radio National's Breakfast program this morning John Howard told Fran Kelly that the words that best described his period in Government were "options" and "choice". He said that his Government offered Australians what they wanted most: options and choice. The Prime Minister is, of course, famous for his mantra that workers should have the right to negotiate with their employers to reach the best deal they can. At Advanced Metals, a metal fabrication plant in Ingleburn, more than 140 workers have been trying to negotiate a new agreement with their employer, Ian Stone. He is a very clever man who runs a highly profitable company. He is on the executive of the Australian Industry Group, an organisation representing employers in the manufacturing industry. The company employs lawyers and accountants to give the best advice possible and together they have written the new agreement that they want the employees to sign.
The agreement is a creative piece designed by Stone and his lawyers but based upon the Australian Industry Group's model, including cashing out annual leave and a wage rise tied to the consumer price index or new Fair Pay Commission. The agreement includes Stone's own unique interpretation of leave and other entitlements that most of us here would never accept from members of our own families. The employees have a problem. Most do not speak English. Some have previously worked for the now infamous Caughlan family at Metro. They know what it means to be out of work and unable to support their families. They cannot afford to employ a lawyer to advise them, even if they could find one who could speak their various languages and interpret the current mess of industrial relations legislation—thanks to the Federal Government.
Never one to take an unnecessary risk, Mr Stone has contacted most of the employees personally, in some instances visiting them in their own homes. He has told them what will happen if they do not sign the agreement—they will lose their jobs. This is "choice" in Howard-speak. Most of us would call this "no choice". Advanced Metals is just one example of the reality that confronts hundreds of thousands of Australian workers under John Howard's Orwellian WorkChoices legislation. John Howard also told Fran Kelly of his particular concern for young Australians. He said that young Australians wanted to have a family and a secure future. Of course, he is right about that. But he is very wrong if he is trying to convince us that his Government is providing young Australians with a secure future for themselves and their families.
This afternoon 600 Qantas aircraft maintenance workers stopped work and marched in the streets as a demonstration of their frustration with Qantas management. Mixing a poisonous cocktail of Federal Government WorkChoices legislation and neoconservative ideology, Qantas management is attempting to drive down the wages and conditions of its maintenance staff. Amidst crippling skills shortages currently facing the Australian economy, Qantas management is threatening to send its highly skilled maintenance work overseas—for no other reason than cost cutting. Qantas has rightly earned its highly prized reputation as the safest airline in the skies for just one reason: its maintenance workers. It is not because of its chief executive officer, Geoff Dixon, who incidentally has been presented with pay rises exceeding 300 per cent over the past five years.
Long after Geoff Dixon has gone the damage that he has caused to Qantas and to the Australian economy will go on. If he is successful in his current plan, there will be no skilled apprenticeships or jobs in the airline industry in this country. Those jobs will all have gone to China or some other country where workers are paid just 80¢ an hour for their skills. I find no comfort at all in knowing that when I am flying at 40,000 feet above the ocean, instead of flying with the world's safest airline I may be flying in planes serviced at the cheapest possible tender price.
John Howard's WorkChoices legislation aims to force Australian workers into servitude. His abject failure to invest in research and development, training and infrastructure provides no real future for families or young people. The Australian people deserve much better than this. They deserve a leader who will invest in them and their future.