Senator AYRES (New South Wales—Assistant Minister for Trade and Assistant Minister for Manufacturing) (13:00): Nothing symbolises more how lost this crowd are on industrial relations than Senator Cash. The former workplace relations minister, nobody is more responsible over on that side for a government that had the longest period of historically low wage growth in our history ever—ever! Since Federation, those guys opposite presided over the lowest period of wage growth in our history and the lowest period of productivity growth in our history. Why? Because they see industrial relations and workplace reform for one thing: they can't stand the union movement. That is all they care about. They are not interested in anything more. It is a one-eyed, prejudiced, blinkered, ideological view about Australian workplaces that can only see one thing. And when there is a little bit of legislation put in front of them—moderate sensible, practical, straightforward internationally comparable—what are they doing? I will tell you what they are doing. Senator Cash: I rise on a point of order in relation to the assistant minister clearly misleading the chamber. If he thinks that hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of pages— The DEPUTY PRESIDENT: That is not a point of order. Senator Cash, please be seated. Senator AYRES: Do you know what? The international evidence demonstrates this. What does this legislation lead to? Multi-employer bargaining leads to more employment. It leads to lower unemployment. It leads to better jobs. It leads to higher wages. It leads to higher productivity. It leads to less gender inequality. But you guys opposite are not remotely interested in any of that. I tell you what, your relationship with the concept of productivity is so broken. What you have here is a government that is doing what it said it would do—that is, legislating its agenda. The only thing that you are doing is trying to break the productivity of this parliament because what is going on does not suit your political timetable. That is what this is really about. What you, you and you want is months and months and months to run a dishonest partisan political scare campaign in Australian workplaces to frighten ordinary small-business owners out there. These propositions are very straightforward, very simple to understand. I will give you an example of how simple to understand they are. There is an outfit called the OECD. You lot opposite may have heard of it. It is run by a fellow who used to loaf around over here trying to keep Australian wages down. That is what former Senator Cormann did; he tried to keep Australian wages down. The outfit he leads, one of the most respected economic analysis outfits in the world, makes the proposition very simple. It says multi-employer bargaining is a cornerstone industrial relations institution in 18 out of 26 OECD countries. It is a cornerstone not just of their industrial relations system but of their macro-economic system— Opposition senators interjecting— The DEPUTY PRESIDENT: Order! Senator AYRES: I mean, honestly. Have a go! It's a cornerstone of their economic systems. It's a cornerstone of their productivity systems. What it leads to is higher employment, lower unemployment, more jobs, good jobs and more cooperation in workplaces over issues like skills. It leads to higher productivity. It leads to lower gender inequality. Which bit of that don't you lot want to have? The fact is: the modern Liberal Party have lost their way on productivity. You've lost your way on the issues that matter for Australian businesses and Australian workers. Nothing represents that more than the miserable stunt that you lot have engaged in today.