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Category: Government and Politics / Business, Economics and Finance / Building and Construction / Federal Government

ABCC should not just focus on union behaviour, Xenophon says

Tuesday, 29 Nov 2016 03:44:33 | Tom Iggulden

Senator Xenophon told the senate last night "we cannot simply talk about the behaviour of some in the union". (ABC News: Marco Catalano)

Changes to the Government's industrial relations legislation proposed by Senator Nick Xenophon are in keeping with "core Liberal values" and should be adopted, an influential coalition backbencher says.

Former employment minister Eric Abetz says agreeing to overhaul security-of-payment laws for subcontractors in the building industry could get the Government's ABCC legislation passed before the end of the week.

"We do support the forgotten people in debates and often it is the subcontractors in the construction sector," Senator Abetz told AM.

"We do look after the aspirational small business people, that is what subcontractors are."

Senator Xenophon told the senate last night the ABCC legislation should not just focus on union thuggery on building sites.

What is ABCC?

It has taken three years but the Government's two industrial relations bills are back in the Senate. Let's take a look at the remaining bill and who is likely to support it.

"We cannot simply talk about the behaviour of some in the union," he said.

"We also need to talk about the behaviour of a number of principal contractors and the way that people have been left in the lurch, the way many thousands of subcontractors have not been paid, not been treated fairly and driven to the brink of bankruptcy."

The senate debated the ABCC bill until 12.45am last night.

One Nation senator Malcolm Roberts accused construction union bosses of "castrating the economy".

Labor senator Kimberly Kitching said the legislation showed the Government's "authoritarian streak" and likened it to a third-world dictatorship.

"Who would have thought Malcolm Turnbull was much like Fidel Castro?" she said.

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