Perin Davey (NSW, National Party, Shadow Minister for Water) Share this | Hansard source

On the Fair Work (Registered Organisations) Amendment (Administration) Bill 2024—how did we get here? How did we get here at this moment where everyone is shocked and amazed at the actions of the CFMEU? How can we be shocked and amazed when we know that this has been happening for years? We have known that the CFMEU was out of control for years. While the Australian Building and Construction Commission was in existence, it ran 35 court actions against the CFMEU, not because they were biased, as has been claimed by those on the other side, but because the CFMEU were aggressive, intimidated people in the workforce, disrupted the workplace, discriminated, boycotted and practised unlawful conduct. Indeed, time and time again, we heard evidence of this behaviour through Senate estimates. I was on the committee. I questioned the ABCC multiple times. Despite knowing this, and despite having the evidence through Senate estimates and through the courts, what did Labor do when they got into government? They abolished the ABCC. What did they do to protect workers and to stamp out workplace bullying? They abolished the ABCC. That's right. Instead of taking action against the bullies, they got rid of the policeman. They got rid of the ones actually protecting workers, managers and employers from intimidation and harassment. On what planet? How does that make sense?

And now—what do we learn now? Not thanks to the government and any strong action on their behalf but thanks to investigative journalists—and it's not every day that someone in this place thanks the media, but today we can do that—the media have taken the blinkers off. Through their investigations, we learned that the actions the ABCC took were right and legitimate. We learned that the CFMEU have done all that they were accused of doing by the ABCC and found guilty of doing by the courts. But we also learned they got involved in organised crime. They have employed bikies to intimidate and harass people. They've decided that the $19 million in fines that they racked up since 2016 were just a cost of doing business. Imagine that. That is $19 million of members' money—members who are largely blue-collar workers, who have paid their union dues supposedly because they want to work in a safe and respectful environment. Instead, the union decided that $19 million of that money was worth being spent on paying fines for illegal actions that actually risk the lives and livelihoods of those very same blue-collar workers.

Take, for example, the report on the ABC yesterday from a health and safety worker who was sworn at, threatened and physically abused for trying to do his job. I thought unions were all about protecting the safety of the workplace. I guess that's only if the inspections are done by one of their own, and, when I say 'one of their own', I mean one of the CFMEU, because we've also seen reports recently of CFMEU members bullying and harassing members of other unions. How's that for solidarity? Despite all this evidence of a union out of control, despite all the fines applied not by the ABCC but by the courts—they were found guilty in the courts—despite the CFMEU continuing to be found to be in breach, even after the abolition of the ABCC, and with all that proven guilt of bullying, harassment and intimidation, Labor came to government and took action to protect the bully. And now the bully has been outed. Now that it's not just the courts exposing the bully and now the bully has been exposed in the public domain, what do Labor do now? They feign outrage. 'We had no idea,' they claim. Where were you during Senate estimates?

But the veil is very thin. Just this week, Jennifer Hewett, in an excellent column in the Financial Review, said:

The shock evinced by Labor governments at the crime, corruption and thuggery alleged in the construction industry surely deserves a special prize for acting.

And I agree.

It was remiss of me. I failed to congratulate the new minister on his promotion, but now I understand why he dropped the ball in the last six months on his previous portfolio of emergency management and why we're still waiting to see the results of round 2 of the Disaster Ready Fund. He was clearly too busy auditioning for his current job. He spent the last six months auditioning for the job that he's eyed for years, his dream job: the minister for the unions; the minister to deliver for the unions, Labor's largest funders. Now, he finds himself having to look like he's cleaning up a mess of Labor's own making, but, given the way he has drafted this legislation, as long as he looks like he's doing it, it seems to be good enough for him.

What else has he done? He sought to appoint blame on employers. In some reports that we've seen recently, Minister Watt has said that, for every bribe paid, there had to be someone paying it, so we should look at them. What? Totally ignore the fact that the poor someone who has been bullied, intimidated and threatened into paying, tantamount to the old standover tactics and protection rackets of the old New York often betrayed in Hollywood movies—the poor bodega owner who either pays for protection or gets vandalised and traumatised on a weekly basis. He's saying that the bodega owners are at fault for paying for the protection. Is that not victim-blaming? Seriously.

Through this horrid, sordid mess, we see Labor's true colours. They talk the talk about safe and respectful workplaces but have absolutely condoned the reprehensible behaviour of the CFMEU for years, abolishing the very body that was established to help stamp out the bullying and intimidation. They talk the talk about supporting victims and whistleblowers, while attempting to shift blame onto them. Then, with this bill, we also see—like so many other actions they've done during this term of government—them talking the talk on transparency, while ensuring everything is cloaked in a veil of secrecy.

Yes, while this bill does propose appointing an administrator to come in and clean up the mess—that is, the construction arm of the CFMEU—there is no transparency. There is no requirement for said administrator to have to submit progress reports. There is no public accountability. How will we in this place and, indeed, how will the public know that the administrator is actually being effective? How do the public have any confidence that the CFMEU, after their 'up to' three years of administration, will be released as a straight, well-functioning union that prioritises workers above intimidation and harassment?

As has been the common practice of the government, they're demanding that this very hastily drafted bill be passed forthwith, without adequate time for scrutiny and without inquiry. But, at least, we are currently having a debate. Despite this haste, we are applying our scrutiny to this bill. In the short time that we have had the bill, we've already identified some really key flaws, and we will be proposing amendments. So, if the government is serious about getting this bill through and cleaning up the CFMEU, and if they are serious about transparency and good governance, they will accept our amendments, because our amendments make this bill and the administration process more accountable and more practical.

For example, our amendments will return transparency to the process. We will make the process fit the rhetoric. We want to ensure the administrator provides written reports to parliament. We need to be able to see the progress being made. We'd like to see the administrator appear before Senate estimates so they are accountable. There should be clear KPIs and a clear objective statement that the administrator must achieve before the administration can end. Currently, the bill establishes an administrator for only 'up to' three years—it's taken decades for the corruption to set in; it may take longer than three years to clear it out—and, under this bill, the minister can end the administration at any time, with no defined achievement that the administrator must make.

The government wants us to leave the decision on when the administration should end in the hands of the unions' key champion, Minister Murray Watt. So, when the media circus has moved on, when union thuggery is no longer on the front page and when the public's attention has turned to the next deadline, maybe the day after the next election if—and I hope it doesn't happen—this government returns to power, Minister Watt can quietly determine: 'The job's done. There's nothing to see here.' He can pick up the phone and say: 'Thanks, administrator, mate. Your job's done. We don't need you anymore. Off you go; you can go home.' Meanwhile, we, here in this place, and those watching on at home, will have no idea whether anything has actually changed. If this bill is not amended, that could be the outcome.

If that happens, how long will it be before there is a return to the thuggery, before the bikies are put back on the payroll, before the standover tactics return to the construction industry and before, again, we are faced with lengthy delays and cost blowouts because of union thuggery? If all of that happens, you know there won't be an Australian Building and Construction Commission to monitor, watch over and take action against such practices. That is why we need our sensible amendments applied to this bill, to ensure that we get this legislation right, because this is too important to get wrong.