Union corruption is the talk of the town at the moment.
We have had a Royal Commission into it and it seems we are about to have a double dissolution Federal election off the back of it.
So determined is Malcolm Turnbull to make it tougher for building industry unions to do their job, and with such a determination to protect the profits of wealthy property developers that he has been holding the reinstatement of the ABCC (Australian Building & Construction Commission) like a gun to the temple of Senators as the double dissolution trigger. Many of these developers whose profits Turnbull seeks to protect are the same ones who made all those illegal political donations to the Liberal party in NSW.
The Royal Commission into the Trade Union Movement cost the taxpayer hundreds of millions dollars yet sections of its findings have been kept secret from all but those whom the Liberal Party deem worthy. A bit like buying your Sunday paper and the newsagent pulling out the sports section in front of you and telling you that you’re not allowed to read that bit. This of course has caused all kinds of speculation about what lies within.
I am confident that if there is anyone that wants to weed out union corruption it is the unions themselves. I’m sure they would like nothing more than to be able to campaign for workplace safety and fight for better working conditions without the scrutiny and stigma attached.
Whenever someone from a building industry such as the CFMEU is charged with a crime we see opportunistic Coalition MP’s making a big mock fuss over it in parliament, and the Murdoch press go up a gear fuelled on by the right-wing commentators. However when those charges are dropped, as we saw last week there is hardly a murmur.
So it may come as a shock to you to learn that some of the organisations looked into by the Royal Commission were receiving tax subsidies and handouts from the government worth millions of dollars?
With the confirmation of this one would expect that public outcry would be deafening, parliament would go into meltdown and the sun would refuse to shine for a week.
However none of that has happened, and I’ll tell you why.
Because the organisations involved have not cost a single property developer an extra dime in the name of worker safety, or demanded better pay and conditions. No, these organisations have only aided, abetted, harboured, provided legal assistance for, and offered forgiveness to the sexual abusers of thousands of children.
That’s right, it’s a different Royal Commission and different organisations but it seems our government cares more about alleged, apparent, and as yet unfounded claims of illegal actions hurting the pockets of their big donor developer pals than they do about the industrial scale raping of children.
Is it just me or have we somehow got our priorities all wrong?
In this on again – off again budget emergency that we are told about when it suits the Coalitions agenda, it turns out we could be saving $390 Million by scrapping tax concessions to religious organisations. We could also scrape up an extra $60 Million by scrapping the School Chaplaincy programme (like putting these people in front of more kids is a good idea).
That’s almost half a billion dollars. Not exactly small cheese.
These figures were released last week by Senator David Leyonhjelm after he received a report from the Parliamentary Budget Office.
So will the government take a serious look at this report and debate the funding? Hell no.
Will the government instead hold the Senator to ransom over the ABCC? Hell yeah.
Meanwhile as the millions in taxpayer subsidies are used in out of court settlements and payoffs to victims of clergy sexual abuse the CFMEU donate $200,000 to a Melbourne Children’s hospital, not that you’ll read that in the news anywhere.
Priorities indeed.
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Sad, but true, Peter.
Of course to the LNP it’s just “politics, stupid” or “business as usual”; the idea of governance to be avoided as repugnant.
Only reason I can figure the Govt has for not releasing certain portions of the corrupt Commissioner Dyson’s report into Trade Unions, something in it is damaging to the Govt, or persons connected to the Torys’
Hopefully an incoming Labor Govt will very speedily reverse that situation.
Watching Meet the Press last week and listening to Dave Noonan and the Industry spokesman – it was good to hear the careful and measured comments made by Mr. Noonan – what was of interest to me as a viewer was the Industry spokesman citing the notion that there were many industrial sites operating safely without the oversight of the Unions –
I know of one for a fact that is operating in a high dense residentially zoned area in the middle of a city – which the local residents demanded should apply for an EPA Licence back in 2004/05- which stated that the operators, many of them being sub-tenants, generated and stockpiled ‘hazardous, toxic Group A Waste’ both atmospherically and via the public sewer system – the Liberal Government removed the Licence immediately they came into office to appease the site operator and its sub-tenants.- according to a State Government Hansard – in a Questions and Answers report the Government does not know whether there is any insurance covering the site as it is up to the site operator to make its own applications for insurance.should they need to do so.
There are currently 100 CFMEU officials before the courts, if they rode motorcycles they’d be a declared criminal enterprise and be forced to disband, well, in Queensland anyway.
We don’t need the ABCC, we needed the ACC to do its job, but it was too busy looking at what sports stars were doing in their locker rooms to do real anti-corruption policing.
The unions are a corrupt influence peddling outfit in desperate need of deep reform, but it won’t happen whilst they’re the funding arm of the ALP or more often than not, in bed with big business. (As shown by Bill Shorten’s relationships and dealings with big business as a union boss, and others like him and theirs)
Even with 100 of its officials before the courts with more to follow the CFMEU have not only refused to reform, they’ve decided to just merge with another union with an equally questionable history.
Where does it end? And who really is working for the workers? Because thanks to the TURC we now know it wasn’t the unions and it surely wasn’t the alternate Prime Minister Bill Shorten.
Being before the courts means nothing, we are innocent until proven guilty.
Also, who said its before criminal courts? The words “before the courts” are being selected carefully as opposed to “charged with crimes”.
I’m sure the CFMEU takes many employers to court over workplace safety issues and wage disputes, that doesn’t meant they are criminals, it is part of their jobs hat puts them before courts.
Slater & Gordon probably have 200 employees before the courts, it’s their job, does that make them some kind of criminal enterprise? Or only if the ride a motorbike to work?
Didn’t Jaqui Lambi say on QandA that she had read the secret part of the TURC report and that it actually stated nothing of any substance, which begs the question – is the Coalition trying to conjure up speculation that there is some dire revelation against the unions, which is too dangerous to release? Tactics to scare the public, tactics which are the ‘trade mark’ of this Coalition in opposition as well as now in Government.
The CFMEU is a protection racket masquerading as a union. It has a long criminal history and having 100 officials as defendants probably wasn’t a surprise to them.
And to think the Gillard Government had the stones to act against the HSU and it only had a small number of corrupt individuals.
It is time for unions to be governed by corporations law.
Mr McKenzie kindly supply links to circumstances of these 100 (convenient number) officials before the courts, and the time frame over which you are making the accusations.
Thankyou
Defendants now are they?
So the Unions should be governed by the same Corporations Law that let the big banks rob customers for years, hand out the worst kind of sponsored financial advice, and foreclose on perfectly serviceable loans? That would lead to *less* oversight of Unions, *less* prosecution of the “corrupt” people, and is quite the opposite of your suggestion, Mr.McKenzie. And I am inclined to wonder exactly what kind of organisations (businesses?) these corrupt union officials could make deals with??? Probably those overseen by Corporations Law!
I agree with Glenn Lazarus (and I am an old Canberra Raiders supporter) that a Federal ICAC is needed, not a narrow politically driven (and useless in its first incarnation) ABCC.
My take also on the ‘too nasty too reveal’ portion of the liar Hendons report. If it was as bad as we led to believe, the Torys would have allowed the mad woman Cash to go into one of her hysterical performances, arms flaying, words spitting forth like some sort of revolutionary flem shooter.
Unless it is a Govt surprise rabbit in the hat waiting for the carrot to be big enough, its a bluff as Senator Lambie indicates.
By the by Nathan McKenzie, I am still awaiting the links etc for your 100 CFMEU officials before the courts, the charges and names etc.
Do I take it from your non response, you have been plucking from the well used Tory book of crap.
Many are being investigated. Not the same as before the courts. Many face civil not criminal powers. One has admitted guilt, leading to conviction. Many have been thrown out of court. Some not even getting to trial.
If union is proven to be corrupt, why hasn’t it been deregistered? Suggest because not evidence was found to allow this action.
Florence precisely..Mr McKenzie is exposed as the Tory troll he is.
How unfortunate that only one party involved in corruption is being investigated.
Before a bribe can be accepted it must first be offered, which may itself be illegal.
If demands for illegal payments or incidents of intimidation are made they should be reported to the authorities. There are existing laws in place to deal with such matters.
Meanwhile the financial and political ties on the Government with property developers are becoming more well known.
It will be interesting to see where this may lead.
The slow destruction of the union movement continues with endless character assassination. The latest slur is ‘Beaconsfield Bill’. Shorten was leader of the Union and was where you would expect a leader to be at such a time and never claimed any credit for himself but spoke about the heroism of the union miners who came from all states to risk their lives to save their mates and criticised the poor safety record of the company. Cant have that can we.
It was said by that early in the disaster the company said the two could not have survived and wanted to stop attempts to recover bodies because of danger but a miner sneaked past them and crawled at great risk to a point where he established voice contact and the rescue had to begin. Make what you want of that. Union members volunteers from all over Australia came to help. Now Shorten goes on and on about the coal miners getting black lung because mines have dropped their commitment OH&S arguably a result of LNP regulations to assist companies to exclude union representation for workers.
I suppose Turnbull will call Shorten’ Black Lung Bill’ now and Turnbull can take a page out of Tony Abbott’s Bernie Banton handbook and attack these men dying a most horrible death saying Black Lung Bill is just making a fuss about men with a bit of a cough to get in the press. Look at the tax payers money they have used to destroy the reputation of unions it is huge. They have a plan
Just to get it all in proportion here is that 26 year old clip again I know tragedy plus time equals comedy but this is still too soon https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0hmfBtk0WaE