Matt O'Sullivan (WA, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Here we are, dealing with a very important bill that is before this parliament. The Fair Work (Registered Organisations) Amendment (Administration) Bill 2024 is well overdue. We tried to deal with this, when we were in government, in the last term of parliament. Unfortunately, there was no cooperation at all from the then opposition, the Labor Party. The chief cheerleader of the CFMEU in this place is now the minister, and he's been dragged into this situation, along with the Prime Minister, to once and for all—it should be once and for all—deal with the lawlessness, the dysfunction and, as we've seen at times, the corruption that's involved with the CFMEU. It is unacceptable that workers, who need to be represented by a reputable organisation and reputable officeholders, are in a situation where their representation—whatever fees they pay and whatever their involvement in their workplace—is treated in such a poor way as has been done by the CFMEU, demonstrated through what's been revealed.

Over the last few weeks, every time that this issue has been raised in a press conference or in a question, the minister—or, indeed, the Prime Minister—stands up and acts like the thuggery, the lawlessness and the corruption that is occurring within the CFMEU is some revelation, as if they've never heard of it before. I've been here for about five years now, and I have sat through most of the Senate estimates on the education and employment committee. Every time we spoke to the various agencies, whether it be the ABCC when they were here, the ROC or indeed the department, you had the minister at the table—and often it was Senator Watt representing the then workplace minister—defending the CFMEU. We brought to them, time and time again, instances of corruption, instances where courts had found that there were gross breaches of standards that would be acceptable in a workplace and instances of intimidation, particularly with the way women were treated in workplaces, and there was a defence every single time. So, for the minister and the Prime Minister to act like this is the first time that they're hearing about it, like this is some revelation and like this is some surprise fools absolutely no-one, because we know they have been running a protection racket for the CFMEU for far too long.

This bill that is before us is an important bill; however, it does not go far enough. There are amendments that are necessary to improve this bill. It is a step in the right direction, granted, but it needs to go much further, and there have to be some loopholes closed in order for the coalition to support this. We could do this very quickly. We could actually pass this bill today, if those loopholes and those gaps that exist within this bill are addressed. I'm going to take you through some of those today.

It was in the early days of this government that it abolished the ABCC. They couldn't do it quick enough. Again, because they wanted to return their favours to their paymasters and preselectors, they abolished the ABCC with haste. This was the watchdog. This was the fair cop on the beat, as it was put by the then prime minister Tony Abbott, who set up the ABCC in his first term. The first thing this government did, among a number of other things, was abolish the ABCC.

The construction industry needs special attention—more than what the Fair Work Commission can provide in its broad remit. They need a specialist targeted commission to make sure that construction workplaces are able to operate efficiently and without the intimidation and the sorts of behaviours that we've seen occur on construction workplaces. But this government abolished that body within the first few months of forming government. It's a great shame.

This body should be re-established. You can call it something else if you want to save your political face. You can call it something else; I don't care. But you need to create a watchdog, a mechanism, to ensure that Australian workplaces on construction sites are able to operate without the sort of behaviour that we've seen occur on workplaces.

The problem with this bill is that, as Senator Michaelia Cash said in her contribution, we have a situation where the foxes are looking after the henhouse. Now, the rabbits are looking after the cabbage patch when it comes to this situation, because there are so many gaps and so many loopholes. We've got up to, I think, 20 amendments that we'd like to see approved by the Senate to close those loopholes. At a minimum, the legislation should set clear and concise objectives of how the CFMEU needs to change before it's taken out of administration. That's not provided under this bill.

Any business that operates in Australia, anyone that employs anyone in this country, makes sure to set KPIs so that they know what they have to achieve. This administrator needs to have KPIs. Australians need to be able to know what it is that they need to achieve in order to be counted as successful and, certainly, that needs to be in order before the CFMEU—or its future; whatever it might be—is taken out of administration. These KPIs need to be set. This has to be a priority. This needs to be a priority so that we can drive the cultural change that is necessary within that organisation.

It needs to apply to all branches of the CFMEU and not just in some states. It should be everywhere, including Western Australia—my home state. The Premier over there seems to think that there's no problem over in WA. Well, if you talk to any construction firm over there or talk to anyone about the cost of doing business and how that's impacting upon projects that are delivered for Western Australians, be it through the government or through private investment—talk to anyone that's involved—they'll tell you what's going on in workplaces. You can bury your head in the sand as much as you like, but the reality, the truth, speaks for itself. This government needs to get serious about addressing the corruption and the issues that are going on. It needs to be across all states.

Presently, this bill just sunsets after three years, regardless of whether anything is actually achieved by the administration. Again, there are no KPIs, but there's a sunset at three years. All the CFMEU officials need to do is just wait their time. And guess what? There'll be another election, and, by the time three years go by, there will be enough time for those funds that you've been receiving from the CFMEU to be received in time for the next election. That's what that's about. Let's call it for what it is. There should be an extension. It should be at least five years. It needs to be longer; it should be a long time. Three years is ridiculous. It's ridiculous. The remnants of the CFMEU just can't wait it out, and that's what they'll do if that amendment is not passed and that issue not addressed. We'll see them rise up out of the tall grass and rise back from the ashes. That's exactly what we'll see.

The bill gives too much discretion over the administration process to the minister. That's the other problem that needs to be addressed. There's too much discretion over the administration process given to the minister. If anything, there should be more distance between the processes and the minister. There should be a separation here. The minister's hands are all over this. He needs to step back. This bill needs to address that and make sure. At a minimum, this bill should include restoring the ABCC and the ensuring integrity bill, which the former government introduced in 2021. As I stated, there was an opportunity back in the last parliament for this government to address all of these matters through the ensuring integrity bill, but they voted against it. They didn't want to see integrity in workplaces within registered organisations because they are their paymasters. They are beholden to them.

Minister Watt was against those pieces of legislation back then, and he's against them now lock, stock and barrel. But that's what they could be doing. They could implement the ensuring integrity bill. We had a lengthy inquiry about it, so the evidence is already gathered. You could implement those changes right now. You could implement those measures within that bill. Call it whatever you like. Give it a different name so you can save your face; that's fine. But think about the Australian workplaces and workers that need to be protected and properly supported.

Minister Watt on 27 November 2019 said of the ensuring integrity bill:

The original version of this bill was dangerous and extreme … This current version of the bill remains dangerous and extreme.

Is it any wonder the minister is dragging his feet when it comes to transparency with this bill? If the ALP was fair dinkum about this bill, it would be restoring the ABCC. After all, the Labor government abolished this watchdog because the CFMEU wanted it gone. They've got to deal with this. At the time, when the abolishment was occurring, the Master Builders Association warned that there were no grounds to abolish the ABCC or divert from the long-standing bipartisan approach of maintaining special interest relations laws for the building and construction industry. It said:

The work of the ABCC is not yet done and its removal will undo the significant improvements it has delivered for our building and construction industry.

Minister Burke's comments on the ABCC, when he introduced the bill to abolish it on 27 October 2022, were:

The Australian Building and Construction Commission and the Registered Organisations Commission are ineffective and discredited institutions, more concerned about prosecuting workers and their representatives than tackling rampant wage theft or addressing workplace safety, or educating and promoting good workplace relations.

What a crock! This demonstrates that they are out of touch with the reality of what's going on. They are infected with a disease that has them absolutely addicted to the funding and donations that come from the CFMEU and their preselection powers over their organisation as a party. They couldn't be quick enough to get rid of the ABCC. Well, they can deal with that.

Between 2016 and 2022, the CFMEU racked up $19 million in penalties for breaches of workplace laws. In 2017, the judge described the CFMEU as 'the most recidivist corporate offender in Australian history'. Another judge said the CFMEU believe receiving fines was a collateral 'cost of doing industrial business'. In 2018, a judge said the CFMEU 'simply regards itself as free to disobey the law'.

The silence of the Labor Party is deafening on this issue. This bill has to be improved in order for it to pass. We stand willing as a coalition to support the government with this bill if they will pass the very sensible amendments that are necessary to improve this bill.

If we need to examine these amendments by way of an inquiry, we can do that quickly. I'm the deputy chair of the committee that would look at it; I'll work over the weekend if we need to. We can deal with this. We can have this bill passed very quickly. Let's get the feedback from stakeholders. Let's implement these necessary changes. Let's support the amendments that are necessary to ensure that there is good, proper functioning of this organisation. It's necessary for Australian workplaces. We've seen cost overruns at construction sites, on construction projects that Australians rely on, because of the thuggery, intimidation and kickbacks that occur. It's driving up costs for businesses and it's impacting Australians in their everyday lives.

Malcolm Roberts (Queensland, Pauline Hanson's One Nation Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Trust has been lost. Anthony Albanese and his Labor government have lost the people's trust, lost the people's confidence, lost the people's support. Labor supports the CFMEU because the CFMEU gives it massive donations—millions and millions of cash for election campaigns. Labor is wedded to the CFMEU. Labor is dependent on the CFMEU.

Labor is hiding the biggest wage theft in Australia's history. Five years I've spent exposing the scam. We have an excellent independent report, Coalminers wage theft, done in February this year. It vindicates what I've been pushing for five years. Some miners in Central Queensland and the Hunter Valley are owed $41,000 per annum in wage theft. The Independent Workers Union, a new, fair-dinkum union operating in Central Queensland and the Hunter Valley, has lodged complaints for many miners because the CFMEU and the Mining and Energy Union have not bothered to do so. They won't go after the back pay of the wage theft.

I'm aware of a complaint lodged just recently, in the last couple of days, to the Fair Work Ombudsman by the Independent Workers Union, seeking, for one person alone, $211,000 in back pay—$211,000 in wage theft that this Labor government condones and hides. The CFMEU drove the theft of wages from Central Queensland and Hunter miners. The workers' former protectors in the CFMEU are now their exploiters. They're hurting workers. I wonder: will Labor's administrator allocate the CFMEU funds to make good the miners' wages? For one person it's $211,000; there are over 5,000 miners losing up to or around $41,000 per year of service.

Labor MPs are complicit because there has been a protection racket for their mates in the CFMEU. Labor MPs in the Hunter denied and then ignored my claims—my claims put to them in writing. I hand-delivered, to Dan Repacholi's office here in parliament, my letter to him explaining this. Not a peep! Instead, we got lies from Mr Repacholi in the Hunter, and similar from Joel Fitzgibbon. Minister Watt in the Senate has denigrated, ridiculed and dismissed more than 5,000 miners' legal improvement entitlements. And I have been proven correct.

Let's return to Monday and Minister Gallagher's word, 'urgent'. 'This is urgent,' she said, as to the administrator for the CFMEU. I add two words: 'cover up'. It's a cover-up. Minister Gallagher says Labor's administrator is 'urgent', yet Minister Watt dropped this bill on us late on Monday night. What gives? Do you expect us to believe that it was drafted on Sunday—that they did an all-nighter in the department on Sunday with lots of coffee? Why did Labor drop it on us without giving it to us earlier? Is it to avoid scrutiny? Yes—I can see some senators agreeing. When did the Greens and the teal Senator Pocock get copies? We've had instances in the past where they have got copies of new bills two weeks before we have and they've been dropped on us at the last minute.

Then Senator Gallagher sought exemption from the normal bills process. Speaking of exemption, Senator Gallagher said, 'The Albanese government says it's a clear path.' Yet the bill is littered with the word 'may'. It's a very unclear bill. It needs the word 'will'. Secondly, she said, 'The people of Australia are expecting a clear response.' With an unclear bill? I echo Senator O'Sullivan's call for a hearing. Then Senator Gallagher said, 'We will give you a firm view at the end of the week.' You will only get a firm view with a hearing. We need a firm view and scrutiny of this legislation. We need 'may' to be replaced by 'will' quite often. We need an opportunity for bipartisan input.

I'm a former member of three unions. I know genuine unions are necessary. The genuine union movement has a long and proud history, going back to Wales and the lodge system in the Miners Federation, which I was a proud member and participant of. Yet today so many union bosses have forgot their workers and members. Why? Today workers' protections are enshrined in law—as they should be—including safety, wages, conditions, security, retirement, health and many other provisions. Now the union bosses erode and steal these for personal gain, as the CFMEU and the Mining and Energy Union have done in Central Queensland and the Hunter. Personal gain and power, that's what it's about now, not looking after members. Why? Because they're an untouchable monopoly. Workers need choice. Workers don't have choice. They must join the union in their industry. That's it. There's no choice. The Red Union in Queensland and around Australia and in New Zealand is giving workers choice.

Thirdly, the Fair Work Commission and the Fair Work Ombudsman have failed to protect miners and workers. The Fair Work Commission has overseen and approved the theft of wages from casual coalminers in the Hunter Valley. As a boy, I lived in Central Queensland and the Hunter coalfields. My dad was in coalmining. I graduated with a mining engineers degree, an honours degree, and then decided I'd better go and learn something, so I worked at the coalface.

I came across Bill Chapman, the legendary president of the Northern District Miners Federation. He was a wonderful man. I sided with him in an open-air meeting when I worked at Westfalen's No. 2 mine when I worked on the night shift there. My dad was complimented, highly, by Bill Chapman at my father's retirement. My dad and Bill used to argue a lot, but they respected each other, because Bill was genuinely concerned about workers. I knew Mattie Best before he died. I worked with him. I played football with him. He was my football coach in Central Queensland when I played rugby league. He was a genuine union delegate who had respect from workers and management and fellow union bosses. He called out safety issues when they were abused.

I am proud to support real unions that work in workers' interests. I worked as a mine manager with the CFMEU union bosses. We developed a landmark award that I instigated, and I instigated many previously undreamt-of provisions because they were to the benefit of the workers and productivity. I worked with the union.

The rank and file in the CFMEU in Victoria during the COVID mismanagement erupted in a mutiny against vaccine mandates and lockdowns. The members realised their union bosses did not care, and they revolted. Labor then abolished the Australian Building and Construction Commission. Senator Watt said, 'Australians expected parliament to deal with criminal allegations inside the recalcitrant union promptly.' How, looking at this vague bill? Where is the trust? It's been smashed. Labor supports the CFMEU because of donations; Labor is wedded to the CFMEU because it's dependent on donations.

Yesterday we heard Senator Pocock, a teal senator, say: 'We need to be cleaning up the union.' Has he forgotten that he supported the abolition of the ABCC? The CFMEU has assisted in theft from miners, as I've explained. They're now exploiting miners. The Labor Party has been complicit. Both Joel Fitzgibbon and Dan Repacholi reportedly get campaign donations from the CFMEU. Then we get Labor's fabrication.

Penny Allman-Payne (Queensland, Australian Greens) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Minister McAllister?

Jenny McAllister (NSW, Australian Labor Party, Minister for Emergency Management) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I wonder if Senator Roberts could be asked to refer to people by their proper titles.

Penny Allman-Payne (Queensland, Australian Greens) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Thank you, Senator.

Malcolm Roberts (Queensland, Pauline Hanson's One Nation Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Labor fabricated an imaginary loophole, which the miners in Central Queensland and the Hunter Valley told me was a fabrication, and I worked out it is. Then they pretended to close the loophole with their closing loopholes bill. All it needed was enforcement of the Fair Work Act and the Black Coal Mining Industry Award. Minister Watt and Minister Burke, his predecessor, and Mr Fitzgibbon and Mr Repacholi are complicit in this way theft, the largest in Australia. Labor enabled casuals—

Penny Allman-Payne (Queensland, Australian Greens) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Senator, please resume your seat. Minister?

Jenny McAllister (NSW, Australian Labor Party, Minister for Emergency Management) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Senator Roberts is reflecting very directly on a range of people, including ministers who represent the government in this chamber, and he should withdraw.

Penny Allman-Payne (Queensland, Australian Greens) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

It would assist the chamber. You were certainly straying into impugning members of the parliament.

Malcolm Roberts (Queensland, Pauline Hanson's One Nation Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

To assist the chamber, and for that reason, I will withdraw. But Labor enabled casuals in coalmining. The Black Coal Mining Industry Award prohibited casuals on production; it still does. Labor, under Prime Minister Gillard, changed the coal long service leave provisions legislation to include casuals. I'm told that Anthony Albanese read the bill into parliament early in 2011. That's what enabled this wage theft.

Penny Allman-Payne (Queensland, Australian Greens) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Senator—

Malcolm Roberts (Queensland, Pauline Hanson's One Nation Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Sorry—Mr Albanese, the Prime Minister.

Penny Allman-Payne (Queensland, Australian Greens) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

This is happening reasonably regularly throughout your contribution. Could you please make sure that you refer to everyone to whom you are referring using their correct titles.

Malcolm Roberts (Queensland, Pauline Hanson's One Nation Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Certainly. Labor has forgotten workers. It's actually helping union bosses—union bosses from the CFMEU—to exploit workers. Minister Watt knows of the wage theft, because he advised us of the Mining and Energy Union's application for a new enterprise agreement. We advised him the application confirms our work. And yet there has been no Mining and Energy Union application for back pay. Why? Because when they were part of the CFMEU they deliberately conjured up illegal enterprise agreements. We've had no word from Minister Watt regarding the investigation into wage theft that the Senate required thanks to my amendment to a bill earlier this year. We do not believe that Minister Watt is fit to oversee the CFMEU administrator. It's a furphy.

Look at the other unions, the health and safety unions, stealing from the lowest-paid workers in Australia, and SDA union bosses corrupt. The Fair Work Act covers union bosses' greed, theft and abuse. Look at Craig Thomson. We're tired of the cover-ups.

Let's get on to the root cause. It was publicly revealed in the Australian Financial Review on 12 April this year. Their journalist David Marin-Guzman wrote an article headlined 'CFMEU push to take control of the Labor Party'. I quote:

John Setka is planning to use the militant construction union's hundreds of delegates and members to boost the CFMEU's influence on internal Labor politics in the Victorian and federal parliaments.

Another quote:

Such a large membership drive could give the CFMEU significant control over Labor preselections and party conferences, which elect the party executive and vote on policy—

even the Premier in Victoria. That's what's going on here; it's a power play.

Then we see Labor Premier Steven Miles in Queensland accused of silencing the Crime and Corruption Commission. Mark Le Grand, who spent 10 years as chief investigator at the then Criminal Justice Commission in the wake of the 1989 Fitzgerald inquiry, told the Australian there would have been no point in having the royal commission if Fitzgerald could not report on its investigation. Labor want to shut down the reporting. I could go on with more quotes.

We then have Robert Gottliebsen telling us of the dire predicament of Australia's productivity decline. Falling productivity—yeah, that's the key to wage rises! The CFMEU is guilty of destroying productivity. When productivity falls it kills industry, kills the future and kills jobs. Add that to the energy prices, the industrial relations policies, the inflation, the productivity decline. It's killing the economy, killing national security and killing the standard of living.

This is about more than just the CFMEU administrator; this is about trust. We see in Queensland that the Labor Party and the union movement are not two separate entities; they are one entity. Minister Grace Grace, when she lost her seat and Campbell Newman took over a decade ago, went straight into a job at $180,000 a year at the Queensland Teachers Union. Then, when Labor got back into power, she slid straight back into working directly with the Labor Party. The whole time she worked with the Labor Party. We've seen the Labor government in Queensland outlaw the Red Union because it's competition for the Queensland Teachers Union and the Queensland nurses union. There's a monopoly in industrial relations and no accountability.

Then we have provisions. I draw people's attention to provisions such as to 323B in the new act, clause 1, clause 2, which I do not have time to go into at the moment. These are things we are focusing on. Section 323C clause 2, section 323D clause 1—so loose, so vague, so open. We need accountability. We need competition amongst unions with better service to members. We need higher sustained wages now and into the future, because an industry that is healthy will pay higher wages. That is a proven fact.

Protecting union monopolies will continue union demise and lead to lower wages. Choice is essential. Look at the players in this: Chandler McLeod Group, part of Recruit Holdings, the world's largest labour hire company working with the CFMEU and the Mining and Energy Union in the Hunter and Central Queensland. Federal government itself uses billions of dollars of labour hire. The Fair Work Commission has approved these awards. BHP forced people to change from being BHP people with permanent employment to Tesla labour hire with a big pay cut, thanks to the union, and then forced to go to Chandler Macleod with another big pay cut.

We need open scrutiny, we need a hearing, not window-dressing. It needs to be sent to committee, or at least get a hearing on Friday. We are thinking of an amendment requesting the administrator investigate coalmining wage theft as per one union report and organise for the CFMEU finances to cover that—but it is not part of the bill, so we won't be doing that. We want to amend the bill to allow disallowance of the minister's regulations. We want to see criminal charges. We want to see the watchdog brought back and comprehensive reform to industrial relations.

Andrew Bragg (NSW, Liberal Party, Shadow Assistant Minister for Home Ownership) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

It is my pleasure to be making a statement on this Fair Work (Registered Organisations) Amendment (Administration) Bill 2024. The opposition wants this bill to be dealt with as fast, or as quickly, as possible, I would say, because this is a major issue impacting the economy and the Australian way of life. The driver of this problem is the fact that the government is generally driven by vested interests, and this is the same charge that Alfred Deakin made 100 years ago when he said the problem with the Labor Party is it is not there to govern for the people; it is there to govern for narrow vested interests—in this case, the trade unions.

The CFMEU has been a major donor to the Labor Party, and its constituent arm, the major Super funds it is associated with, have also made significant payments through to the ALP's associated unions. The enormous flow of funds has bought policy in Australia. These organisations buy policy from the Labor government and, in buying policy, they are buying the outcomes that are good for the union, not the outcomes that are good for the Australian people. That is a consequence of the Labor Party's history and present structure whereby its members of parliament in the Senate and in the House are reliant upon these organisations for support, for their preselections, for campaign financing and for manning the polling places. This is the consequence of the structure of the Labor Party and it is a cancer, frankly, because the people who pay the price for this are of course the Australian people, and the price that the Australian people are paying for the CFMEU buying the policy of the national government is a 30 per cent tax on construction costs in Australia. So every time an apartment is built in Australia, where the CFMEU is associated, there is a 30 per cent premium paid to the CFMEU.

We're living in a period where under-40s feel more frustrated than ever about the political system. One of the major things people under the age of 40 are concerned about is access to housing. The fact that the average worker feels that the house that would be an entry point for them—maybe an apartment in a city—is out of reach is a disgusting blight. The death of the Australian dream is in part due to this 30 per cent tax, which is levied on all Australians by the Labor government and its best friend, the CFMEU. These are the corrupted priorities of the government hurting all Australians, particularly younger Australians, who will only be able to access the Australian dream if we correct course and are able to build more houses at a reasonable price. That is where we are. I just want to be very clear about what is at stake here. This is not an obscure issue. This goes to the heart of one of the major problems facing the Australian people, particularly younger people. Younger people ought to know that it is this model of government that is causing so many people to feel that the Australian dream is, in fact, out of reach.

This 30 per cent issue has been addressed by the Master Builders Australia CEO, Denita Wawn, who has said:

We have always said that up to 30 per cent increases occur on construction sites, because of the activities of the CFMEU.

I was visiting a site recently in Sydney where it was very clear to me that these activities are causing a massive slowdown and an increase in cost in construction. Another developer, Mr Diaswati Mardiasmo, has said, 'There are guys on site attending, and it's all about enforcing the 'no ticket, no start' type arrangements.' He goes on to say:

… which means if you're not in the union, you don't get to work on site.

On large sites, there may be anywhere between five and 10 of these guys walking around, and that's a cost that gets built into the system, and it's a significant cost.

The country is paying the price for these people to walk around construction sites, which is a pay-off to the union and is presiding over a massive drop in productivity. Labour productivity has fallen 18.1 per cent, almost 20 per cent, in the construction sector in recent years, far worse than other parts of the economy, apparently in large part because of the CFMEU, which has been blamed for these massively inflated costs.

If you look through the EBAs, you will see that, wherever the CFMEU is involved, the output is lower and the costs are higher. At a time when the Australian dream is slipping away, putting the CFMEU in charge of the housing agenda is a very twisted priority. I wonder whether in fact the government will live to regret their judgment to abolish the Building and Construction Commission, as one of the first acts passed when they came to this particular parliament. Minister Watt was able to achieve his great dream of doing that. And I wonder whether that will come back to haunt the Labor Party, because the ABCC was perhaps the only institution capable of trying to rein in some of this appalling behaviour, which is hurting younger Australians.

If we turn to the remedies here, we've got Labor's bill, which is a start but something which needs to be significantly amended if it is to do the job. The bill as it stands gives Minister Watt complete control over administration. Given his past statements defending the CFMEU over many years, I doubt that that is a good judgment or in the public interest. That is why the coalition has recommended amendments to the bill, and we've also sought, as Senator O'Sullivan has said, to have a hearing and an inquiry into this bill, because it's so important that we get this right. The abolition of the cop on the beat here really is an unbelievable outworking of the last couple of years. It's been a bizarre parliament to be a part of, in fact, because not only have we rolled back tax reforms of previous parliaments but the parliament have rolled back integrity and governance improvements, including this and in the broader construction sector. We believe that reinstating the Building and Construction Commission would be a very good start. We think that this is an important institution, and we think that putting in place the ensuring integrity provisions is also absolutely important here.

The other bizarre element is that the government in this parliament have opened the door for the CFMEU and the Cbus Super fund to be part of the Housing Australia Future Fund. So having abolished the Building and Construction Commission and established an enormous slush fund for housing—it builds no houses but spends millions of dollars on administration and has a number of union hacks on its board—they're now opening the door for this organisation to be do business with the Cbus fund, which has three CFMEU trustees on its board. I note that this morning the Australian Prudential Regulation Authority, APRA, has said it will apply licence commissions onto the Cbus Super fund and another super fund that has CFMEU trustees on its board. It is very good that APRA has decided to act. It has taken APRA a long time to move here, but the government seem disinterested in looking to protect worker savings where there are CFMEU trustees on the boards of compulsory super schemes.

They also seem to be relaxed about the idea of the Cbus fund partnering with the Housing Australia Future Fund. The Cbus chair, Mr Wayne Swan, who is also the president of the Labor Party, is the only super fund official who has publicly committed to invest with the Housing Australia Future Fund. That strikes me as very curious because the last time I looked Mr Swan was not the chief investment officer of the Cbus fund, he was the chair of the fund, but apparently he can commit $500 million of members funds to co-invest with the Housing Australia Future Fund. So why would we be giving the CFMEU and the Cbus people taxpayer funds in partnering with this organisation when we know that these are the people that are making housing so much worse in Australia? These are the people who are charging a 30 per cent premium on housing in Australia, making the Australian dream disappear from sight. This is another example of the government's twisted priorities and their fidelity to being a government for vested interests.

Ultimately, it comes down to a trifecta of failings on housing. There's the CFMEU tax of 30 per cent. Labor has also presided over enormous inflationary pressures in the housing sector. Rents went up by seven per cent in the last dataset. And then there has been a litany of failures on the housing policy itself. There has been a reshuffle of the ministry in recent weeks, which has seen a new housing minister come into play, but the new housing minister has the same problem as the old housing minister in that she has committed to the same failed policies.

The Australian Housing Future Fund, which is a multibillion-dollar boondoggle, has built no houses but spent millions of dollars on administration. Then you've got the housing targets, which will be 200,000 or 300,000 houses short because of ballooning costs, an inability to get skills and a range of other factors. You have a complete failure on supply. You cannot solve this housing challenge without building more houses, and Labor's two supply policies on the housing targets and the Housing Australia Future Fund have both failed.

Then you look at what Labor have offered on the demand side to help first home buyers. They've offered this bizarre shared-equity scheme, which has mostly been offered by state governments for years. It has been extremely unpopular; in fact in some states they've been abolished by state Labor governments. No-one wants to live in a country where the government owns half your house so that is why they've been very unpopular policies. And that is all the government is offering. Oh, there is one more policy: a tax cut for foreign fund managers to build build-to-rent houses.

The government have waved the white flag on supply. They've waved the white flag on trying to level the playing field, or tilt the playing field, for first home buyers. And their remaining tax policy here is one that seeks to give a tax cut to Vanguard, Black Rock and even maybe Cbus if they can find a way to structure themselves as a foreign fund manager. With Wayne Swan at the helm maybe they'll find a way to do that, but that is where we are on housing. It has been an absolute disaster in terms of the policy; a disaster in terms of rampant inflation, which Australia has almost uniquely in the Western world, in the liberal democratic world; and a disaster in terms of this 30 per cent premium from Labor's best friends in the unions, which is causing the cost of construction to be uneconomic in so many cases.

Ultimately, young people will work this out. Young people will work out that, unless the country is going to find a way to build more houses, then the housing crisis will never be solved. With the CFMEU running the government, the Labor Party will never be able to solve Australia's housing crisis. What that means for young people is that the Australian dream will be further and further away. Why does it have to be the case? All because Labor has an internal problem where it must run its government for some narrow vested interests. If only Labor could think about the long-term interests of the nation and think about what's important to people, not what's important to the union movement, the CFMEU and the like, then I actually believe that they would be able to solve this. But this is a structural problem that the government have. They only get out of bed every day for these rent seekers. They are making housing a nightmare in Australia. This bill is a starting point. We think it should be improved. In any event, it needs to be dealt with very quickly because the nation cannot afford to pay for this 30 per cent premium on housing any longer. Young people can't afford it, and the lead time to building houses is so significant that the 30 per cent premium staying there for any longer than it needs to means that that Australian dream is just going to disappear out of sight.

Perin Davey (NSW, National Party, Shadow Minister for Water) Share this | Link to 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.

Susan McDonald (Queensland, National Party, Shadow Minister for Resources) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Well, the Mafia has nothing on the CFMEU. That is the kind of statement I'm getting from building contractors, from workers, from people in the community. This building came together in a bipartisan way to address workplace cultures. We passed legislation, codes of conduct. We are very conscious that we are holding ourselves out as the nation's example. We were here to call out any culture of intimidation, a culture of a fear of speaking out, a culture of discrimination, a culture of helplessness felt by recipients and victims of workplace abuse. Yet that bipartisan will to call out bad workplace culture evaporates when it comes to dealing with the kind of thuggery and intimidation on other workplaces across Australia.

When we talk to industry, when I talk to workers, about what is happening on work sites across Australia, they immediately ask for anonymity. That is their first request. They will say that bully boys do not belong. That request for anonymity proves we have an industrial environment where people are too scared to come forward, too scared to call out that sort of intimidation and thuggery. But through the prism of anonymity, they will tell the stories of what has been happening on the Cross River rail site in Brisbane. We have seen on TV the scuffles, the fights. What we don't always see is the workers being followed home and intimidated there. What we do not see is parents being sent photos of their children at school, with the insinuation being there will be a consequence for their children if they do not toe the union line.

Businesses are being intimidated into using certain contractors and being subject to outright vandalism and delays on their project when unions do not get their way. This includes things like the power supply to the site being cut, things like toilets being filled up with concrete and toilet paper to undermine all the plumbing work that has been done, doors being kicked off their hinges to demonstrate they are not fit for purpose. This is what is happening on building sites and it has been happening for decades. It is only now being brought to the notice of the public with a demand for a consequence for this outrageous behaviour. The malicious lodgement of ambit improvement notices aims to tie up companies in legal costs, where they have to go to the courts and have them proven as being unreasonable and thrown out so they do not receive consequences for future projects.

In my home state of Queensland, I heard stories of workplace health and safety inspectors who are on stress and sick leave because they have been bullied so much. How did we get to this situation? What it does is undermine every union in this country. Every union in this country who is represented by a union official sitting opposite has been undermined by the unwillingness of people to call out what has happened with the CFMEU.

We have watched the current minister, Minister Watt, spend almost his entire time in this place being the CFMEU's biggest cheerleader. We have seen it at Senate estimates, where he would mercilessly attack the building regulator when they dared to hold his mates at the CFMEU to account. Members of this government said, 'There is nothing to see. I had no knowledge of what was going on,' when it would have taken only the most cursory conversation with the construction site worker, a building contractor or even their CFMEU mates to know that this was a case. I thought it was extraordinary to see the tattoo that has been emblazoned across the chest of John Setka. That's terrifying. That's not something that should be around his neck.

Thank you, Senator. That is such intimidation. And it's not intimidation for those of us on the coalition side; that is a clear message to members of the Labor government that they are coming back to haunt you. I won't put up with that, and I hope you don't either. I say that because it has not been about fair pay; it has been about payoffs. When the government mandates 30 per cent pay hikes for these well-paid construction workers, what does it do then for nurses, police officers, childcare workers and teachers across the public and private sectors? They are not getting a 30 per cent pay rise. This is not about fairness; it's about payoffs.

Labor has brought forward this bill not because new information has been found out but because they have been caught out protecting the CFMEU. It has been a part of Labor's DNA to turn a blind eye to these intimidations and threats. It has been part of Labor's DNA to wilfully walk past behaviours that are, at their heart, criminal. Having wilfully turned that blind eye and having wilfully walked past those behaviours in clear sight, Labor now asks us to trust them and to trust their minister, who is the CFMEU's greatest cheerleader, to be the watchdog. We have no confidence that this minister intends to genuinely root out the evil that has existed in the heart of the CFMEU. Labor hasn't only been reliant on the support of the CFMEU; in many ways Labor has been a product of this support.

The coalition will hold the government to account. We will shine a light into the dark places that Labor has sought to keep hidden. We are proposing amendments to this legislation that will ensure that the administration must apply to all branches of the CFMEU for a minimum of three years—the minister should not have the ability to unilaterally end the administration early—and to ensure that the scheme of administration can be varied only by the Federal Court on the application of the administrator. The legislation must clearly set out what must be in the scheme of administration. It should not be determined solely at the whim of the minister, who has been the greatest cheerleader for the CFMEU. Political donations, political campaigns and advertising by the CFMEU should be explicitly banned during the period of administration.

Our amendments propose that, for the purposes of transparency, the administrator must provide a written report to the parliament every three months from the commencement of the administration about its activities and progress, and appear at Senate estimates. Further, a new 'fit and proper person' test must be introduced for all CFMEU delegates and officers, and I would hope that that would apply to all delegates and officers of all unions. The administrator should be given additional powers to investigate dealings between the CFMEU and other parties, including other registered organisations and political parties, and the administrator should be given the power to review and amend the CFMEU rules.

There are three things that we think must happen. We must bring back the ABCC. It was the only regulator of the construction union and the only one calling out this behaviour, and there were still intimidation, threats, thuggery, cost overruns, workers going on stress leave and damage to worksites. All that was still happening, so we must bring back an empowered ABCC. We must reintroduce the former coalition government's ensuring integrity bill, which Labor blocked in 2019.

These are just some of the things that would provide some protection to future workers in the construction industry and ensure that this doesn't lead further into civil contracting. We are seeing that play out right now. It's happened in Victoria. Queensland and New South Wales are the next battlegrounds to see that kind of intimidation, enforcement of subcontractors, overpayments and delays expand from the construction sector into civil construction. It's extraordinary that it has happened under Labor's watch, while they say, at the same time, 'There is nothing to see here.'

We owe it to workers, their families and their children to stop this culture of intimidation. It's a culture that is not acceptable in this place. It is not acceptable in any other workplace in this country, but, somehow, it has become acceptable in the construction industry to cover your face, shirtfront other workers, stop them going to work, verbally and—worse—physically assault them and then follow them home so you know where they and their children live. This has been documented and yet, kicking and screaming, Labor has been dragged to finally acknowledge what has been going on for years. We owe it to workers, their families and their children to stop this culture, but we also owe it to the taxpayers of this country because, every time this happens on site, every delay—such as the 13 weeks of stoppages on the children's hospital in Victoria—and every site that has been damaged or delayed results in inflated costs. Who pays? Maybe you think it's the big construction companies, but it is always the taxpayer, particularly on the construction of public assets.

In my home town of Townsville, the stadium overran by 30 per cent. Millions of dollars that was spent on building a stadium ran away from being spent in a hospital, on the roads or on other things that the Australian taxpayer deserved. They've paid for it. It's their money, and yet where has it gone? It's gone to cost overruns, bullying and intimidation on construction sites right across this country. Imagine what that would do to the budget. The Treasurer should get very excited about those kinds of savings.

Mostly we owe it to all Australians, who've said they want better. They want better in their workplaces and they want better from their leadership. They certainly don't want to have us and the Labor government continue to walk past behaviour that is not acceptable anywhere in the world. So we will be supervising and watching the minister. I'm deeply worried that what the minister is proposing—unilateral powers and the ability to pull up the administration at his discretion—is a veneer of taking action that is tissue-paper thin, and that it is not because new information has been found out but because Labor have been caught out protecting a union that funds them and that has possibly intimidated people sitting right here in this chamber. I hope that's not the case.

We will continue to provide a bright light to hold the minister to account, and we seek the support of others to make amendments to this legislation that will make it stronger and more powerful to protect the people specifically in the construction industry. Thank you.

Matthew Canavan (Queensland, Liberal National Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I want to start my remarks by putting on record my support for trade unions in this country and the work that they do. I mentioned in my first speech to this chamber that trade unions play an important role in our nation and they've done great things for workers, over many years, in Australia. I've been happy to work with many trade unions on various issues—most recently with the Transport Workers Union. There are some very good people, like Michael Kaine, in that union. I worked closely with the Australian Workers Union on manufacturing issues and with Mr Daniel Walton, when he led it up. I worked very closely with the MEU of the CFMEU, the mining division, when I was resources minister, and over the years I've been happy to campaign alongside mining union members for things like the New Hope coalmine. I recognise that the mining union have largely separated themselves from the rest of the CFMEU because of the issues that are needing to be tackled within the Fair Work (Registered Organisations) Amendment (Administration) Bill 2024.

It's very regrettable that we are at this stage and are having to fix something long after the issues have been widely known across the country. It is somewhat a mess of this government's making. They came to government and abolished the Australian Building and Construction Commission, a commission that was clearly needed because the construction arm of the CFMEU was openly flouting the law, time and time again. This was well before any of their more salacious issues and the recent reports around criminal gangs and mafia-like connections to the CFMEU. But for years the construction division of the CFMEU has been openly flouting court orders, refusing to rein in their law-breaking tactics on workplaces and effectively seeing the millions of dollars of fines that have been imposed on them because of those criminal breaches as some sort of cost of doing business.

That was very clear. It's been clear, and it was not like the Australian Building and Construction Commission had nothing to do; they were constantly trying to fight back against this organisation that seemingly had no interest in abiding by the law. This was all known. Everybody knew this, and that's why people like the mining union have desperately sought to separate themselves from the construction arm. The forestry division is, I think, trying to do the same. People wanted to run a million miles from the construction arm of the CFMEU, even within the trade union movement.

Yet then we had Anthony Albanese elected Prime Minister, and, quite the opposite from what these other trade unions were doing, he rushed to embrace these law-breaking elements of the trade union movement. The Labor Party has taken $6.2 million in donations from the CFMEU since Anthony Albanese became leader. How do they explain that? We all knew this. We all knew they were breaking the law, yet the Labor Party were happy to be funded by people that were openly breaking the law.

Most of our issues with this bill—we support the overall intent of doing something here; something has to be done, clearly—are with the simple fact that it's hard to trust a government that has been so closely tied to and financed by an organisation that it now tells us it'll rein in. They can be trusted, apparently, to re-impose a level of law and order on this element of the trade union movement. I don't think it's unreasonable for those of us outside the Labor Party to just be a little bit cynical about that and to say, 'Look, can we really trust a workplace relations minister who's just been appointed and who for years was the attack dog for the CFMEU in Senate estimates and in going after people like Senator Cash who are trying to hold this law-breaking organisation to account?' That's what Senator Watt did time and time again over the last decade, and now he gets up and has the temerity to say: 'Now you can trust me. Give me almost omnipotent authority to re-establish law and order.' I don't believe that for a second. I think what we really need here is proper accountability for this and ongoing accountability—not just in this sitting fortnight, not just while the glare of the media spotlight is shining brightly on these issues. We need accountability over many years to re-establish some level of law and order in this element of the trade union movement.

This bill doesn't do that, because, as I was alluding to, this bill gives the minister enormous authority to do whatever he chooses to do, with almost zero parliamentary accountability. I'll go to some of the specifics later, but the general point here can be highlighted by the fact that, for some inexplicable reason, this bill exempts a variety of ministerial decisions made under the bill from disallowance. I'll explain to the average person what that means. Normally, the default provision is that, when a minister makes a decision under the delegated authority provided to him or her by legislation, there is always the ability of either chamber of the parliament to disallow that decision if they choose to do so. If a minister made a decision, say, on a certain amount of where fishing could occur in the oceans under legislation, either chamber could pass a resolution to disallow that decision under the default provisions of the way regulations work in this country.

This bill says:

An instrument made under subsection (1) is a legislative instrument but section 42 (disallowance) of the Legislation Act 2003 does not apply …

Why? For what rationale at all can there be a justification that the minister does not want to be accountable to a disallowance motion by either chamber? There's no rationale for that at all. Sometimes, there's a rationale for that if the decision is of a national security nature or has to be made urgently and any kind of hold up by the parliament might create issues, but this is not one of those issues. This has been festering for years. It's hardly been something of urgent attention for this government. There is no reason why the parliament shouldn't have that review mechanism that it normally retains to be able to disallow a minister 's decision.

This is just a power grab. That's what it is. It's a power grab. It's criminal activity, exposed criminal activity, and a crisis now in the construction sector being used and abused by this government to just grab more power and to try to do so under the distortion that they are actually doing something good for our national interest. It's absurd. So that should be changed. That's a very simple change. At the very least, there would be some level of parliamentary accountability there.

There are also some other things that we should clearly do. After everything that we know now, why doesn't this bill ban the CFMEU from making political donations? That seems to make some sense, and it raises questions if the government doesn't want to do it. Why don't they want to do that? They are not going to give the money back, apparently. Again, if they really want to be trusted, if they really want to convince the Australian people that the very people who were the closest to the CFMEU can now be trusted to rein in this fox and protect the hens, give the money back. Give back the $6.2 million that the Labor Party received from the CFMEU since Anthony Albanese became leader. It's tainted money now, clearly. It's been tainted by crime. Give it back.

Ross Cadell (NSW, National Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Give it to charity.

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

Don't give it back to them!

Matthew Canavan (Queensland, Liberal National Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

True. You can't give it back to them. They're under administration. At least give it to charity or something. That's exactly right. Don't take the money. But they are not going to do that. Let's be realistic; they won't do that, of course not. But we could easily put in a provision here that the CFMEU no longer makes political donations while in administration. That seems fair enough. If they are in administration, why would they be making clinical donations anyway? No corporate business would do that. They've got to focus on getting themselves out of this process and should not be involved in politics while they're doing so. They should be clearly focused on their members right now, not on trying to influence politics.

There is also the issue here that the minister, with just a stroke of a pen, can take the organisation out of administration—again, with no parliamentary accountability and no ability to disallow. We think there needs to be a proper and more vigilant process here than simply giving one minister of a government that's compromised by the CFMEU this untrammelled power. There are some very reasonable amendments to be made here.

There's also a suspicion that we have, understandably, that the government is somehow trying to ram this through with these clear issues in the bill and not expose them to public scrutiny. There should be some hearings on this. We can do that quickly, and we can make sure we get it through, but the government has not felt the need to act for two years while it's been in government, and now it wants to pass this within two weeks. There's something fishy about that. It should be done properly. It's a serious issue, and there is no reason that there shouldn't be proper hearings and proper accountability so we can get to the bottom of these particular issues in the bill and make sure we get this right.

It's very important we get this right. Obviously, there's the issue of making sure that people and significant institutions like the CFMEU abide by the law. That is very important in our law-abiding society. If we allow people just to break the law willy-nilly and not face consequences, then it will destroy our harmonious society. That is the principal reason we need to act here. But there is also a broader issue: the conduct of the CFMEU, their tactics, are imposing an enormous cost on Australian society, and especially on average Australians.

The biggest issue people face right now is simply the cost of living—their ability to buy basic things at the shops, to stay in their own home, pay their mortgages. It's a major issue, and there is a connection here because one of the major reasons for this cost-of-living crisis is our poor productivity performance. That's been going on for a number of years, but to some extent the chickens have come home to roost the last few years. We have constantly had an inferior productivity performance for some years; meanwhile we kept spending government money, we kept interest rates low and eventually, when you have too much money, too much government spending chasing too few goods being produced you end up with inflation. That's positional.

There are two ways we can fix that. There's a hard way and an easier way—well, they're both hard, but one of them is much harder on Australian families. The harder hard way for Australian families is we have to have the Reserve Bank keep raising interest rates until the pain's too much and we take out that excess demand from the economy. That's very hard for people, and we're seeing the consequences of that now. The less painful way—it's still hard, but it's less painful—to impact on Australian families is to increase our productivity to produce more goods so that we soak up excess demand and then we don't have to raise interest rates by as much to bring inflation down.

The productivity performance of the construction sector in particular has been absolutely woeful. In fact productivity in our construction sector is effectively at the same level it was in the year 2000. There has been a 0.2 per cent a year increase in multifactor productivity growth in the construction sector for 24 years. For a quarter of a century, for a generation, we're basically at the same level. It's one of the worst-performing sectors across the Australian economy.

If we could lift the construction sector's productivity performance to that of the economy wide average—just the average; get it to the average level and have some moderate increase in productivity performance over time—that would unlock $56 billion in savings—$56 billion we could potentially spend to build other things. And if you put that into real things, tangible things that people can understand, $56 billion could build a thousand new schools. It could build 10,000 kilometres of new roads, and don't we need that! We need that in regional Australia in particular. Regional roads are horrible at the moment. I don't know what's happened there, if it's the productivity performance or not, but in the last few years the basic standard of our roads, like the Bruce Highway and other country roads, have become horrible. It's a safety issue right now. We're losing people because of that. We could do that—10,000 kilometres of new roads. That would be great if we could improve productivity in the construction sector. It would also help us build 25,000 new hospital beds too, that $56 billion. Again, we need that. We have public hospitals currently sending people to private hospitals because they do not have enough beds, they do not have enough space. We could invest in that.

There is a real cost here for not reining in the lawlessness of the construction, the C of the CFMEU. And while this is a belated effort by this government to do this—it is a mess that they have made by abolishing the ABCC, which they're trying to clear up—it is very important that we get this right for those reasons, for all Australians to get this right and make sure there is a proper cop on the beat. We could strengthen this legislation. We also need to reintroduce the ABCC, if the government was serious about fixing this problem and making sure we have a construction sector that delivers for all Australians and is not corrupted for the political purposes of the Labor Party.

Claire Chandler (Tasmania, Liberal Party, Shadow Assistant Minister for Foreign Affairs) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Actions have consequences. That's something we have to remember in this chamber as we are here debating the Fair Work (Registered Organisations) Amendment (Administration) Bill 2024. Actions have consequences. It was this government that abolished the ABCC. We the coalition warned, at the time, that that would have significant consequences—that abolishing the ABCC would result in more lawlessness from the union movement in this country. Now, here we are debating a piece of legislation that this government has been forced to introduce to address the disgraceful behaviour of a union, the CFMEU. Australians need to remember that it was this government that abolished the ABCC—the regulatory authority; the cop on the beat—that could've been looking at this sort of behaviour. Not only that; I think there were many in the government that knew of the disgraceful behaviour of the CFMEU, and they decided to abolish the ABCC anyway. That is a very poor reflection on those in the government, and they need to remember actions have consequences.

The government, I think, are being very creative with the truth, when they say that this bill that we're debating here today will entirely clean up the scandal plagued construction sector. I frankly don't think anyone in Australia believes the act that they've put on in the parliament this week or believes that the party that have taken millions in donations from the CFMEU at the same time that CFMEU officials were engaged in criminal activities—the threats, the corruption, the bribery and the intimidation and violence that we've heard so much about in recent weeks—are suddenly going to be the government that protects consumers from the CFMEU, because, like I said, this is the government that abolished the ABCC. Why did they do that? They did it because the CFMEU told them to.

As the shadow Attorney-General said, this bill that has been presented by the Albanese government is so weak that it itself could've been co-authored by the CFMEU. It provides the minister, a Labor minister who sits in a party room with all of their colleagues who have benefited from CFMEU donations, with the power to end the administration that the CFMEU will be put under early. Of course, the bill is silent on the Labor Party continuing to receive donations from the CFMEU, despite the obvious conflict that this presents.

Consequences have actions, and, while we welcome the fact that the government have brought legislation into this place this week to address the issue that they knew about—the issue that they themselves created when they abolished the ABCC in relation to the CFMEU—we in the coalition would certainly like to see this bill strengthened up. Like I said, it goes part of the way to addressing these issues; it's not going to go the full way to rid Australia of the incredibly disgraceful behaviour of the CFMEU. You have to ask the question: well, why is that the case?

The CFMEU's militant and corrupt behaviour is driving up the cost of building in Australia. That affects all Australians, and my colleague Senator Canavan certainly made some pertinent remarks in that regard in his contribution just now. But that's why we in the coalition want to see this bill amended before it is passed, because we think this bill needs to be strong and it needs to be effective if we are going to address this behaviour and attempt to drive down the cost of building in Australia. Like I said, we know that that cost is going up and up, and the impact that that has on all Australians is incredibly significant.

I'm sure everyone in this place receives regular complaints from our constituents about how high the cost of living is. I certainly do, back in my home state of Tasmania, so the government should be doing everything it can to address that cost-of-living concern. Again, I don't think that the government is doing everything to address that concern, but this debate today is not where I will be outlining my frustrations in that regard. I'm sure I'll have an opportunity at some other time.

The shadow Attorney-General, my colleague Senator Cash, has developed a range of important amendments to this bill that the government has presented. We would like to see these amendments agreed to and actually get a piece of legislation through this chamber and through the other place which will effectively hold the CFMEU accountable. Like I said, this bill is a start, but it could be vastly improved. We want to see sensible amendments, including that the administration that the CFMEU will be placed under must apply to all branches of that union for a minimum of three years. We want to remove the ability of the minister to end the administration early. It's important to remember that the behaviour from the CFMEU that we're talking about here is not casual disregard. It is pretty disgraceful behaviour from union officials. You only have to read the front pages of most newspapers in the country from over the last few weeks to see exactly what that behaviour is. We think that the way to deal with this is to place it under a lengthy administration, and that doesn't mean giving the minister the ability to end that administration early if they wish.

We also believe the legislation must clearly set out what must be in the scheme of the administration, and this is, again, not something that should be determined solely at the whim of the minister. This is something that should be very, very clearly established in legislation. We also want to see an express ban, an explicit ban, on political donations, political campaigns and advertising by the CFMEU during the period of administration. Again, I don't think that that is too much to ask for in a situation where the CFMEU has behaved so badly, and we know that the CFMEU is obviously, like most unions, in the business of making political donations to one particular political party—that being the Labor Party.

The situation we are now in with the CFMEU and the need to pass this legislation are direct results of the actions of the Albanese government, as I said in my initial remarks, and also of choices made by Prime Minister Albanese, who I think has shown real weakness on this particular issue. The government, in introducing this legislation, is trying to desperately fix a mess that it created. Like I said, actions have consequences. But this bill that they have introduced is weak and needs to be strengthened to ensure that Australia is protected from lawless thugs and corrupt union officials.

The Albanese government was warned that this would happen. We warned them that this would happen. I'm sure many other commentators out in the community warned that this would happen, but the government abolished the ABCC anyway, to the cheers of their mates and their donors at the CFMEU. Prime Minister Albanese made the choice to change workplace laws in Australia to directly benefit an organisation which has donated $6.2 million to the Australian Labor Party since he became the leader. Of course, that organisation is the CFMEU.

The CFMEU knew, and the Labor Party also knew, that, by abolishing the ABCC, the Prime Minister and the government were giving effective control of the construction sector in this country to the CFMEU and its militant union officials. Frankly I imagine the $6.2 million that has been donated by the CFMEU to the Labor Party since Prime Minister Albanese has been leader would have paid a very handsome dividend for them. They won the last election.

Unfortunately, for this, all Australians are paying the price. As a result of the Prime Minister's decision to abolish the ABCC, and this government's decision to abolish it, we have seen criminal activity, threats, corruption, bribery, intimidation, violence, bullying, standover tactics, misappropriation of funds and other accusations of lawlessness by the CFMEU in the construction sector. As I said, you only have to look at a newspaper anywhere in this country at the moment to read these reports for yourself.

The CFMEU construction division were undoubtedly bad before but under Albanese they have taken their lawless activities to a whole new level. Labor's open support for its CFMEU donors means Australian taxpayers are paying 30 per cent more on major projects, as my colleague Senator Canavan was saying. This has an effect on every taxpayer in Australia. The cost of construction is going up so significantly and, in some way, shape or form, that does hit everybody's back pockets. It particularly hits your back pocket if you're trying to build something at the moment. The government support for the CFMEU is a direct hit to the hip pockets of Australian families struggling with the cost of living. As I said earlier, I and many of my colleagues—all of my colleagues, I think—are completely unconvinced that the government is taking the cost-of-living crisis seriously. But certainly, in the way that they have sought to address concerns with the CFMEU through this legislation here today, I think that inability to take this issue seriously is on full display.

We are glad that the government has introduced this bill to the parliament this week because we do need to clean up this government's mess. We do need to ensure that the CFMEU is dealt with appropriately. But this is a mess of the government's own making. This is a mess that has occurred because the government has not been happy to take a strong hand when it comes to the union movement. It has abolished the ABCC, which was the cop on the beat, the authority that had the power to stop this sort of behaviour from occurring.

Whether it is because they have rushed to get this legislation in here, whether it is because they are still taking the calls of their friends in the CFMEU, the legislation that the government have introduced is a start but it is certainly not enough to appropriately deal with the disgraceful behaviour of the CFMEU. So we in the coalition will be moving a series of amendments when this bill goes into committee stage, some of which I have referenced, not foreshadowed, in my contribution here today and we certainly hope that the government will agree to strengthen this bill.

We certainly hope that the government will realise they need to take this issue seriously when cleaning up their own mess and agree to the amendments we are proposing, because, yes, this is about ensuring that the CFMEU is held to account for its disgraceful behaviour. I know the overwhelming majority of Australians want to see the CFMEU held to account for its disgraceful behaviour. But this is also about dealing with the cost-of-living crisis, dealing with the rising construction costs and recognising that part of those rising costs are as a result of the behaviour of unions like the CFMEU. So we will be moving amendments in the committee stage, and I certainly hope that the government is open to considering those amendments, but we will have to see what happens when this bill goes into committee later on today if not tomorrow.

Kerrynne Liddle (SA, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Child Protection and the Prevention of Family Violence) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The Albanese Labor government has been and will always work for its union masters because the union pays its bills. Therefore, for Labor, the unions must come first. In the case of the CFMEU, its interests come before developers building the road and transport infrastructure we all depend on, before those who invest in apartment complexes, shopping centres and public infrastructure like hospitals and schools, before Mum-and-dad investors, before retirees relying on the best possible returns on their hard-earned superannuation nest egg, before medium, small and family businesses that bring the building projects to life and the workers they employ, who rely on the prosperity of those businesses for their pay. Before all of them and before the interests of everyday Australians, the Australian Labor Party puts the CFMEU first.

Australians would not even be aware that most senators on the other side in this chamber are here because of their union links. Those opposite would find it difficult to argue against the claim that at least 70 per cent of the Labor Senate party room either has worked for or is closely affiliated with a union. In the 2022 federal election, the union spent $37 million on donations, campaign materials and election advertising, including $16 million in direct payments to the Labor Party. A third of those donations were from the CFMEU. The Australian Labor Party's dismantling of industry watchdog the ABCC, its go-slow on acting on the CFMEU until the public interest made it impossible to ignore and its connections to the CFMEU explain why this legislation in its current form is designed to put the interests of the CFMEU first.

That's why the coalition will propose a number of amendments to make this bill better and give greater confidence that the Construction, Forestry and Maritime Employees Union cannot re-engage in the same behaviour—though it won't fix the harm already inflicted on so many. Labor ministers have known about that behaviour for a very long time but only now are decrying an abhorrent and intolerable culture in the CFMEU.

The allegations as to the CFMEU are of systemic corruption and unlawful conduct, including corrupt payments; physical and verbal violence; intimidation; abuse of right-of-entry permits; secondary boycotts; breaches of fiduciary duty and contempt of court. For so long, powerful political friends paved the way for former secretary John Setka to become even more fearsome and brazen. You need look no further than the CFMEU recently taking on the AFL, seeking to sack its chief umpire and the former chair of the ABCC because he dared bring forward evidence of the CFMEU's bullying, thuggery and intimidation to the courts, which found the CFMEU had breached the Fair Work Act in 91 per cent of cases. John Setka threatened to 'pursue anti-union, anti-worker' Australians 'like him', and said, 'We will until the end of the earth,' and threatened to 'cost the AFL a lot of money' if they didn't meet his demands. Almost every Australian watching that saga play out, I'm sure, was astonished.

As shadow minister for child protection and the prevention of family violence, I found it appalling to see in recent sittings the Australian Greens and the Labor Party ignore the CFMEU's shameful treatment of women. The female-dominated Textile, Clothing and Footwear Union merged with the CFMEU in 2018, but wanted to back out in February 2024. Their wishes, though, were voted down in this Senate chamber by the Australian Greens and the Labor Party. Other separate matters involving the mistreatment of women were also publicly vented. Minister Watt may be the new Minister for Employment and Workplace Relations, but these issues are not new to him. Yet he and his colleagues would have you believe that this is all new.

The clampdown on the CFMEU should have happened years ago. There was evidence for action. There was opportunity for action. The Labor Party would have none of it. In 2022, the South Australian Labor Party confirmed that the Victorian CFMEU's donation of $125,000 would be returned days after the Setka-led Victorian branch took control of the South Australian branch. In South Australia they knew it was unconscionable to keep the money, and South Australians would have responded with anger had they done so. That's what drove the return of the money: fear of public backlash—nothing else. The federal government could and should have done the same, but it didn't and it's still saying it won't.

Master Builders in South Australia were onto the risk of the CFMEU muscling in on South Australia and had been ever since Labor abolished the ABCC. 'There's a lot more pressure on people in construction in South Australia to do what the union wants them to do,' CEO Will Frogley told the Advertiser two years ago. In a mysterious coincidence, a decapitated Kermit the Frog puppet was left on the fence of Frogley's family home, and Master Builders' cars and property were vandalised.

Master Builders South Australia represents over 2,500 builders, specialist contractors, suppliers and manufacturers—hardworking Australians, hardworking South Australians. Last year I stood in this chamber to share an example of how the CFMEU was flexing its muscles in holding South Australian businesses to ransom. An agreement brokered by the John-Setka-led CFMEU included a swag of bonus allowances at a Wingfield crane firm that included $10 for each day workers arrived at work on time and wearing the correct uniform. Extraordinary! That's not reasonable; nor is it fair.

The same year, the CFMEU spent thousands of its members' money to wrap an Adelaide tram in the union's slogan: 'A union of opportunity'. It was a blatant membership drive of the CFMEU and a breach of SA government rules, but the CFMEU carried on regardless.

The CFMEU has driven, and always will drive, Labor Party policy and action. This bill is Labor admitting they have failed. They were warned in this parliament by industry, by regulators and by the courts. This bill seeks to reverse the vengeful acts the Prime Minister has made against the ABCC since he was elected. One of his tasks when he came into government was to get rid of the watchdog, the ABCC. As Jennifer Westacott, the former Chief Executive of the BCA, said at the time:

Australians should have safe jobs, well paid jobs and rewarding jobs, but the government's radical shake-up of the industrial relations system will not deliver that.

These changes will create confusion and extra costs … make it harder to hire casual workers and create uncertainty for employing anybody.

Any government that's serious about cost of living would not do this.

As it is, any government that is serious about the cost of living would also have acted on the CFMEU and its activities a long time ago. But, without accountability, we have seen criminal activity, threats, corruption, bribery, intimidation, violence, bullying, standover tactics, misappropriation of funds and other accusations of lawlessness by the CFMEU, and we've had skyrocketing costs that have seen Australian taxpayers forking out up to 30 per cent more on major projects. South Australia has had some pretty significant infrastructure projects too. Perhaps the government there might want to do a bit of work to find out how much extra the CFMEU's involvement in South Australia has added to those major projects.

The inaction by the Albanese government until now has had perverse and far-reaching upstream and downstream consequences, even for those not directly associated with the CFMEU. It is one of the many reasons that business failures in South Australia soared 70 per cent early last year and are expected to get worse. And those failures are replicated right across Australia. Action against the militant CFMEU should have been taken a long time ago. This bill doesn't respond to the appalling actions of the CFMEU. All the Albanese Labor government is seeking to do is to get its own handiwork out of the headlines, out of the news cycle.

The coalition's amendments seek to do more than the Albanese government is prepared to do. These amendments will make the bill better. They include the minister not having the ability to end the administration early; any variation to the scheme of administration must be agreed by the Federal Court, not the minister. Political donations, political campaigns and advertising by the CFMEU should be explicitly banned during the period of administration. The administrator must provide a written report to parliament every three months and appear at Senate estimates. A new fit-and-proper-person test is to be introduced for all CFMEU delegates and officers. Members should expect no less.

The cost of fixing the CFMEU mess should not be borne by the Australian taxpayer. The administrator should be given additional powers to investigate dealings between the CFMEU and other parties, including other registered organisations and political parties. With these changes, the Albanese Labor government has the opportunity to do what it said it would and truly crack down on CFMEU misconduct—but I'm not going to hold my breath, and nor should Australians.

The bill presented before us today falls well short of what is needed and what everyday, hardworking Australians should expect from their government. This bill, and the government's response to the CFMEU, confirms that Labor will continue to put their union masters first. For everyday Australians, hardworking Australians, hardworking small businesses, family businesses, investors and those retirees waiting for their superannuation funds to be maximised so they can enjoy their hard work in retirement—well, let's hope these amendments will be accepted so they don't have to watch, yet again, the Labor Party put union masters first and Australia's interests last.

Gerard Rennick (Queensland, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise today to speak to the Fair Work (Registered Organisations) Amendment (Administration) Bill 2024. It's pretty obvious that when it comes to unions—and unions are important, I want to add; unions are extremely important for protecting workers' rights. But they should not be used for protecting Labor's rivers of gold. That is what the Labor Party is all about today. It is no longer the party of the worker; it is the party of the rorter. It's, 'How can we use unions to exploit the Australian worker for our rivers of gold?' It doesn't matter whether they're channelling union fees into their coffers directly, via superannuation funds or via childcare centres—that's right, I said it; come at me! That is what the Labor Party is all about today. They do not care about the workers. They do not care about the children. They do not care about the individual. They want to maintain their command and control over the Australian workplace to make sure they enrich themselves.

I've got to tell you: the Australian people have woken up to this. We saw it a couple of decades ago when the Howard battlers came across, and we see it all the time; more and more blue-collar workers are joining the coalition and coming over to the right because they can see through Labor. They can see through the games played by the Labor Party and their bullying tactics. It doesn't matter whether it's the CFMEU in the workplace or, as we saw on the weekend, the Prime Minister or the education minister using names like 'cooker', 'anti-vaxxer' and 'climate denier'; with anything that impedes or gets in the way of their rivers of gold, the Labor Party has to bully people. That's not the way to treat people. That's not respectful. It's not rational. It's not the way democratic debate should occur in this country. We see the leaders of the Labor Party showing us their immaturity and their shallowness in dealing with running a country. Every little step of the way, they are always trying to play games in how they can milk the system in order to enrich themselves and keep those rivers of gold flowing.

I've got to hand it to you guys. I did a master's in finance and I didn't fail a subject, but I failed an assignment that was on superannuation about 15 years ago. I ripped into superannuation back then. I'll call out my own side too; I called John Howard out on this because Costello and Howard should have got rid of super when they got in back in 1996. But they didn't because they got into bed with the CBA, who took over Colonial Mutual, and with NAB, who took over National Mutual, and Westpac, Banks Trust, ANZ and ING. Superannuation today now controls $3 trillion. If you control $3 trillion, you control industry, and it's no wonder that, when we had the Voice vote last year, we had industry promoting the 'yes' vote. We've got this woke mind virus in our corporate boardrooms. We've got it in our childcare centres. We've got it in our education centres. We've got it in our universities. We've now got it in our corporate boardrooms.

Andrew McLachlan (SA, Deputy-President) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Thank you, Senator Rennick. You'll be in continuation. We've reached the appointed hour, so I shall now proceed to senators' statements.