Andrews deflects labour mess

BUILDING-UNION corruption allegations are seriously undermining Victorian Labor’s run to the November 29 election.

BUILDING-UNION corruption allegations are seriously undermining Victorian Labor’s run to the November 29 election, but leader Daniel Andrews refuses to take action to avoid political fallout.

Mr Andrews has defiantly refused to address corruption alleg­ations and Construction Forestry Mining and Energy Union state leader John Setka’s long criminal history, amid fears of an internal ALP backlash that could affect his leadership.

The CFMEU is a large Labor donor and is part of Mr Andrews’s Socialist Left faction and will be the subject next week of inquiries by the royal commission into union governance and corruption.

The hearings have coincided with a series of leaks alleging criminality by union members and a low-level ALP office-bearer.

Victorian Planning Minister Matthew Guy accused Labor yesterday of refusing to address the issue of union criminality. “This scandal is tickling the criminal under­belly of the ALP: this is complete chaos from Labor’s side,’’ Mr Guy said.

But a national secretary of the union, Dave Noonan, has blasted the leaks and urged the royal commission to focus on its task.

Mr Andrews, who opposes the commission, refused yesterday to back any action against the CFMEU before the commission’s findings, not due until December 31, well after the election.

“When the royal commission’s work is finished every Victorian can be confident and should be in no doubt that I will have no hesitation in acting on any findings that the royal commission brings forward,” he said. “That’s the appro­priate way to act. These are serious matters. They need to be properly investigated.”

Mr Andrews deflected all questions about interim steps Labor might take to distance itself from the CFMEU and protect itself in the lead-up to the election.

“I have no doubt that (Victorian Premier) Denis Napthine and his ministers will continue to try and focus on these issues because they certainly can’t run on their own record,” he said.

Asked if Labor would return the union’s donations if the commission found the union had acted corruptly, Mr Andrews declared such a position would pre-empt the commission’s findings. He said he had not personally heard of Labor members seeking money for industrial peace as alleged.

Allegations against the CFMEU include that a $50,000 payment was demanded by a Labor office-bearer in exchange for industrial peace, connections with bikie gangs and close relations with gangland standover man Mick Gatto.

In a letter to royal commissioner Dyson Heydon, Mr Noon­an referred to media reports attacking the CFMEU: “These events suggest that not only the subject of next week’s commission hearings but the evidence itself has been leaked to the media.

“Any such disclosure would be particularly outrageous when in March the ACTU wrote to you about the union movement’s fears that there would be selective and unfair briefings of journalists by commission staff.’’