Mr LINDSAY(6.56 p.m.) —Ever since the Labor Party instituted the unfair dismissal laws I wanted to become a member of parliament. I have wanted to stand in this place and I have wanted to do whatever I could do to vote those laws down because, after 25 years of running a small business, I understand exactly what damage that has done to the business community in this country. I understand exactly what it has done to jobs. I understand how the community now employs people on a casual basis and gives them no security in their jobs.

Last September, the Townsville Chamber of Commerce conducted a survey among their members who represent about 500 businesses in the Townsville and Thuringowa regions. The survey was conducted to identify issues, both big and small, that the chamber should address. Of course, top of the list was unfair dismissals. I would like to give the parliament an example of the kind of thing that has occurred. Just last week a charitable body in Townsville—a charitable body, mind you—was having difficulty with an uncontrollable employee. That uncontrollable employee went to the AGM of that charitable body with relatives, trying to stack the meeting to overturn the management of the place. It caused that employee to have tremendous stress and the employee went on stress leave. Seven months later, the employee was still on stress leave.

Management can, after three months, give notice to an employee. In fact, they persisted with the employee, trying to make sure that the employee could come back to the job. But after seven months that was just too long to wait. They made that employee redundant. The employee responded by claiming $6,000 for unfair dismissal, after seven months of being on stress leave. The charitable body said, `We are not up to paying $6,000.' So the advocate for the employee said, `We will take you to a five-day hearing and that is going to cost you $10,000.' The gun was at their head.

That charitable body paid $4,000 last week to settle the claim because they had no alternative. The advocate was saying, `We will take you to court and we will bring out all this dirt in the court.' A charitable body cannot have that. A charitable body has got to avoid all those sorts of matters. The conclusion drawn from that is that, in any action that is going to cost less than $3,000, employers are basically just paying up and not fighting under this loaded legislation. They are just taking what the best commercial outcome is, not what was right.

As both Senator Ian Macdonald and I—he is on the road to recovery, by the way—have been saying to the Townsville, Thuringowa and North Queensland business communities, the proposed changes to the unfair dismissal laws are necessary and long overdue. The process will be simpler and fairer with a heavier emphasis to be placed on the merits of a case rather than legal moot points and legal blackmail, giving everyone concerned a fair go all round.

Before I conclude I am going to repeat the words of the member for Flinders (Mr Reith), because they need to be driven home. Labor's unfair dismissal laws have `discouraged investment and diverted the attention of industry from its prime task of making workplaces more efficient and providing more real jobs'. The coalition's proposed changes to unfair dismissal laws go a long way to achieving just that: more efficient workplaces and more real jobs. I am proud to have been the last speaker to drive that point home in the parliament here tonight.

Mr DEPUTY SPEAKER (Mr Andrew) —Order! The time allotted for the second reading of the bill has expired. The question is that the words proposed to be omitted stand part of the question.