Page 245 - Week 01 - Thursday, 15 February 1990
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It is important that we examine the performance of the players in this Assembly at the time that this legislation was dealt with. I think the most significant issue in relation to the designated work groups was the position that was taken by the Residents Rally party and, in particular, their leader. Mr Collaery danced all over the place, as usual, and it was very difficult to determine what his position was. The one thing that was made very clear to us was his attitude to workers in this Territory, which he was able to convince his party should be followed.
Mr Moore: The remnants of the party.
MR BERRY: As Mr Moore rightly says, it now could be described as the remnants of the party. What developed was a hatred for organised labour in this Territory and in particular for the Building Workers Industrial Union. Because the strength of that union, the weight that it put behind this legislation and the importance that it placed on it - we certainly want exposed the conservative nature of Mr Collaery's party's politics - enraged him somewhat and then a reaction was taken against workers in this Territory, he was the one who effectively stood in the way of the designated work groups being placed in a stronger position in order to protect conditions in the workplace. Some of the interesting things that one can find in the transcript relate to his eventual attitude. He said:
We were not criticising unions such as the carpenters and joiners, the painters and decorators and the others per se; we were referring specifically to the exemplary role that the BWIU should play in this matter.
So he had a definite dislike for the BWIU. He also pointed out the populist position of the Residents Rally party. At page 2233 of Hansard of 31 October 1989 he said:
It is clearly a matter of surprise to the Deputy Chief Minister and members of the ALP that the Rally has this role in the Assembly. It is not undertaken for any power gamesmanship because clearly the Rally cannot win votes either way out of the position it has taken. It is a very difficult position to sit in the middle on issues like this. The Rally has taken a principal view that the BWIU has an extreme duty upon it; it bears the onus of acting as one of the leading unions or perhaps the most prominent and powerful union in this town in the implementation of this legislation.
I indicated very clearly that the Rally will support an amendment in due course so long as the Act is phased in and is seen to be established and accepted in the industrial workplace.
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