Senator SHELDON (New South Wales) (15:10): What a particularly interesting speech, because I've just heard a political speech from the opposition, talking about bringing back the actual organisation that had criminal gangs working right underneath it and didn't see a thing. They want to come in here and say: 'We've got an answer. Let's put the same people and the same organisation in control.' More of the same thing is what they want. The difference is that we've made firm, direct action to make sure that we can turn around and make sure the criminal element is out of that industry, because they saw it flourish under their proposal, their strategy, and they want to readopt it. Not only was it unsuccessful; it saw productivity collapse in the construction industry. That's how successful they were. But they want to play politics. They want to reinstitute the same lame organisation that failed before. When you start looking at what they did do with the ABCC, I'll just give you one example—there are so many—of where they turned around and sued the union over flags for half a million dollars while there were issues about organised crime. They sued the union over flags. They sued the union because they wanted female toilets on a worksite. These are the big issues where they want to get the dogs out to turn around and make a change. What you should do is listen to what we're doing, understand why it's being done and understand that working people in that industry deserve the representation they should have, because what they're really about is not having working people getting representation in construction. That's what they're really about. When they had the ABCC there—I'll give you one of many examples. Back in 2018, the Royal Hobart Hospital was one of the biggest construction sites in Tasmania. The ABCC went out to that site on numerous occasions and never found anything wrong. But what was happening? There were 200 Chinese workers engaged on that site, many of them on student visas or other temporary work visas, who had not been paid for six weeks. They hadn't been paid. Their entitlements were taken off them; they'd been ripped off. There was sham contracting, and the ABCC, despite being at the site multiple times, never sniffed a single thing. Guess what? In 2019, their crap organisation dropped any charges. So we know what you're about. You're not about fixing this industry up. You're not about making a difference. To hear a criticism—I'll take it as a misstep because I know the good senator. You know, we might disagree on things, but I know his morality is questionable but ethically right. Senator Sharma: A misunderstanding. Senator SHELDON: A misunderstanding—thank you. But when it comes to this point, saying that we should have an issue about these companies and the ABCC, what the minister has rightly said is that we should be looking at the companies as well. Heaven forbid that the person who does the bribe is not guilty! That's what they're telling us. Have you heard anything more ridiculous in your entire life? The construction industry does need to be turned around and properly dealt with. The DEPUTY PRESIDENT: Senator Cadell, on a point of order, I assume. Senator Cadell: I think I've been misrepresented. I actually said that they were responsible. The DEPUTY PRESIDENT: Senator Sheldon. Senator SHELDON: Thankfully, we're on the same track. I misunderstood what you were saying because of the complicated way you said it. So thank you for agreeing with me. Those companies, just as we are rightly doing, are going to take action, because the ABCC never took action. That goes to my point about what the good senator raised just then, because we put a proposition about how to move forward. I will also just jump to a critical issue that was raised during the questions on the cost of living. I'm going to run through this pretty quickly. We know people are doing it tough, but on 1 July 2024 we saw tax cuts come into place, and Sussan Ley, the Deputy Leader of the Opposition, says she wants to scrap them; 2.6 million low-paid workers will get their third consecutive pay rise, but the Liberals and Nationals oppose it. The Liberals and Nationals opposed the increase to the minimum wage in 2022 and in 2023. The member for New England, Barnaby Joyce, said that someone earning another $110 a week more is just 'window-dressing'. Labor's cheaper medicine policy saved families $63 million in 2023 in my state of New South Wales alone. Labor's 60-day prescriptions will save patients more than $1.6 billion over four years, up until 2027. The Liberals and Nationals opposed cheaper medicines because they said it would cause pharmacies to close. There's been electricity bill relief, and the average family would have been $230 worse off in 2023-24 without Labor's energy price relief, but the coalition voted against it. And the list goes on.