Bridget McKenzie (Victoria, National Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

My question is to the Minister for Employment, Senator Abetz. I refer the minister to reports of continued thuggery by unions purporting to represent workers on construction sites. Can the minister update the Senate of the current state of the construction industry in light of this and other reports?

Eric Abetz (Tasmania, Liberal Party, Minister for Employment) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I thank the distinguished chair of the Senate's employment committee for that question. Today's Financial Review shows yet again just how far officials of the CFMEU are willing to go to bully and intimidate anyone who stands up to their thuggery. According to the report, when the employer rightly contacted the Fair Work Building and Construction industry watchdog, inspectors who arrived at the site were actively abused and threatened. This behaviour included one CFMEU official spitting at a female FWBC staff member. This is the same female staff member who was last year subjected to misogynous and sexist abuse by CFMEU official Luke Collier, who used many four-letter expletives. Labor frontbencher Senator Cameron knows what was said, yet spent over 30 minutes and 61 questions at Senate estimates trying to defend not the female public officer, but the misogynistic, offensive union bully.

What was the response of the CFMEU to such behaviour by its officials? Last year, following Mr Collier's abuse of a female inspector, CFMEU boss Dave Noonan issued a press release defending the behaviour and saying: 'Swearing on building sites is nothing new.' And Mr Shorten sends in his frontbencher to defend the thugs at Senate estimates! The case for a tough cop on the beat in the form of the Australian Building and Construction Commission is well and truly made out, and the government urges the Senate to reintroduce this important mechanism to reinstate the rule of law.

Bridget McKenzie (Victoria, National Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Mr President, I ask a supplementary question. Can the minister inform the Senate of any other examples of thuggish behaviour by union officials, particularly towards female public officials?

Eric Abetz (Tasmania, Liberal Party, Minister for Employment) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Just yesterday, in Senator Cameron's home state, in Sydney, one union bully went well out of his way to single out a female inspector and spit at her. In another example, CFMEU official Shaun Reardon was recently stripped of his role as a White Ribbon ambassador following evidence that he had made a late-night threatening phone call to a female staff member of the ABCC. Yet another CFMEU comrade called a female ABCC staff member late at night at home and threatened her with gang rape, saying that he and his seven mates were coming around to do it. And, in the face of all this ugliness, we have, of all people, the President of the ACTU writing to senators, championing the CFMEU, with no mention of the OH&S issues for these female workers who were sexually harassed. I ask: what about their rights at work? (Time expired)

Bridget McKenzie (Victoria, National Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Mr President, I ask a further supplementary question. Will the minister inform the Senate of the actual impact of this thuggish behaviour on building workers?

Eric Abetz (Tasmania, Liberal Party, Minister for Employment) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

These thugs act in wilful defiance of their own members and other workers on site. During the Grocon dispute in Melbourne, CFMEU staff members wanted to work but were blockaded from their own workplace by CFMEU officials who were not even working at the site. The blocked workers even took out an advertisement in the newspaper calling on their own union to back off and let them go to work in peace. Just yesterday, Sydney workers who had voted against the union's demands were again forced off their own work site as their ostensible representatives in the CFMEU padlocked the entry gate to their work site. The thuggish behaviour of the CFMEU hurts workers and trashes the reputation of honest trade unionists. It is time for Labor and the Greens to come on board and restore the reputation of unions. (Time expired)