James McGrath (Queensland, Liberal National Party, Shadow Assistant Minister to the Leader of the Opposition) Share this | Hansard source

When it comes to the Fair Work (Registered Organisations) Amendment (Administration) Bill 2024 and the debate it's often said that the standards you walk past are the standards you accept. With the Labor Party and the CFMEU, the Labor Party are bending over and giving the CFMEU a big sloppy kiss, because we know about the relationship between the Labor Party and the CFMEU. They are one and the same and one and the other.

Let's talk about the tactics and the behaviour of the CFMEU not just over the last year or last month but even what they have done today. The CFMEU are a corrupt criminal cabal. The CFMEU are a blight on Australian democracy and a blight on all those who believe in the freedom of people to join a union and the right of people to form together and start a union. With the CFMEU it is all about them. It is all about their corrupt conduct. It is all about the sexism within the CFMEU, which is never called out by the Labor Party or the Greens. It is all about the violence within the CFMEU not just to other members but also on worksites across Australia—violence that is never called out by the Labor Party or the Greens. It is all about their connection with bikie gangs, drug taking and drug selling—lawbreaking that is never, never called out by the Labor Party or the Greens.

What we see in Australia is a protection racket between the Labor Party, the Greens and the CFMEU. You just have to look at who the president of the Labor Party is. It is Wayne Swan, the world's worst Treasurer. What other role does Wayne Swan have apart from being the world's worst Treasurer and president of the Labor Party? Guess what? He happens to be the chairman of the CFMEU's superfund, Cbus. So you see there is a revolving door between Labor Party politicians and the financial interests of the CFMEU.

But then we look at the green light that has been given to the CFMEU by, for example, Sally McManus, from the ACTU, who, a couple of years ago said that people should break the law if they thought the law was wrong. What that said to the CFMEU, who are a lawbreaking organisation who specialise in breaking laws, who specialise in intimidating people and who specialise in thuggery, was that the chief unionist, Sally McManus, said we can break the law. For the CFMEU, breaking the law is just the cost of doing business. It is the cost of doing business and they will bail out their members. They will make sure that the criminals, the thugs and the people who perpetrate violence against innocent people are looked after. But they forget about looking after the real interests of normal union members across this country, because the CFMEU exists for one reason only, and that is to continue to grow its influence within the Labor Party and grow its influence across Australia.

We saw John Setka rather charmingly show off his new tattoo during the week. It was not a tattoo like 'I love you mum' or of a dolphin or something nice; it was effectively a threat to everybody. When you at John Setka and look at that tattoo, you see the face of the union movement in Australia at the moment. The Labor Party sometimes must wonder—if they a brain cell between them—why it is that union membership in this country has gone from 40 per cent under the Hawke-Keating government to less than 10 per cent. Fewer than one in 10 Australians in the workforce is a member of the union. I can give you a reason why. It is because of the CFMEU. It is because of their practices. It is because of the corruption within that union.

What is interesting about the Labor Party is that, when they won the election in 2007, one of their first acts was to abolish the then Australian Building and Construction Commission. When we won the election in 2013, we were able to reintroduce the Australian Building and Construction Commission and then, when Labor won the election in 2022, they abolished it again. Why does the Labor Party want to keep abolishing the cop who is going through the worksites protecting the small businesses across Australia, protecting normal union members and protecting those who may not be union members? It is because of the financial interests between the Labor Party and the CFMEU.

Since Anthony Albanese became the Leader of the Labor Party, $6.2 million has gone from the CFMEU to the Labor Party. The CFMEU is one of the largest donors to the Labor Party. It's effectively the Labor Party's sugar daddy when it comes to helping it run election campaigns, helping it fund election campaigns and getting CFMEU acolytes into parliament. So 6.2 million reasons should show every Australian why the Labor Party is soft on the CFMEU and why the legislation currently before this parliament does not go far enough. The Labor Party and the CFMEU are one and the same, and we have minister after minister who are effectively the ministers for protection rackets and for boondoggles, who will not stand up to the financial interests of the CFMEU because they know it is not in the financial interests of the Labor Party.

People across Australia will wonder why everything costs so much at the moment. We are in a cost-of-living crisis. Power prices are up, mortgages are up, rents are up, food is up—everything has gone up since the Labor Party came to power. The main reason is the Labor Party's economic policies—an extra $315 billion being spent. But another reason why everything is going up is the impact of the CFMEU on infrastructure projects across this country. When the CFMEU are involved with an infrastructure project, it costs an extra 30 per cent. This is not 30 per cent that comes from some magic money tree at the bottom of the garden; this is 30 per cent for publicly funded infrastructure projects that comes from the taxpayer because the CFMEU see the taxpayer as a giant money tree from which they can continue to get money, and that forces up the cost of infrastructure projects.

It's the same in the private sector, where the CFMEU force up the costs of projects and use their so-called industrial blackmail to exhort from private businesses corrupt payments. They try and exhort from private businesses over-the-top pay rises. They try and exhort from private businesses any sort of sweet money deal. Just look at Queensland. We have the Ekka on this week—the royal exhibition, in Brisbane. It's in August every year. But for the second year in a row the local railway station is unable to open for the Ekka—particularly for People's Day, which is today—because the CFMEU is refusing to allow it to be opened. Welcome to Queensland and welcome to Australia, where a political union, an industrial union, use their might to make life more difficult for people because they just don't care about normal people. They don't care about small-business people. They don't care about normal union members. To them, life is a game and the point of the game of life is to make as much money as possible. The CFMEU is a corrupt organisation, and it is supported by the Labor Party and the Greens. That is why we want the ABCC to come back. We want the Australian Building and Construction Commission to come back to be that cop on the beat.

We also think this bill should be sent to a form of public inquiry. We're all here now in this building. It would be very easy for the relevant committee of the Senate to conduct an inquiry into this bill. We could do it on Friday. The alternative, as Senator Michaelia Cash has said, is that there are a number of amendments that have been proposed by the coalition. If the government accepted these amendments, we'd pass the bill tonight. There's no point challenging the Greens, but I challenge the Labor Party: if you are serious about reforming the CFMEU, if you are serious about ensuring that the CFMEU represents the interests of its members and that the CFMEU can become a positive player in Australia's industrial relations scene, accept these 20 or so amendments we are putting forward and we can pass the bill tonight. This should show the Senate at its best, where, when the parties of government can agree there is a situation, we will compromise and you will compromise. Let's just put these amendments to the vote and let's get on with the job. But dear viewer, dear listener, I think we all know that is not going to happen. The Labor Party and the troglodytes and the Greens will certainly not allow that to happen. They will continue to try and run their protection rackets, and the bill that is before the Senate is a bill that will not do the job.

So what are these amendments that the opposition is putting forward? They are pretty simple amendments. They are what you would call 'head-nod' amendments. But the Labor Party, the Greens and those other left-wing Independents who pretend to be centrist Independents certainly won't be supporting these. The first amendment will include that the administration of the CFMEU must apply to all branches of the CFMEU for a minimum of three years. That is a pretty good recommendation, you would think, considering how deep the corruption, the misbehaviour, the malfeasance, just the general appalling behaviour, are entrenched within all branches of the CFMEU. So you would think that would be a head nod.

The next recommendation is the minister should not have the ability to end the administration early. The minister shouldn't have that power. If the parliament has made the decision that the CFMEU will be placed into administration for a period of three years, let it be for three years. And let it be that the minister, particularly our Labor Party ministers who know that their own organisation has received $6.2 million worth of donations from the CFMEU—I may not be the smartest cookie in the jar but to me that is a slight conflict of interest—cannot end the administration early. But the scheme administration can be varied by the Federal Court on the application of the administrator, so if an administrator has been appointed and says, 'Look, we need to vary it,' then the Federal Court can say 'yay' or 'nay', and the legislation must clearly set out what must be in the scheme administration. This should not be merely at the whim of the minister, because the bill before this parliament allows the minister to effectively become the minister for the CFMEU. It gives the minister all of the power, and we don't think that is appropriate. We think an appropriate balance is for the administrator to have their powers set out, rather than the minister determine what those powers should be.

This one will be very controversial: political donations and political campaigns and advertising by the CFMEU should be explicitly banned during the period of administration. Now, the Labor Party in the Greens certainly won't be supporting that one, will they? We all know why—$6.2 million is why. There is no way they are going to say no to that. We all know what you are. The CFMEU just pay you all the time. We know exactly what you are. You are in the pocket of the CFMEU and it is a very deep pocket. It has $6.2 million in it, and this is what this debate comes down to. This debate comes down to an opposition who have put forward amendments, sensible amendments, that will improve this legislation but we know the Labor and the Greens won't do it because they love the money. It is the standard that you walk past that is the standard you accept. This mob, they don't just accept the standard; they bend over and give it a big sloppy kiss every time, because the CFMEU, the Labor Party and the Greens are in bed together and it is a disgrace.