Government expected to appoint administrators to clean up CFMEU, as union remains defiant
- Written by Michelle Grattan, Professorial Fellow, University of Canberra
The Albanese government is expected to appoint independent administrators to clean up the CFMEU.
On Tuesday the defiant union was trying to fend off government action to deal with sweeping allegations of widespread misconduct that have been revealed by Nine media.
CFMEU national secretary Zach Smith declared, “External administration and further interference of the government isn’t necessary”.
“The union and the union movement is more than capable of dealing with allegations in our own ranks, in responding appropriately,” Smith told the ABC.
The government is under pressure to act as soon as possible against the union, as is the Labor Party nationally.
The party’s national executive will meet on Thursday to deal with requests from the Victorian and South Australian premiers and the Tasmanian Labor leader to suspend the CFMEU’s affiliations in those states.
The meeting will also discuss suspending the acceptance of political donations from the union. This has already happened in Victoria.
Smith has put the Victorian branch of the union in administration. He said as part of this “I’m in the process of standing up an investigative process” to test allegations.
“Obviously if there is any wrongdoing found, people will be removed from our ranks.” He would bring in “external eminent legal minds to help manage the investigation process, to conduct the investigation, and to make any recommendations necessary”.
But the government has made it clear the union’s internal action is not enough.
Smith also defended the former secretary of the Victorian and Tasmanian branch of the CFMEU, John Setka, who resigned suddenly on Friday, as Nine papers were set to begin publishing stories containing detailed allegations, as well as damning footage of incidents.
The allegations include thuggery, kickbacks, standover tactics, and the parachuting of senior bikie figures into lucrative union delegate roles on major Victorian construction projects.
Smith said Setka had decided to resign because he thought that was in the best interests of the union and its members.
“I think that speaks to his integrity and his credibility,” Smith said.
“One thing that no one will be able to take away from John is his legacy as an industrial leader – the conditions that he’s won for workers here in Victoria and the strength that he’s built in the Victorian-Tasmanian branch.”
Nine reported on Tuesday that Prime Minister Anthony Albanese and then Victorian infrastructure minister (now premier) Jacinta Allan were sent “detailed evidence in 2022 that CFMEU officials were threatening extreme violence and unlawfully black-banning non-union-preferred companies from state and federally funded projects”.
A federal government spokesman said the email to Albanese had been sent “to an inactive email address”.
Cabinet Minister Bill Shorten, a former workplace relations minister, made it clear on Monday strong action was imperative. He said in an ABC interview: “The investigations and some of the footage and the stories which we’ve seen in very recent days show that there is a pathology of engagement by some in the construction sector with criminals and bikies. That has to stop. They have no home in the Australian trade union movement.” Shorten’s old union, the AWU, has often been at loggerheads with the CFMEU.
Albanese said on Monday, “Everything is on the table, including whether the union continues to be able to operate, whether administrators will be placed into the union. […] All of that is completely on the table.”
