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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 2001 Week 4 Hansard (28 March) . . Page.. 1114 ..

MR STANHOPE (continuing):

clarified the doctrine of ambit for the purposes of attracting the jurisdiction of the Australian Industrial Relations Commission in relation to the prevention and settlement of industrial disputes. The High Court found that an industrial dispute created by the service and rejection of a log of claims, in that particular case by ambulance service employers, was valid.

I raise that case because it goes on to discuss the use of ambit. Ambit, of course, is the range between the claim and the response to the claim. It is a common tool. It is used around the nation in relation to industrial relations. It is a common tool to ensure that unions serving a log of claims have as large a range as possible.

A log of claims is commonly extravagant or exaggerated. Everybody in the world knows this.

Mr Stefaniak: That one was extravagant.

MR STANHOPE: You know about these things, Bill, and you know it was a very cheap and nasty shot. A log of claims is commonly extravagant or exaggerated to ensure there is a wide ambit in which the parties to a dispute may operate. That is the purpose of it. This is primarily because the service of a log of claims is an expensive and time-consuming exercise which unions do not like to frequently repeat. The service and refusal of a log of claims is the main method of establishing the existence of an industrial dispute. That is why it is done. That is why unions use ambits. That is why all unions in Australia use ambit claims.

It is necessary that there be an industrial dispute, to allow both the resolution of the dispute and the making and varying of federal awards by the AIRC. The AIRC's jurisdiction is constitutionally limited-Bill would remember this from constitutional law-to conciliation and arbitration for the prevention and settlement of industrial disputes extending beyond the limit of any one state. The existence of an industrial dispute only requires that a demand be made by one party and refused by the other.

There is a lot more in this judgment from the High Court. It is very interesting, and it would perhaps be useful for the Chief Minister to seek to understand the nature of industrial relations law in Australia. We have discovered over the last few weeks that the minister for health understands nothing about industrial relations or the settling of disputes.

When the log of claims was lodged in the AIRC last November by the Media, Entertainment and Arts Alliance, in part on behalf of members of staff of this place, the ACT government was of course represented. The Chief Minister was represented in the commission on that day. Did the Chief Minister's representative object to the log of claims, to the ambit claims? Of course he did not. It was lodged last November, and the ACT government lodged no objection to the nature of the claim. I make that point to highlight the fact that this really was an incredibly low attack, or a purported attack, on me and my colleagues in the Labor Party through a member of my staff. I think in this place there is nothing lower than that.

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