More than 170 breaches, 50 court cases: CFMEU deemed ‘recidivist offender’
A Federal Court judge has labelled militant union the CFMEU a “well-resourced, recidivist offender” after three construction officials were fined over workplace breaches at the site of a major freeway upgrade.
Justice John Snaden fined the construction union and officials Paul Tzimas, Gerald McCrudden and James Harris a combined $108,980 after they admitted to contravening labour laws at sites run by infrastructure giant McConnell Dowell.
CFMEU members and delegates voted through a new enterprise bargaining agreement last week.Credit: Eamon Gallagher
The court heard Tzimas and McCrudden had entered the Mordialloc Freeway upgrade site on November 18, 2020, and raised concerns about safety issues, including emergency plans they claimed were inadequate and the use of a metal they said could cause the deadly lung disease silicosis.
Tzimas and McCrudden took their concerns to a health and safety manager who, according to Tzimas, told them that workers would only be at risk from the metal if they were “lying on the ground licking the road”.
“Mr Tzimas did not react well to [health and safety manager] Ms Canatta’s observation,” Sanden found.
“[Tzimas] responded by saying to Mr Shanley and Ms Canatta, ‘You’re pathetic’ and ‘You’re a disgrace’,” court documents say.
McCrudden told the court that safety managers at the site said work should continue while the issues were addressed, to which he responded: “You’re f---ed this time.”
In a separate incident on December 2, Harris went to a site near Woodlands Drive in Braeside, in Melbourne’s south-east, and served notice of possible contraventions under the Occupational Health and Safety Act. Harris then stood in front of concrete trucks as they were trying to enter the site.
After the incidents, the CFMEU arranged for Tzimas, McCrudden and Harris to undergo “resilience training” by business growth and innovation specialist Damian Karaula, and training sessions administered by Brian Lacy concerning the nature and limits of entry rights.
The CFMEU told the court that its history of breaching workplace laws should not impact the court’s assessment of fines “because the conduct attributed to it here was impulsive or, at any event, not reflective of some broader union objective”.
Snaden fined the union $95,000, Tzimas $3990, McCrudden $3330 and Harris $6660, and said he was satisfied the penalties would deter future breaches.
The CFMEU and its officials will pay fines of more than $108,000.Credit: Joe Armao
“On any view, the CFMEU is properly to be described as a well-resourced, recidivist offender. Since 2010, it has been held to have contravened [section] 500 of the [Fair Work] act more than 170 times in no fewer than 50 proceedings,” he found.
“Its record of contravening demonstrates a general disregard on its part of workplace laws … It is appropriate, though, for the court to fashion penalties that, in their totality, reflect the wrongdoing that is to sheet home to the CFMEU.”
The CFMEU and McConnell Dowell were approached for comment.
The court decision comes shortly after a big win for John Setka’s Victorian branch of the construction union, which pushed through a 20 per cent pay deal over four years and restored conditions previously banned by the Coalition’s building code.
Last week, thousands of members and delegates voted through the new enterprise bargaining agreement at Festival Hall in a deal that included union vetoes over rostered days off, labour-hire limits and mandated union flags displayed on site.
The deal grants workers pay rises of 5 per cent a year and loosens regulations governing work during poor weather.
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