The federal government’s proposed bill to intervene in the Country Fire Authority dispute has received wide backing, with Nick Xenophon and three crossbench senators expressing support for the volunteers’ position.
Senator Derryn Hinch is in favour of the changes, while Xenophon and senators Bob Day and David Leyonhjelm have all expressed in-principle support for the move to boost the volunteers’ position in the CFA dispute.
On Monday the government unveiled proposed changes to workplace law prohibiting terms in agreements that restrict emergency services’ ability to deploy volunteers.
The changes seek to boost the position of CFA volunteers in a long-running industrial dispute with professional firefighters and the United Firefighters Union in Victoria, including by giving volunteer organisations the ability to make submissions on workplace deals that affect them.
On Tuesday Hinch told ABC News Breakfast he had “come out 100% supporting my first initiative to the government and that’s supporting the CFA in Victoria”.
“I had talks with [employment minister] Michaelia Cash last week and during the campaign ... and I’m pleased that the government is going to do this to try to thwart premier [Daniel] Andrews.”
Hinch said volunteer services had “national consequences” and rejected characterisation of the CFA dispute as a solely state issue.
Xenophon, whose party holds three Senate votes, wrote to the council of volunteer fire associations days before the election to support legal changes to boost volunteers’ position.
In the letter, seen by Guardian Australia, Xenophon said: “I support moves to rectify the anomaly that has been identified as a result of the dispute that has occurred in Victoria with the Victorian government.
“I will work constructively with you to deal with the issue as a matter of urgency.”
On Tuesday Xenophon said the letter still reflects his position.
The Volunteer Fire Brigades Victoria believes the CFA dispute has revealed an anomaly that allows enterprise agreements for paid emergency service workers to include provisions that override state emergency management laws such as the CFA Act.
For that reason, the government’s proposed changes would also strike out terms that are inconsistent with state or territory laws that regulate such bodies.
But an industrial relations expert, Prof Andrew Stewart, has described that element of the new bill as “entirely irrelevant” because the Fair Work Commission would not approve an enterprise agreement that breached the CFA Act.
The Victorian supreme court is judging a case in which the volunteer firefighters’ organisation is claiming the deal breaches the CFA Act.
Day told Guardian Australia he is “totally on the side of the volunteers”.
“Subject to looking at the details of the bill, I am very keen to support government moves to support the volunteers,” he said.
Leyonhjelm said he was “broadly sympathetic to what the government is trying to achieve” but had not yet scrutinised the bill.
If those three crossbenchers and Xenophon back the bill, the government will need to win support only from Pauline Hanson’s One Nation to pass it.
A One Nation spokesman told Guardian Australia its four senators would vote as a bloc but the party did not have a position on the changes yet.
The party would receive further briefings from Cash and from its Victorian Senate candidate, Simon Roylance, who has been a CFA member since his teenage years.
Speaking on Radio National on Tuesday, Cash said a number of industrial terms discriminated against volunteer fire brigades, including one that required seven professional firefighters to be dispatched before volunteers could start fighting a fire.
“One of the more offensive changes ... is that union agreement will be required to change policy, and that includes policies that affect volunteers,” she said.
Asked why the federal government did not wait for the supreme court and FWC rulings on the agreement, Cash said the court challenge only dealt with “process” but the Fair Work Act changes would deal with “the source of the problem”.
On Monday Labor’s workplace relations spokesman, Brendan O’Connor, said the dispute should be left to the Victorian supreme court.
“The legislation released today is drafted in broad terms but the government hasn’t thought about the implications other than to further its politically motivated intervention in this Victorian issue,” he said.
Crossbench senator, Jacqui Lambie, said she would not take a position on the CFA until she had consulted with Tasmanian firefighters and established whether “Tassie has the same problem that Victoria has”.
“I’m very disappointed that this dispute in Victoria has been politicised and now elevated to a national level,” she said.
Addressing concerns the Fair Work Act changes may not be constitutional, Cash told Guardian Australia “the government does not proceed with amendments unless it is satisfied they are constitutionally valid”.
Speaking on 3AW radio, Hinch also came out strongly against a same-sex marriage plebiscite, saying it could cost $250m or more.
“It is crazy and I hope there’s some way it could be avoided because that’s a heck of a lot of money,” he said.
“It should just be: bring it on, vote it in, and let’s get on with it.”
