Mrs CHILD(9.53) —Yes, I second the amendment. I do so very strongly. I think that the plight of the employee when the firm by which he is employed goes broke is pretty deplorable. Recently several firms in Melbourne, particularly manufacturing firms, have collapsed and a receiver has been appointed. In each case several hundred employees were immediately out of work, and with little warning. I will return to that aspect later. However, their plight is even worse than that of persons who are sacked or rendered redundant because in those cases people at least receive payment for the weeks they have worked, plus a week's notice with pay. Those men and women who have given their services and fulfilled their contracts with the firm concerned not only did not receive the pay that they were waiting for, which was probably needed to pay the rent and buy groceries, but also did not receive a week's notice pay, long service leave pro rata payments and holiday pay. The employees are way down the line as regards the priorities list.

What happens when a firm goes broke, firstly, is that the secured creditors receive first call on the available finance followed closely by the Taxation Office, which we all seem to have a bogy about. It collects the accumulated pay-as-you-earn instalments. In the cases which I outlined this amounted to thousands of dollars. Another matter that I would like to know is why does the Taxation Office allow firms that are getting a bit rocky to owe it such tremendous amounts of money? In fact, in their final gasp, those firms are trying to float on employees' deductions. Then the companies go broke, that money goes too. The Taxation Office takes another bite in claiming tax on the undistributed dividends and then a third bite on tax on interest remitted overseas.

Then the unsecured creditors are entitled to receive their share. We still have not reached the employees because nine categories of unsecured creditors come first. The workers run fifth. I find it quite unacceptable that unsecured creditors are placed ahead of employees on the list because unsecured creditors become involved after the winding up of a company. The employee was owed the money before the receiver came in. These debts were incurred after the winding up and the receiver was brought in, but the unsecured creditors still get paid before the debtors with whom the firm incurred liability before it became insolvent. If it were a horse race the workers certainly would run unplaced.

The Crown must abrogate all Crown priorities in insolvency cases in line with the amendment which has been moved by the Opposition. As my colleague the honourable member for Parramatta (Mr John Brown) has pointed out, the Taxation Office certainly has plenty of other ways in which it can recoup its money. The employee cannot. I take the point which was made about the registered mortgage being applied against assets, but I again point out that the worker has invested his or her labour and I believe that his or her security is of prime importance no matter what is happening within the firm. If a person works for money it has become his or her money. Most firms know that they are going bankrupt while the employees are still working for them. It is quite immoral for firms to keep employees working when the management knows that they will not be paid at the end of that month, fortnight, or whenever the final crash comes. The rights of the worker in regard to payment for services given should receive the first protection. All wages and compensation payments to employees must be given priority over all other creditors. Maybe we need to have a reclassification of employees to place them in the first group, which is the secured creditors. I think that is where the employees belong.

I cannot say too strongly that the Opposition believes that we have a moral and legal right to protect the wages of those who work. We were disappointed that the Government accepted the recommendations of the Senate Standing Committee on Constitutional and Legal Affairs in regard to Crown priorities. The Government did not go into a huddle with the States to get the States to agree that the Taxation Office should get out of the way and let the secured creditors and the workers take their bites before it received its share. In one of the cases which I referred to, something like $170,000 is owing to the Taxation Office. I think that the Department will have to waive that money because it should never have let the debt get to that extraordinary amount. It is important to realise that the employee has no other recourse for reimbursement. If he cannot get paid out of the funds, that is it. He cannot go to the man to whom he owes the rent or the person to whom he is paying the mortgage on his house and say: 'I worked for a month but I did not get paid'. Nobody will let him off the hook for what he owes. I urge the Government to accept this amendment which is on behalf of the workers. The Government and the Opposition in this place represent the people of Australia who are the workers.