Mrs CROSIO (12:41 PM) —I speak against the government's amendments and certainly against this particular bill, but at the moment in the consideration in detail stage I will speak to the amendments that have been moved. What we really have here is just another cog in the federal government's plans to destroy the Maritime Union of Australia and to drive a nail into the heart of unionism itself. You have got to ask yourself in this House: for what? Why are they doing it? Is it because our waterfront crane operators are not like Third World country operators? Is it because they just do not go up a crane with a sandwich and a bucket, if you do not mind me saying, Madam Deputy Speaker, in which to urinate so they can stay there all day? That is not what happens. Is it because they do not work eight-hour shifts without a break? Or is it because they want to belong to a union, they are now going to be virtually stopped by this bill from doing their work?

The coalition is trying through its amendments and through this bill to wield an ideological hammer with which to smash the MUA and to weaken all other unions in the process. This bill, I believe, is an ugly step in an ugly campaign. How can the Minister for Workplace Relations and Small Business (Mr Reith) and the Prime Minister (Mr Howard) say with straight faces that they have no problems with unions or even the members of the MUA and that all they want is an efficient waterfront? It is beyond me.

If that were really the case, why have they not stood up in this House and praised the work that is being done? But all we have had repeatedly is, day after day, this Prime Minister and this minister for workplace relations misleading the Australian people as to the work practice of the wharfies. They are indulging in propaganda and vilification and they are denigrating and inciting public anger where there should not be any, because what they are saying is untrue.

What the government really wants to do is to lend a hand to Patrick's while there is no such lending hand or words of support, for example, to the Cobar miners or to any other workers who have now lost everything because their firms have either closed down or because redundancy packages have not been put into place when appropriate action should have been taken.

This bill was introduced at the time supposedly because of the Howard government's genuine concern that the Patrick's workers received their full entitlements and redundancies. This government does not care in the slightest about guaranteeing workers' entitlements. This bill was originally introduced because of its base political motives, pure and simple. It was introduced as part of an orchestrated campaign to destroy—and I will repeat myself—the Maritime Union of Australia and to strike at the heart of the union movement in this country. It was introduced as part of a strategy to destroy the delicate balance of power between employers and employees that we have been able to achieve in Australia. It now wants to rebuild that balance with workers' rights at a disadvantage.

It is nothing more than a tax on those efficient operators and competent waterfront managers who have been able to achieve satisfactory productivity outcomes with their work force through negotiation. They are now going to have a tax that I believe they will be unable to absorb. It stands before us as an ugly symbol of all that is to be condemned and regretted about this Howard government.

Make no mistake: the issue of guaranteeing workers' entitlements lies at the heart of this piece of legislation and these amendments. This is a government that supports the restructuring of the corporation that kicks nearly 2,000 waterfront workers out of their jobs by manufacturing the insolvencies of the companies for which they worked. But, subsequently robbed of their entitlements, the federal government then steps in with its $250 million package and says to the wharfies, `Okay, if you go along quietly and if you play our game, we'll guarantee your entitlements; otherwise you'll get nothing.' This is a government of standover, this is a government of intimidation and this is a government that cares nothing for the workers of this country.

It also represents a government that considers assisting in the payment of entitlements to workers from insolvent companies as something to do only when it suits its political motives. Any other workers in the same boat crying out for the same assistance but in less political important industries can fend for themselves, and they are being told so.

The only difference between the wharfies and the Cobar miners, the Goulburn miners, the South Grafton abattoir workers and the nurses from Yeppoon and Rockhampton is that the stakes are higher for the government on the waterfront than in any other area. If the stakes were not as high then this bill would not even have been introduced into this parliament in the first place. Now we are being told that the wharfies are lucky to have been granted this guarantee of their entitlements. Of course they are not. It is just that the government considers this bill and the redundancy package it seeks to set up as an essential part of getting rid of them.

For the evidence of how cynical the Howard government is in introducing this bill and these amendments, just take a look at how fast the minister for workplace relations acted to cover the waterfront workers' entitlements compared to assisting other Australian workers in similar positions. The waterfront workers were locked out, thrown out of their place of business, on the night of 7 and 8 April, and on the day of 8 April the minister for workplace relations was in this House introducing this bill.