THE HON MARK DREYFUS QC MP
SHADOW ATTORNEY-GENERAL
SHADOW MINISTER FOR THE ARTS
MEMBER FOR ISAACS
THE HON BRENDAN O'CONNOR MP
SHADOW MINISTER FOR EMPLOYMENT AND WORKPLACE RELATIONS
SHADOW SPECIAL MINISTER OF STATE
MEMBER FOR GORTON
MORE EVIDENCE THE UNIONS ROYAL COMMISSION WAS A FARCE
Revelations this evening that personal information delivered in confidence to the Trade Union Royal Commission has been sent mistakenly to third parties is yet more evidence of the farcical nature of the entire process.
The Royal Commission was an anti-union witchhunt led by the Abbott-Turnbull government, which cost taxpayers $80 million and has been mishandled from the very beginning. It is now even more obvious that the governments argument that the highly politicised Royal Commission justifies the reintroduction of the Australian Building and Construction Commission is built on sand.
Despite this, the union movement fully cooperated with the Commission, including providing confidential documents when asked. This cooperation has now been thrown back in its face thanks to significant breaches of privacy.
Even worse, the initial error of misdirected documents was brought to the attention of the officials handling the matter, and the mistakes were subsequently repeated.
Ironically, one of the reasons Michaelia Cash gave for playing political games with the selective release of the TURC report was privacy concerns. We can see now how hollow that argument was.
The government will undoubtedly re-use the highly flawed Royal Commission in its argument to force through the ABCC bill in coming weeks. The two are not linked. The ABCC bill will not address criminal activity, it is a civil body, which encroaches significantly on the rights and freedoms of tradies.
While Labor abhors corruption in all areas of the public and private sectors, it will never support one set of laws for tradies and another set for everyone else. Especially if such a flawed Royal Commission is used as a phony justification.
WEDNESDAY, 6 APRIL 2016
