Page 2018 - Week 10 - Tuesday, 24 October 1989
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and I am sure that the TLC would have put up a very good case. But I wonder how many workplaces they visited or how many workers they spoke to. It is all very well to talk to the employers, but how many employees did they address?
Mr Kaine: They went up to the fifth floor but everyone was on strike.
MRS GRASSBY: No, they were not on strike, Mr Kaine. I was here from 10.30 am until 7.30 pm. I spent one hour out doing a small job and that was it. I was here, answering my own phones, by the way. The Chief Minister was answering hers too. I can vouch for that because I was here with her. Also the Health Minister was in and out of the building many times doing his job. We were not on strike. I would like that understood right now. Employees in my office, who belong to a union, took the decision to go on strike and I have no right to tell them that they do not have that right.
Mr Kaine: Don't you? I thought this was a sovereign parliament.
MRS GRASSBY: No, this is not the Liberal Party, Mr Kaine. I think you have misunderstood. This is the Labor Party and we do not tell our workers that they do not have rights.
Mr Kaine: You do not tell your workers they have to do a day's work for their pay?
MRS GRASSBY: My workers do more than a day's work, Mr Kaine. My workers very rarely leave this house before 7.00 pm or 8.00 pm, and they are all in here by 8.00 am. A lot of them work over weekends. Let me tell you, Mr Kaine, my workers are underpaid and overworked. If my staff choose to obey the union's laws and take the day off for a strike, I am not here to tell them they do not have those rights.
Mr Kaine: You got to the bottom of it eventually. They take a day off when there is a strike on.
MRS GRASSBY: They did not take the day off. If you had watched television you would have seen the Health Minister's staff out picketing the office and you would also have seen one of my staff members. They were not taking the day off; they were making known the fact that they believe in a cause, which they have the right to do. If I were not a Minister in the Government, I would probably have been picketing with them because I believe in their right. I finish up by saying - - -
Mr Kaine: I hope so.
MRS GRASSBY: Thank you, Mr Kaine. Just because you did not speak and because you had more champagne than I did at David Jones does not mean to say I have no right to be on my feet.
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