tag:theconversation.com,2011:/id/topics/registered-organisations-bill-25948/articlesregistered organisations bill – The Conversation2016-11-25T00:52:14Ztag:theconversation.com,2011:article/694052016-11-25T00:52:14Z2016-11-25T00:52:14ZVIDEO: Michelle Grattan on One Nation’s troubles<figure>
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<p>Tensions between Pauline Hanson and her beleaguered One Nation senator Rod Culleton have been on open display this week, raising the question of whether the party will be able to hold it all together. </p>
<p>Michelle Grattan tells University of Canberra vice-chancellor Deep Saini that it’s going to be quite hard for Hanson to keep her senators well disciplined.</p>
<p>“At the same time it’s obvious that both sides of politics are now really fearing Pauline Hanson’s electoral power. We heard George Brandis caught on an open mic telling the Victorian Liberal president that One Nation really was going to be quite significant at the next state election [in Queensland] and I think that both sides of politics feel that,” Grattan says. </p>
<p>“You have this paradox in a sense – rising importance of One Nation electorally but difficulties in keeping the show together in Canberra, in the Senate, where of course it’s also powerful.”</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/69405/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Tensions between Pauline Hanson and her beleaguered One Nation senator Rod Culleton have been on open display this week, raising the question of whether the party will be able to hold it all together.Michelle Grattan, Professorial Fellow, University of CanberraPaddy Nixon, Vice-Chancellor and President, University of CanberraLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/681872016-11-03T12:28:42Z2016-11-03T12:28:42ZGrattan on Friday: Industrial bills test Turnbull’s negotiating skills – and backbone<p>Malcolm Turnbull laughs off the suggestion that this week’s extraordinary developments mean the Senate is in chaos. Okay, let’s humour the Prime Minister. The upper house looks a teeny bit messy and the future composition of the crossbench a tad uncertain, right?</p>
<p>To strip this down to its essentials – here’s the situation.</p>
<p>Family First’s Bob Day, from South Australia, is gone, exiting amid the financial disaster of his business, which turned out not to be his only problem.</p>
<p>Depending on how the High Court rules on whether he was eligible to be elected on July 2, his party could get to choose Day’s successor (then likely be Rikki Lambert, Day’s former staffer, or Robert Brokenshire, a SA MP); the second candidate on the Family First ticket (Lucy Gichuhi) could be installed; or the seat could go to Labor.</p>
<p>The first scenario is if Day wins the case; the latter two are if he is found to have been ineligible. ABC electoral analyst Antony Green predicts the most likely outcome is the elevation of Gichuhi, a Kenyan-born lawyer.</p>
<p>If One Nation’s West Australian senator Rod Culleton doesn’t survive the judgement the High Court will make on his eligibility, his place will go on the recount to the next candidate on the party’s ticket, Peter Georgiou, who is Culleton’s brother-in-law, neatly keeping the seat in the family.</p>
<p>When the Senate resumes on Monday, Family First will have no one there. To pass bills opposed by Labor and the Greens the government will need eight of ten crossbenchers, where previously it required nine of 11.</p>
<p>The government is putting to the Senate next week its legislation for the same-sex marriage plebiscite, destined to go down. But unless it has a change of heart, the industrial bills – to restore the Australian Building and Construction Commission and toughen union governance – would be waiting until the final sitting fortnight, starting November 21. That is, if they are to be considered this year.</p>
<p>Turnbull on Thursday left up in the air whether the bills would come to a vote before the parliament gets up for the summer recess. “It will depend on our discussions with the crossbench. The reality is, as John Howard always said, politics is governed by the iron law of arithmetic,” he said.</p>
<p>The government would present the industrial legislation “when we believe there is a majority that will support it and on terms that we will accept”, he said. “It is important that we commit to a vote that we can win in the Senate.”</p>
<p>There is another important consideration in politics and that’s demonstrating leadership and resoluteness. The government made these bills triggers for a double dissolution. It has previously been very hopeful of getting them through. Turnbull’s own credibility surely requires that the bills go to a Senate vote before Christmas, whatever the outcome.</p>
<p>At worst the government suffers a defeat, which admittedly would be a blow for Turnbull. But at least he would be making a gesture on the legislation he argued is so critical.</p>
<p>As double dissolution bills, they are eligible to go to a joint sitting, but the government believes they would fare worse there than in the Senate.</p>
<p>Turnbull desperately needs some policy achievements by year’s end, and these bills are the obvious candidates. If they are pushed to a vote, this would concentrate the minds of the crossbenchers, who otherwise might just procrastinate endlessly.</p>
<p>The prospect of success is not likely to be much improved by delay and there is the outside risk that, if things turn out badly for the government, the ALP might pick up an extra number in the Day replacement.</p>
<p>The negotiations underway on the bills will be watched closely after the revelation of the horse trading on migration legislation that Abbott government ministers did with Liberal Democrat David Leyonhjelm, giving him a sunset clause on the Adler import ban (which the government later got around, to Leyonhjelm’s anger).</p>
<p>The government has made it clear it is willing to be flexible on amendments. It knows that is its only chance.</p>
<p>As matters stand on the ABCC legislation, which is the more difficult part of the industrial relations package to get through, One Nation is mostly on side, although there is confusion about whether and how Culleton (who has been critical) would vote. At the other end of the spectrum, Tasmanian independent Jacqui Lambert won’t support it.</p>
<p>Nick Xenophon has a plethora or amendments. Leyonhjelm, still smarting over his “dudding” on the Adler, had discussions with Turnbull on Thursday. “I could go either way at the moment,” he said afterwards. He is looking for a trade off on some other issue on his economic or social agenda. Derryn Hinch, who has concerns, will have amendments and demands.</p>
<p>Labor is also busy lobbying the crossbenchers, trying to prevent them being swayed.</p>
<p>Turnbull on Thursday was again attacking the Construction, Forestry, Mining and Energy Union, describing it as “a union whose lawlessness is one of the great scandals, one of the great handbrakes on economic development around Australia”. If, after all the talk, he didn’t stand up and let the numbers be counted on these bills by year’s end, it would surely be seen as a lack of backbone.</p>
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<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Michelle Grattan does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Malcolm Turnbull laughs off the suggestion that this week’s extraordinary developments mean the Senate is in chaos. Okay, let’s humour the Prime Minister.Michelle Grattan, Professorial Fellow, University of CanberraLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/672492016-10-18T08:19:55Z2016-10-18T08:19:55ZTurnbull walks right into Shorten’s gun-sight<p>The government has a new buzzword. In the partyroom on Tuesday Malcolm Turnbull and Barnaby Joyce urged the troops to make the Coalition’s policies “tactile”.</p>
<p>In less-fancy terminology, what they mean is showing people how the benefits of policies are tangible and real.</p>
<p>Turnbull instanced talking about health savings being about providing funds to make available expensive drugs. In industrial relations, the government’s preferred topic of the week, Turnbull casts the government’s tough industrial relations legislation as “economy-boosting” and “job-creating”.</p>
<p>The government is increasingly confident that the two double-dissolution bills – to resurrect the Australian Building and Construction Commission (ABCC) and to toughen union governance – will pass the parliament. But it will have to compromise when the bills reach the Senate in order to get the required crossbench support.</p>
<p>It is willing to do so, because that is likely to lead to a better end than the riskier course of a joint sitting.</p>
<p>Mostly this will involve changes to the detail of the bills themselves. But Liberal Democratic senator David Leyonhjelm plays a wider game. He wants the ban on the importation of the Adler seven-shot lever-action shotgun lifted as a quid pro quo. He claims he was previously dudded because the ban was just reimposed once a sunset clause he had extracted last year came due.</p>
<p>Two seconds worth of thought would tell you that a trade-off between issues around guns and the industrial relations legislation would be a bad path for Turnbull.</p>
<p>But interviewed on Tuesday morning Turnbull did not flatly shut down the Leyonhjelm demand, as he should have. He didn’t want to get drawn on negotiations or further irritate Leyonhjelm, who already describes himself as “grumpy”.</p>
<p>“We will be dealing respectfully with all of the crossbench senators,” he said on the ABC. Later he told journalists: “I’m not going to speculate about negotiations with senators. I’m certainly not going to negotiate in advance.”</p>
<p>Of Leyonhjelm’s gripe he said: “David Leyonhjelm and I have discussed the matter and I’ll be working hard to ensure that any concerns or disappointment he has is addressed.” Leyonhjelm went to Turnbull to complain during the first week of the new parliament.</p>
<p>Labor, so much more agile than the government on tactics but under pressure over industrial relations, saw an opportunity to switch the heat off itself. It proposed a motion in parliament saying Turnbull “has on at least five occasions just this morning refused to rule out trading away John Howard’s gun laws to pass the Abbott government’s industrial relations bills”.</p>
<p>Tony Abbott, also sensing an opportunity, tweeted: “Disturbing to see reports of horse-trading on gun laws. ABCC should be supported on its merits.”</p>
<p>Turnbull, who had gone into the House to train the fire hose on Labor’s motion, was still trying to gain control of the issue in Question Time.</p>
<p>He declared there was “no chance” of the government “weakening, watering down John Howard’s gun laws”.</p>
<p>He said that presently lever-action shotguns were in the most easily acquired category of guns. After a proposal last year to import a significant number of the beefed-up version in question, there had been a need to get federal-state agreement on a reclassification – which hasn’t yet been reached.</p>
<p>The Commonwealth had imposed the import ban, pending an agreement, “to hold the ring and prevent the lever action guns of that capacity to be imported at all”. The ban would continue until the classification was sorted.</p>
<p>Meanwhile the opposition was pursuing the fact that in Abbott’s time Leyonhjelm’s obtaining the sunset clause had secured his opposition to Labor amendments on migration legislation.</p>
<p>By now what Deputy Opposition Leader Tanya Plibersek called “guns for votes” had taken over the political battleground. The opposition had shifted the conversation from union bad behaviour, on which Labor is vulnerable, to whether Turnbull might play footsie on guns.</p>
<p>It was yet another demonstration of how, in the initial weeks of this parliament, the government is frequently outwitted by its opponents.</p>
<p>Earlier, in the Coalition partyroom, MPs had canvassed the possibility of an electronic system for parliamentary votes, raised by former minister Kevin Andrews. For example, members would still come into the chamber and take seats, but then they would insert personalised cards into machines at the desks. Turnbull is having Leader of the House Christopher Pyne bring forward a submission.</p>
<p>While the government was worrying about saving the moments, Turnbull was throwing away a day.</p>
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The government has a new buzzword. In the partyroom on Tuesday Malcolm Turnbull and Barnaby Joyce urged the troops to make the Coalition’s policies “tactile”. In less-fancy terminology, what they mean…Michelle Grattan, Professorial Fellow, University of CanberraLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/672322016-10-18T05:42:47Z2016-10-18T05:42:47ZPolitics podcast: Stirling Griff and Skye Kakoschke-Moore on life in the Senate<p>Nick Xenophon’s two new Senate colleagues, Stirling Griff and Skye Kakoschke-Moore, are no strangers to the political process, having both worked with Xenophon behind the scenes.</p>
<p>In a joint interview, they tell Michelle Grattan about their contrasting experiences in becoming politicians. Kakoschke-Moore says she has had the benefit of being around Xenophon for nearly six years. “So I understand the way he operates,” she says. </p>
<p>Working as a Xenophon adviser, she learnt the ropes of the Senate. “It is so rule-driven and so procedure-driven that I have a great deal of sympathy for people coming into this who have had no exposure at all to the inner workings of Senate procedure.”</p>
<p>Stirling Griff, on the other hand, has had a “huge learning curve”. </p>
<p>“I’m following behind Skye like she’s the mother hen and I imagine I’ll be doing that really for another few more weeks,” he says. </p>
<p>With the government’s industrial relations legislation before the parliament, the Nick Xenophon Team is looking for some amendments. </p>
<p>“Particularly in relation to the building code and requiring building projects, to the greatest extent possible, to use Australian goods and services. So we’ll be looking at the bills closely but we’ll also be keeping an open mind to amendments,” Kakoschke-Moore says. </p>
<p>The pair are dismissive of any move by senator David Leyonhjelm to push for concessions on gun laws in exchange for passage of the industrial relations bills.</p>
<p>“They’re not related and we don’t want to play those games,” Griff says.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/67232/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Michelle Grattan does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Nick Xenophon's two new Senate colleagues, Stirling Griff and Skye Kakoschke-Moore, are no strangers to the political process.Michelle Grattan, Professorial Fellow, University of CanberraLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/566762016-04-15T03:28:59Z2016-04-15T03:28:59ZExplainer: what are the ABCC and Registered Organisations bills?<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/117799/original/image-20160407-10004-zckc24.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">The government argues its industrial relations bills are necessary to deal with widespread corruption uncovered by the trade union royal commission.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">AAP/Joel Carrett</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Federal parliament will convene for three weeks from Monday for a special sitting to consider the Australian Building and Construction Commission (ABCC) and the Registered Organisations bills. Crossbench senators are <a href="https://theconversation.com/turnbull-ultimatum-july-2-double-dissolution-unless-reconvened-senate-passes-industrial-relations-bills-56586">facing the threat</a> of a double-dissolution election if the bills do not pass.</p>
<p>The government’s case for the bills is essentially that they are necessary to deal with widespread corruption uncovered by the <a href="https://www.tradeunionroyalcommission.gov.au/Pages/default.aspx">trade union royal commission</a>. Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull <a href="http://www.abc.net.au/news/2016-03-21/malcolm-turnbull-brings-budget-forward-threatens-election/7262898">argues</a> the ABCC’s restoration is a “critical economic reform” and will reduce the high levels of industrial disputes on building sites. </p>
<p>But what is actually provided for in the two bills? And to what extent would they actually deal with union corruption or criminality if passed?</p>
<h2>What is the ABCC bill?</h2>
<p>The <a href="http://www.aph.gov.au/Parliamentary_Business/Committees/Senate/Education_and_Employment/Building_and_Construction">ABCC bill’s</a> main purpose is to re-introduce the Howard-era regulator for the construction industry.</p>
<p>In 2012, the Labor government replaced the ABCC with <a href="https://www.fwbc.gov.au/">Fair Work Building and Construction</a> (FWBC). It has reduced powers and lower penalties for breaches of prohibitions on unlawful industrial action and coercion.</p>
<p>The current arrangements have, <a href="http://www.constructors.com.au/wp-content/uploads/2015/08/ACA-Media-Release-ABCC-and-Related-Legislation-11-August-2015.pdf">according to some</a>, allowed damaging and unproductive practices to re-emerge in the sector.</p>
<p>The powerful Construction, Forestry, Mining and Energy Union <a href="http://www.standupspeakoutcomehome.org.au/abcc-will-try-silence-workers">continues to oppose</a> the ABCC’s ability to subject construction workers to compulsory interrogations under threat of imprisonment (among other features of the bill).</p>
<p>In addition to restoring the ABCC, the bill would:</p>
<ul>
<li><p>expand the definition of “building work” subject to ABCC oversight to cover the transportation or supply of goods to building sites and offshore resources platforms;</p></li>
<li><p>create new prohibitions on the organising or taking of unlawful industrial action, or unlawful picketing. This is a response to <a href="http://www.theage.com.au/victoria/cfmeu-signs-35m-grocon-payout-20150619-ghsbgi.html">disruptive pickets</a> by building unions such as that which took place on the Grocon Myer Emporium site in 2012;</p></li>
<li><p>increase penalties for unlawful industrial action from A$10,800 to A$34,000 for individuals, and from $54,000 to $170,000 for corporate entities – including unions – with the same penalties applying to unlawful picketing;</p></li>
<li><p>remove the current limitation preventing the regulator from initiating or continuing enforcement action where the parties involved have settled a dispute; and</p></li>
<li><p>give legal effect to the government’s <a href="http://www.corrs.com.au/publications/corrs-in-brief/abbott-government-releases-new-construction-code/">procurement framework</a> that enables further Commonwealth control over the industrial practices of companies tendering for federally funded projects.</p></li>
</ul>
<h2>What is the Registered Organisations bill?</h2>
<p>The <a href="http://www.aph.gov.au/Parliamentary_Business/Bills_Legislation/Bills_Search_Results/Result?bId=r5422">Registered Organisations bill</a> seeks to implement the Coalition’s <a href="http://www.liberal.org.au/better-transparency-and-accountability-registered-organisations">2013 election policy</a> to impose higher standards of regulation on union officials – mainly in response to the <a href="http://www.heraldsun.com.au/news/victoria/inside-the-corrupt-culture-of-the-health-services-union/news-story/3e6ef215ecdbd1daeb142795f0472ec6">Health Services Union corruption scandal</a>.</p>
<p>Under this legislation, a new specialist regulator, the Registered Organisations Commission, would take over responsibility from the Fair Work Commission for oversight of registered unions and employer associations.</p>
<p>In addition, the bill would, in many respects, align the regulation of registered organisations with that applying to corporations. This includes:</p>
<ul>
<li><p>increasing the obligations of office-holders in registered organisations with respect to the disclosure of material personal interests, and decision-making where officers may have such interests;</p></li>
<li><p>strengthening the financial, disclosure and transparency requirements applicable to officers in financial management matters; and</p></li>
<li><p>increasing civil penalties and imposing criminal liability for serious breaches by officers of their statutory duties.</p></li>
</ul>
<p>The Senate has already rejected this bill twice.</p>
<p>The government is expected to introduce a new version of the bill to include some of the royal commission’s broader recommendations. This may include new criminal offences relating to the payment of corrupting benefits/secret commissions, and increased regulation of union-run “slush funds” (as the royal commission described them).</p>
<h2>Will they combat corruption?</h2>
<p>In his <a href="https://www.gg.gov.au/sites/default/files/files/gg/2016/Documents%20relating%20to%20proroguation%20of%20the%20Parliament%2021%20March%202016.pdf">letter to the governor-general</a> requesting parliament’s recall, Turnbull described the bills as necessary:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>… to deal with widespread and systematic criminality in the building and construction industry.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>However, the ABCC bill mostly imposes only civil penalties for workplace law breaches in the construction sector – with the exception of the criminal penalties for not participating in a compulsory witness examination. It does not include <a href="http://www.afr.com/news/politics/7-out-of-8-crossbenchers-ready-to-talk-on-abcc-bill-20160329-gnsu5m">any measures</a> to tackle union corruption.</p>
<p>The Registered Organisations bill deals with union corruption but in a broad sense, rather than anything specifically focused on the construction industry.</p>
<p>Much of the current debate also overlooks the existing building industry regulator – the FWBC – and that it has some of the former ABCC’s coercive powers (until May 31, 2017).</p>
<p>We will know soon whether the crossbenchers will bow to government pressure and pass these two controversial bills.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/56676/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Anthony Forsyth is a Consultant with the Employment, Workplace & Safety Team at Corrs Chambers Westgarth. He is/has conducted commissioned research for organisations including the Victorian Government, CFMEU (Mining and Energy Division), Business Council of Australia and Fair Work Commission.</span></em></p>To what extent would the ABCC and Registered Organisations bills actually deal with union corruption or criminality if passed?Anthony Forsyth, Professor of Workplace Law, RMIT UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.