Labor premiers in Victoria, NSW, Queensland, and South Australia have committed to suspend their parties’ affiliations with the CFMEU (Construction, Forestry, Maritime, Mining and Energy Union), and not to accept donations, while police investigate allegations of corrupt behaviour, criminal infiltration, and links with bikie gangs, following revelations in Victoria.
Will ACT Chief Minister Andrew Barr do the same as his Labor colleagues? Opposition leader Elizabeth Lee is adamant that he must do so, to assure the public of the integrity of their government.
“It is incumbent on Andrew Barr to come clean, to be upfront, to show some leadership, and provide a commitment to Canberrans that he is satisfied the serious issues happening in the Victorian branch of the CFMEU are not happening in the ACT,” Ms Lee said.
“[Mr Barr should] show some strength and say ‘We don’t accept this behaviour; and as a result, whilst there are some serious investigations happening around the country, we will suspend affiliation with the CFMEU and stop taking donations. But the fact that Andrew Barr has failed and refused to do this to date is telling.”
Neither the Chief Minister’s office nor the ACT Government have replied to e-mails from Canberra Daily seeking comment.
Mr Barr said yesterday, however, that ACT Labor has received no donations from the Victorian branch of the CFMEU, and that the allegations do not include the ACT branch of the CFMEU.
But Ms Lee said: “It is not good enough for Andrew Barr to point the finger at other state branches of the CFMEU and say we don’t accept donations from those branches so it will be business as usual.”
The South Australian premier, Peter Malinauskas, she observed, had suspended affiliation despite there being no evidence of criminality in the South Australian branch.
The CFMEU, Ms Lee stated, was a member of the ACT Labor party; it influenced the selection of party leaders and proposed policies; and it donated to the party ($50,000 at the 2020 election). (Altogether, unions donated nearly $90,760 to the party.)
“There’s no doubt that the ACT branch of the CFMEU have an incredibly significant and close relationship with ACT Labor,” Ms Lee said. “And so, it is incumbent on ACT Labor members to be very upfront about their affiliations and the influence that unions may have on them and their decisions. That’s something Canberrans rightly should expect to know.”
Most of ACT Labor’s left faction MLAs have ties to the CFMEU and other unions. Michael Pettersson was a former Industrial Officer of the CFMEU; Ms Lee is concerned by his statement to the effect that the union and the party were one. In 2017, Mr Pettersson said: “The codified links between the Labor Party and the trade union movement go back over a century. Trade unions are not external to the Labor Party. They are an intrinsic part of it. Our support for working people and their right to collectively organise are the key foundations of our party.”
Deputy chief minister / education minister Yvette Berry was a union organiser for 15 years with trade union United Voice (now part of the United Workers Union), and her election campaign was backed by the CFMEU, the Community and Public Sector Union (CPSU), and the Transport Workers’ Union (TWU).
The Integrity Commission last year heard claims that Ms Berry’s office exerted pressure to award a tender for the Campbell Primary School modernisation project to a company favoured by the CFMEU, rather than to the preferred tender, which was on bad terms with the union. Ms Berry has denied the allegations.
Health minister Rachel Stephen-Smith was a member of the CPSU and the Australian Manufacturers Workers’ Union, and the CFMEU, United Voice, and the TWU backed her campaign.
Mick Gentleman worked for the Transport Workers Union.
Suzanne Orr was a workplace delegate, and the CPSU, the TWU, the CFMEU, and United Voice backed her campaign.
Ms Berry, Ms Stephen-Smith and Mr Pettersson took part in a CFMEU rally against their own government in 2022.
The Canberra Liberals are also concerned about the CFMEU’s proposal to the ACT Labor conference for “extraordinary and unprecedented additional powers” over ACT Government procurement and appointments of senior public servants.
“We’re talking about a union that is seeking basically police powers to be able to investigate and prosecute companies that are in line or are likely to get ACT tenders,” Ms Lee said. “That’s an extraordinary overreach in relation to influence…
“The fact is that Andrew Barr’s weak response to some of the incredibly damning revelations about what’s happening in unions just goes to show that ACT branches are being emboldened to demand this type of additional power, and it’s utterly unacceptable.”
Mr Barr said yesterday that the CFMEU’s proposals were “neither an ACT Labor party policy position, nor something that is being actively considered by the Government”.
But should it come to debating the CFMEU proposal at the Labor conference, just how will those CFMEU-backed MLAs vote? And in whose interests: Canberrans’ or the union’s?
“The significant closeness of the relationship between the CFMEU and ACT Labor cannot be understated,” Ms Lee said.
