CFMEU’s John Setka tells Bill Shorten: loosen strike laws

Emboldened union leader John Setka calls on Bill Shorten to make it easier for workers to strike as he slams the legacy of the Rudd-Gillard years.

Victorian construction union leader John Setka in Melbourne yesterday after having blackmail charges dropped. Picture: Stuart McEvoy

Victorian construction union leader John Setka has called on Bill Shorten to make it easier for workers to take strike action and to relax union right-of-entry laws, as the fallout from a botched blackmail case escalates.

The union movement sought to ramp up pressure on the Turnbull government over the dropped blackmail charges against Mr Setka and his deputy, Shaun Reardon, while ACTU secretary Sally McManus called for an inquiry into whether federal Coalition politicians played a role in helping bring the “unwarranted and discredited criminal charges” against the union pair.

In an interview with The Australian, Mr Setka criticised Labor’s Fair Work Act and accused Kevin Rudd and Julia Gillard of being “probably the worst Labor prime ministers” in Aus­tralia’s history.

As Labor frontbencher Joel Fitzgibbon defended Mr Setka in the wake of the charges being dropped, declaring that the “history of mankind and our progress” had been built on civil disobedience, Malcolm Turnbull took aim at the union leader for linking the CFMMEU’s success to its willingness to break the law.

The Prime Minister said comments yesterday by Mr Setka had underlined “the way in which the Labor Party is parting company from the rule of law”.

The political stoush over the Construction Forestry Maritime Mining and Energy Union came as it was poised to tighten its grip over the Australian Council of Trade Unions, with Michele O’Neil expected to become ACTU president, replacing Ged Kearney who resigned to contest the by-election in the Melbourne seat of Batman for Labor in March.

Ms O’Neil is the national secretary of the textile, clothing and footwear sector of the ­manufacturing division of the CFMMEU.

Mr Setka said yesterday Labor should commit to removing conditions attached to legal strike ­action, including protected action ballots of workers and notice ­periods and called on a Shorten government to give unions an unfettered right to enter workplaces to organise members.

“If I am on site and my boss is ripping me off, I am not getting my proper wages and he’s just screwing me, who is the law to tell me, hang on a sec, you just can’t walk off the job, you can’t stop work,” Mr Setka said.

“I am a human being. I am not a slave. I am working. I am not in the army. I have not been conscripted to work there.” He said right-of-entry laws should be relaxed to allow unions better access to members. “This is Australia, not North Korea.’’

He attacked the record of the Rudd and Gillard governments on workplace relations. “That Labor government was in for five years — what did they achieve for workers?” he said. “Nothing. They should be ashamed of themselves. Some of the same people who were in charge then now have a chance to redeem themselves.

“Be the stand-for-something Labor Party. The legacy the Rudd and Gillard governments left is an absolute disgrace.”

He said he believed Mr Shorten was trying to make the Labor Party “how it used to be, actually stand(ing) up for working people”.

In response to Mr Setka’s comments, opposition workplace relations spokesman Brendan O’Connor said last night Labor wanted “fairer workplaces”.

“For that reason, we are in different discussions with unions, employers and other affected stakeholders to achieve that end.’’

Mr Shorten took a hard line against organisations or individuals that broke the law. “I don’t think you need to break the law, full stop,” he said. “But I think the issue you’re going to is the court case (on Wednesday), that the prosecution dropped all its matters. I think that speaks for itself.”

Mr Turnbull criticised Mr Setka over his union’s willingness to break the law. “The law applies to everybody. To everyone,” the Prime Minister said. “Laws can be changed by parliaments, democratically elected. Unions and unionists do not have some sort of privilege — as Sally McManus and John Setka would like to claim — to go around breaking the law without consequences.”

Jobs Minister Michaelia Cash accused the CFMEU of believing it was above the law, saying Mr Setka had “proudly broken the law and been charged in excess of 59 times” including for assault and jail time for contempt.

“The irony of Sally McManus’s and John Setka’s position is, it is Labor’s laws they are complaining about,” she said.

Workplace Minister Craig Laundy denied the dropping of the charges was embarrassing for the government, noting that the CFMEU had racked up $15 million in fines for law breaches over the past two years. “This is a rogue union and this is exactly the sort of behaviour going on day in and day out that the courts are dealing with, and the royal commission exposed, and we’ll continue to legislate off the back of that to make sure they behave themselves,” he said.

Mr Setka urged an independent inquiry into the role of Victoria Police and the Australian Federal Police, Victorian and federal Coalition MPs, and lawyers.

He said the union’s lawyers would meet next week to consider legal options, given the case had cost the union in excess of $1m.

Mr Fitzgibbon defended Mr Setka after the blackmail charges against him were dropped. “Next time they tell you these guys have been fined 1000 times or whatever they are claiming, ask what they were fined for,” he told Sky News.

“I suspect in most cases they were fined for trying to stick up for workers, notwithstanding legislative barriers this government has put in their way.”

Ms McManus said the dropped case was the centrepiece of the trade union royal commission, which she said was used as a political weapon by Tony Abbott and former workplace relations minister Eric Abetz to “smear” unions.

“At what levels were the government involved in what we believe are trumped-up charges against these union leaders,” she told Sky News.

Mr Abbott lashed out at the CFMEU following the decision, saying “one failed prosecution doesn’t turn Australia’s most thuggish union into a bunch of choir boys”. Senator Abetz ridiculed Ms McManus’s claims he and Mr Abbott were involved in the CFMEU court action, saying charges were laid by Victoria Police in 2015 and prosecuted by the state Director of Public Prosecutions.

The chairman of Mr Abbott’s commission of audit and the former head of the Business Council of Australia, Tony Shepherd, said there was no need to roll back workplace laws.

“The Fair Work Act and Fair Work Australia were established by Labor," he said.

“They were modified during the Labor government quite significantly after a review which included consultation with unions and with industry.

“Membership of unions in Australia has declined significantly, but … on the whole workers are feeling they are being treated fairly and properly.”

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Legal cases arising from the trade union royal commission

COMPLETED

Nine criminal convictions

Halafihi Kivalu

Former CFMEU official, found guilty of the blackmail of a Canberra subcontractor. Given a suspended sentence of two years nine months and ordered to pay reparations of $70,000 in June 2016

Derrick Belan

Former head of the NSW National Union of Workers, found guilty of 58 fraud offences and one criminal group offence. Also pleaded guilty to two counts of fraud. His offences totalled more than $650,000. Due to be sentenced next month.

Danielle O’Brien

Former NUW employee, pleaded guilty to 148 charges of fraud and two counts of participation in a criminal group for misusing union funds.

Angelo Millena

Business person associated with the NSW branch of the NUW, pleaded guilty to charges of participating in and receiving benefits from a criminal group.

Maria Butera and Lisa Zanatta

Former Cbus employees, found guilty of giving false and misleading evidence to the royal commission. Both given suspended sentences of 14 months’ imprisonment in March 2016.

Tuungafasi Manase

Non-financial member of the CFMEU, found guilty of giving false and misleading evidence to the royal commission. Sentenced to three months’ imprisonment in May 2016.

Luke Collier

CFMEU organiser, found guilty of obstructing a commonwealth official.

Kane Pearson

CFMEU official, found guilty on three charges of obstructing a commonwealth official. Fined $3200 in August 2016.

Three civil convictions

James McGiveron and Richard Burton

Former Transport Workers Union officials, found guilty of breaching their duties as registered organisation officials for misusing union funds.

Transport Workers Union

Found by Federal Court to have failed to properly keep a register of its members and failed to remove non-financial members from its register. This matter is under appeal as to penalty.

ONGOING

Criminal matters

Kathy Jackson

Former Health Services Union national secretary, charged with 70 counts of theft and deception offences totalling more than $500,000.

Dave Hanna

Former CFMEU official, along with two Mirvac employees, charged with secret commissions offences in regard to more than $150,000 worth of alleged free work done to Hanna’s Cornubia house. Also committed to stand trial over the alleged destruction of documents relevant to the royal commission.

Ralph Blewitt

Former Australian Workers Union official, charged over alleged fraud offences relating to the AWU Workplace Reform Association fighting fund.

Civil matters

Michael Ravbar, Peter Close and Andrew Sutherland

CFMEU officials, facing proceedings for coercion and adverse action against the Fair Work Act in regard to the company Universal Crane.