Senator CARR (12:53 PM) —In this season of mean and nasty actions I wish to raise again in the Senate a particularly nasty story involving the victimisation of meatworkers at G & K O'Connor's abattoir in Pakenham, Victoria. When I spoke on this subject more than two years ago this vicious attack on the O'Connor work force was in its infancy. But already the dimensions of the bastardry that we have witnessed in recent times were clear. However, as this vindictive and unnecessary dispute has dragged on, the legal efforts of the Meatworkers Union and the investigative skills of television journalists have brought to light many of the nastier aspects of this case that I am sure both the O'Connor management and this government would prefer to have remained concealed.

It is one aspect of the conspiracy mounted by this government against organised Australian workers, a conspiracy in which the livelihoods of thousands of Australian unionists have been threatened and in which the welfare of thousands more has been held hostage against the delivery of windfall profits to the admirers of former workplace relations ministers and profits paid for by wage cuts and reduced social prospects.

It is a story of what happens when this government sanctions the use of the worst aspects of the American industrial relations system against Australians with the inevitable attendant intimidation, violence and social cost. It is also the story of a good employer turned bad—a Jekyll and Hyde story, if you like, in which the coercive effects of Peter Reith's, and now Mr Abbott's, industrial relations legislation can be seen taking its toll on the honesty and practices of employers as well as deliberately undermining the living conditions of workers.

What would be the effect of an employer who, having previously maintained fair working conditions and having received loyalty and commitment in return, now takes recourse in the employment of industrial spies, thugs and standover merchants and, in doing so, introducing a Pinkerton culture into a previously productive work force? What would be the effect of an employer contracting the services of Mr Bruce Townsend, a notorious schemer and knuckle man who accurately describes himself as `a head kicker to the landed gentry'? This black episode demonstrates in stark fashion the damaging and vindictive effects of the Workplace Relations Act and the government's industrial relations policy on the lives of ordinary Australians. It also exposes an abuse of the government's much vaunted New Apprenticeships scheme. As a government program with government training subsidies, it has effectively underwritten the efforts of an employer to deny the Industrial Relations Commission's decisions and to break a campaign in defence of legitimate employment conditions by O'Connor workers.

In 1992, O'Connor negotiated a groundbreaking certified agreement with the Australasian Meat Industry Employees Union. In doing so, the company broke away from the employer association that had adopted a confrontationist approach to industrial relations and had relied heavily on the advice of the legal firm Dunhill Madden Butler. This new agreement provided huge productivity increases for the company. From 1992-99 wages and conditions were guided by this agreement and its successors, with wage increases falling well within the prevailing inflation rates. Both were negotiated without a single day of strike action.

In 1998, Kevin O'Connor met with the union to discuss the renewing of the agreement. He complained that times were tough, that live exports had reduced the availability of stock and that, due to other factors such as increasing livestock prices and the drought, profitability had been reduced. O'Connor acknowledged that he would not `take away what was already there'. Instead he was only going to look for a change. Other employers expressed similar views and, as a result, the Victorian branch of the Meatworkers Union recommended to its members that they accept modest wage increases with minimum changes to existing terms of employment.

Despite some pressure for further concessions, union members, including those at O'Connor's, agreed to this approach, and so did O'Connor's competitors. In November 1998, following a prolonged period of inactivity, the union received from O'Connor a list of demands for heavy reductions in pay and conditions. Despite having agreed to a reasonable and moderate approach to improvements in wages and conditions, we find the employer taking deliberately provocative actions to undermine those settled conditions.

O'Connor's stated intention was to conclude the negotiations within one week, notwithstanding that the previous agreement had taken 18 months to develop. Nevertheless, the union arranged a series of meetings with the company to try to resolve and negotiate a new arrangement. At these meetings the company insisted on union acceptance of wage cuts ranging from between 10 and 17 per cent as a pre-condition for further discussions. An impasse was soon reached, despite the union's agreement to be flexible on a range of issues obviously aimed at further increases in productivity.

O'Connor's demands were accompanied by a notice of initiation of a bargaining period under the Workplace Relations Act. At the same time, the company switched legal firms, moving from Clayton Utz to Dunhill Madden Butler—one of whose partners, Steven Amendola, just so happens to be Mr Peter Reith's personal solicitor. Clearly Kevin O'Connor had recovered from his displeasure at this legal firm, which he had denounced some years previously for costing him huge amounts of money for very bad advice. Perhaps subsequently he has been impressed by the actions of this new firm on behalf of the government in its notorious attempt to de-unionise the waterfront.

The works manager at O'Connors, Mr Peter Allen, who led the O'Connors negotiating team, flatly denied that the company would lock out its work force and accused the union of grandstanding on this issue. In March 1999 O'Connor's locked out its entire work force of 250 employees. Meat workers with up to 20 years service were thrown out of work without notice and without payment. The lockout also froze their entitlements to wages and denied them access to their long service leave, to annual leave, to sick leave and to other entitlements normally available to workers when a meatworks closes down temporarily. It is not unknown in this industry for there to be fluctuations in trade, but this was an attempt essentially to freeze the assets of these workers. The lockout continued for nine months. It was one of the longest lockouts in the history of industrial relations in this country.

In August 1999 O'Connor's altered the purpose of the lockout from one initiated to negotiate a collective workplace agreement to one seeking to establish individual Australian workplace agreements. Despite the fact that union members who remained locked out appointed union officials as their bargaining agents, their attempts at negotiation were met only with further harassment, together with further pressure designed to force workers to sign these AWAs. In retrospect, it is illuminating to note that, during proceedings in the Industrial Relations Commission at the time, Mr Kevin O'Connor accused the union of outrageous and disgraceful behaviour insofar as they even had the temerity to suggest that there had been discussions with the employment relations minister, Mr Peter Reith. It has taken persistent questioning through Senate estimates committee hearings and through other means to establish that Mr O'Connor was lying and that he had indeed personally met with Mr Reith, including immediately prior to the commencement of the lockout proceedings.

The union was also attempting to stop the current agreement from being set aside. When O'Connors claimed that the company needed to lower wages and reduce conditions in order to maintain profitability, the union sought all the relevant records in an attempt to verify such a claim. Naturally enough, under the present industrial relations law access to those records has been denied. The commission ruled that the current agreement had been improperly certified and set the certification aside. The company then sought to avoid having the no-disadvantage test for AWAs being measured against the 1995 agreement and instead argued that the appropriate comparison was the Federal Meat Industry (Processing) Award. Following further resistance from the union, the Federal Court rejected this proposition as well.

Such were the draconian effects of the O'Connor's proposals that they failed the no-disadvantage test—Mr Reith's laws—even when compared with the 1992 award. The Employment Advocate, Mr Jonathon Hamberger, approved the AWAs. What a surprise! The work force was then locked out and O'Connors started to recruit alternative workers.

What we have seen in this situation is the longest lockout in history. Clearly, the government is deeply involved with this arrangement. O'Connor's are clearly getting support through the Employment Advocate. They now seek to employ federally funded trainees. As I have it, in December last year they had more than 125 employees on federally funded traineeships. On top of that, they seek the employment of 50 to 60 refugees on temporary refugee visas. So 80 per cent of the work force are either trainees or unfortunate enough to be refugees. Huge subsidies are being paid, through the taxpayer. They are being used to displace a highly skilled and long serving work force, who are being locked out in an attempt by the company to reduce wages.

I remind the Senate of some basic propositions that this parliament has been advised of in the past. The Prime Minister said, `I give this rock solid guarantee: our policy will not cause a cut in the take-home pay of Australian workers.' Mr Reith also said, `Employees' wages will not be reduced by any provisions in this particular bill.' In both those cases, we can see clearly that the government has lied. Both Mr Howard and Mr Reith maintain that they stand by their promises. I think we can clearly challenge the veracity on all of those counts.

In recent times, the courts in this country overturned that lockout, which was terminated as a result of legal action. The solidarity of the meatworkers on the site has also been maintained despite the extraordinary pressures. Employees are now expected to work for wages that in many instances are topped up by welfare payments. So they do not even reach the poverty line. In a country like Australia, workers in a full-time job rely on welfare payments to get above the poverty line! Workers were forced to maintain substandard conditions. The union, of course, successfully sought a Federal Court injunction.

The social and economic effect of this company's vendetta against its own work force has been catastrophic. Many workers have been forced to give up an unequal struggle and have had to lease their homes and seek work elsewhere. Those who have stayed have been abused and vilified and, of course, have suffered huge personal hardships. Houses and cars have been repossessed, mortgages have been foreclosed and families have broken up. They are the economic and social consequences of these sorts of policies.

On top of that, uncontested evidence taken in the Industrial Relations Commission under oath revealed that O'Connor's spent more than $48,000 on expenses for industrial spies, who were employed to infiltrate and report to management on the activities of the union and to fabricate evidence against union organisers and delegates at the plant. Under instructions from managers such as Peter Allen, the spies have made accusations regarding the theft of property and have essentially been involved in conspiracies to fit up union organisers. They have been involved in conspiracies to break industrial relations laws. In addition, there is evidence from other witnesses before the courts of this country that the company has employed a Mr Dekker, an undercover surveillance expert who glories in being known as `the spy catcher' and who provides secret agents with hidden video cameras and tape-recording devices to use against the workers on the site.

One of the company's spies has been troubled by this action and his conscience has got the better of him. He has sought to work with the union and has demonstrated that the fabrication of evidence, the incitement to perjury and the use of violence against the union have all been part of a conspiracy that involves this government, the company and the various scab masters such as Mr Townsend. This is a direct result of a government philosophy that says that it is legitimate to use any device at all to import the American style industrial relations to undermine and destroy the conditions of workers and the security of people's employment. (Time expired)