THE HON BRENDAN O’CONNOR MP
SHADOW MINISTER FOR EMPLOYMENT AND
WORKPLACE RELATIONS
MEMBER FOR GORTON
E&OE TRANSCRIPT
RADIO INTERVIEW
ABC AM
THURSDAY, 31 DECEMBER 2015
SUBJECT/S: Trade Union Royal Commission.
KIM LANDERS: Brendan O'Connor is the Opposition's employment and workplace
relations spokesman and he joins us on the line. Brendan O'Connor, good morning.
BRENDAN O'CONNOR, SHADOW MINISTER FOR EMPLOYMENT AND
WORKPLACE RELATIONS: Good morning.
LANDERS: There are 79 recommendations in this Royal Commission report. Do you
accept any of them?
O'CONNOR: Well I said yesterday that there are serious but isolated instances that
should be dealt with by the full force of the law but the sort of breathless response by
the Prime Minister is very hard to believe...
LANDERS: But do you accept, my question was do you accept any of the
recommendations?
O'CONNOR: Yesterday I went through the report in detail. And I've said where there
has been misconduct, and where the commission has recommended something that
will assist in order to improve governance, in a way that won't diminish the capacity
of unions to represent their members, of course Labor will support reforms. And
indeed for example looking at improving auditing arrangements, ensuring that there's
better governance by having ASIC be the regulator, is an idea that Labor is putting
forward which I think is a better suggestion than a separate commission regulating
registered organisations. So I think Labor came out well before this commission's
report to add to the reforms we did in government to improve governance of
employer bodies and unions, because we have absolutely zero tolerance for
corruption.
LANDERS: Well you say you've got zero tolerance, how can Labor prove to voters
that it is serious about that approach when for example you continue to accept
millions of dollars worth of donations from the CFMEU, a union that the Royal
Commission has found has a culture of disregard for the law?
O'CONNOR: Well this is the problem with the sort of questioning I'm having to
endure today. The fact is the Royal Commission was a political witch-hunt basically
presided over by a Liberal identity. A person who is willing to raise money for the
Liberal party. When I talk about raising money for a political parties, you have Dyson
Heydon, a supposed eminent person, who actually was invited and accepted an
invitation to raise money for the Government.
LANDERS: But with respect Mr O'Connor...
O'CONNOR: That happened during the course of him presiding over the most
politically charged Royal Commission....
LANDERS: And that is a point that both you and the Labor party have made on
numerous occasions, there were legal hearings about that...
O'CONNOR: Let me make it very clear, we have no tolerance for corruption but we
will not stand by and watch the Government hand pick a person who went about...
LANDERS: But my question...sir my question was about the CFMEU.
O'CONNOR: ....[talking about Dyson Heydon's inflammatory and injudicious
commentary in the report] that was written by a B-grade sub editor of a sleazy
tabloid.
LANDERS: My question was about the CFMEU and the Labor party's affiliations with
the CFMEU. Is that to be reconsidered at all given the findings of this commission?
O'CONNOR: Well as I made very clear we've taken instances that are of a serious
nature very seriously. And we believe that anyone who's broken the law should be
dealt with appropriately but to suggest because there may be individuals in an
organisation, somehow that organisation is systemically corrupt, it does not hold
water. Can I be frank here. You’d have to conclude, if that was the case, the Liberal
Party Victorian Division should be deregistered as a political party because its
director stole $1.5 million and is currently sitting in jail. We talk about the tip of the
iceberg; the tip is some serious but isolated instances of corruption by some union
officials. The iceberg is the thousands and thousands of workers in this country that
are underpaid and exploited by employers and of course Malcolm Turnbull will do
nothing about it.
LANDERS: Well talking about Malcolm Turnbull, the Prime Minister says that he's
prepared to fight an election on these reforms that he's proposing, is the Labor Party,
and are you prepared for that perhaps to be an early election?
O'CONNOR: I tell you what we're willing to fight on: which major party is going to
look after the millions of workers that are in this country that need decent
representation and decent laws.
We have a Government... Malcolm couldn't stop talking yesterday, but last week
when the Productivity Commission handed down a report recommending cutting
penalty rates for low paid workers, where was Malcolm Turnbull then? Couldn't find
him, because he won't talk about what his Government's looking to do: cut conditions
of employment in this country for millions of workers, for millions of workers.
This is a distraction. That's not to say that some of the instances in this commission's
report are not serious and we've said that from the beginning....
LANDERS: If we look at the politics of this...
O'CONNOR: we will not let this Government distract us from defending millions of
workers, and the fact that you can believe the Malcolm Turnbull is going to want to
strengthen the union movement is laughable, quite frankly.
LANDERS: The Prime Minister says that he's going to put that legislation to set up
the Australian Building and Construction Commission once again to the Senate, it's
been rejected several times, are you worried that some of the crossbenchers that
have rejected that in the past might be swayed now to support the Government
because of this Royal Commission report?
O'CONNOR: Well we'll talk to the crossbenchers and I think they've had an open
mind to these matters. And I think it's fair to say we want to see reforms. We have
said let's improve arrangements. When we were in government we added to the
reforms that were there and we added to the improvements of transparency and
accountability and again recently Bill Shorten and I announced a series of reforms
that I think will improve governance because we are serious about tackling these
problems.
We feel an abuse by union official to a member or to a worker moreso than any
Liberal Party Member of Parliament because we represent working people in the
Parliament. And so we'll talk to the crossbenchers about these matters, but we want
the reforms to be proportionate and be reasonable, so that it's not about weakening
and destroying the capacity of unions to represent workers but it is about making
sure they're as clean as possible. Of course we want to see that, we want to see an
effective, honest and strong union movement.
LANDERS: Brendan O'Connor thank you very much for speaking with AM.
O'CONNOR: Thanks very much.
LANDERS: Brendan O'Connor, the Opposition's employment and workplace
relations spokesman.
ENDS