There is already a legislative framework in place which, if invoked appropriately and used in conjunction with existing common law remedies, would make it very expensive for unions and union leaders to wantonly breach the law.

The government is clearly ideologically motivated on this issue. Big business and the various employer lobby groups are the cheer squad we can hear roaring from the sidelines.

The Coalition has already had one very costly crack at this with Tony Abbott's trade union Royal Commission which got them precisely nowhere. Its only lasting effect was to make a handful of lawyers even more comfortably well off than they had been previously.

"Ensuring integrity" has everything to do with the Coalition's commitments to its corporate supporters and the fact that WorkChoices is dead, buried and well and truly off the agenda. Nobody on the conservative side of politics is about to forget it was the wind beneath Kevin 07's wings when John Howard lost his seat more than a decade ago.

The real surprise was Pauline Hanson's emergence as a very unlikely working class hero who had been expected, like Lambie, to side with the government to get the bill through.

While Hanson has not ruled out supporting the bill when it is put for a second time next year it seems unlikely even she will change her position yet again.

The former small business person is getting a lot more love, much of it from some very unexpected quarters, than is usually the case.

Hanson's claim she decided to oppose the bill after many voters contacted her to say the government had one rule for white collar crime and another for blue collar crime will strike a chord with a multitude of Australians in the wake of recent events.

Lambie, who is no fool, shrewdly shifted her position after earlier saying she would support the bill unless Setka stepped down as the head of the CFMMEU. She justified the change by saying the Coalition refused to discuss late amendments.

There is also the small, but not insignificant, point that this government is in no position to claim the moral high ground on ensuring integrity of any sort right now.

Neither Angus Taylor's explanations over his controversial Sydney City Council download or the PM's decision to have a chat to the NSW Police Commissioner about the embattled Energy Minister would past muster in any pub test.

We are also at an interesting point in history where there is growing opposition to any expansion of the government's powers, whether it be over the unions, whistleblowers, the media or anybody else.

Trust in government is at an all time low and it only has itself to blame. Raids on journalists and secret trials of Canberrans only add to that level of distrust.

Yes, the unions have their own problems and have not done enough to clean up their own houses. But there have to be better ways of dealing with these issues than to launch an all out assault on the rights and freedoms of Australian workers.

Doing so will only result in a backlash from thousands of hardworking Australians who haven't seen a pay rise in years and are already struggling to pay the bills.