Sally McManus calls for investigation into John Setka blackmail charges

The ACTU secretary has called for an investigation into the Coalition’s knowledge of events leading to blackmail charges against union bosses.

The ACTU has not specify what form an investigation should take. Picture: AAP

ACTU secretary Sally McManus called for an investigation into the Coalition’s knowledge of events that led to the blackmail charges against Mr Setka and Mr Reardon.

Ms McManus said the government had “serious questions to answer”

She said the Director of Public Prosecutions discontinued the case after the committal heard evidence that representatives from the government were liaising with Boral executives before any allegations against the union duo were formally raised.

“The possibility that members of the Abbott/Turnbull Government were closely consulting with Boral over events that led to these discredited charges is deeply disturbing. This possibility should be fully investigated,’’ she said.

“This is the same Government that orchestrated the ROC raid, wasted $80 million on a union witch hunt, and is the successor of the coalition government that conspired to ruin the lives of waterfront workers 20 years ago.

“It is not acceptable for any government to attack the elected representatives of working people in order to advance their political agenda.

The ACTU did not specify what form an investigation should take.

“John Setka and Shaun Reardon have stood up for working people in the Victorian construction industry. They stood up for safety in an extremely dangerous industry.’’ She said.

“And for doing that they have faced unwarranted and discredited criminal charges. Working people deserve answers about how this happened.”

Meanwhile, Workplace and Deregulation Minister Craig Laundy has denied that the dropping of blackmail charges against militant Victorian construction union leader John Setka and his deputy Shaun Reardon yesterday was embarrassing for the government.

Lawyers for Mr Setka and Mr Reardon yesterday flagged legal action after the case against them collapsed midway through committal proceedings, which were prompted by trade union royal commissioner Dyson Heydon’s recommendation that charges be laid against the men.

Asked whether the dropping of the charges was embarrassing for the government and the royal commission it set up, Mr Laundy said: “Well the short answer is no.”

“Obviously this is the Victorian Department of Public Prosecutions, the DPP, that brought the charges off the back of the royal commission, not us,” Mr Laundy told ABC radio.

“It’s them that withdrew it, and if people have questions for them, they’re more than welcome and happy to answer them I would guess.

“That said, what’s been missed here is that we’re talking about one, yesterday’s decision, however, there have historically been so far, 12 convictions, nine criminal and three civil, since the royal commission, and a further eight matters are currently subject to legal proceedings, all off the back of the royal commission.”

Mr Laundy said that independently of yesterday’s decision, 70 CFMEU officials were currently facing court action over 39 different matters, and the union 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 that is 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 that they behave themselves,” Mr Laundy said.

Witnesses in Mr Setka and Mr Reardon’s dumped blackmail case allegedly redrafted their witness statements 18 and 40 times respectively.

Mr Laundy said he could not comment on why that may have occurred.

“The Victorian DPP handled the case, not the federal government, so any attempt to conflate the two is, excuse the French, but tabloid journalism,” he said.

“John Setka has been found guilty of 59 offences including assault, theft, wilful trespass.

“He has been jailed twice for contempt of court. Now any attempt to rewrite that history is a joke, and that’s what we are facing day in and day out on union sites around this country and we won’t stop legislating and empowering our courts and the Fair Work Commission to deal with it, because our economy, the productivity and economic benefits of these sectors of the economy are so important.”

Asked about allegations executives at building supply company Boral had colluded with his predecessor as Workplace Relations Minister Eric Abetz in the blackmail case, Mr Laundy said: “My opinion is no.”

“I know definitely in terms of my time in the portfolio, I’ve been sitting back and watching the case unfold,” he said.

“Now if other people have different accounts or thoughts on how it unfolded prior to me coming to the portfolio, that’s an issue for them to raise, however, we’ve been sitting back letting the Victorian DPP handle the prosecution, which is completely appropriate, independent of us, and the outcome is what it has become.”

Mr Laundy said it was not true that many recent union breaches had been right of entry breaches rather than examples of thuggery.

“In 2015 a court found Mr Setka pinned a security guard up against a wall, threatened to shut him up permanently, punched the windscreen of a car with employees inside, and then said to one worker who he knew had cancer, ‘I hope you die of cancer’, and that’s just one of his 59 offences, so no, the short answer to your question is no,” Mr Laundy said.

“These are very serious breaches at times that the courts have to deal with and deal with appropriately.”

Mr Laundy initially failed to give a direct answer to a question about whether the Australian public trusts banks or unions less, given the recent royal commissions into both.

“I think royal commissions into both will make recommendations and I mentioned the 12 convictions and eight other cases that are at the back end of the union royal commission,” he said.

“I’m guessing at the back end, given what we’re hearing, of the banking royal commission, they’ll make recommendations and then the relevant state and federal jurisdictions will decide whether or not they proceed forward with those, and I think that will play out, and as that plays out and the behaviour that we see, people will make their own minds up over time.

Pressed again to answer the question he had been asked, Mr Laundy said he was not here to judge how the public feel.

“I don’t like seeing bad behaviour irrespective of whether it’s on behalf of a union or a bank, and I think they should behave appropriately whether they’re a union or a bank, and I think most people in the public would agree with me,” he said.

Senator Abetz said Ms McManus’s claims that he and then prime minister Tony Abbott were somehow involved in the blackmail charges against the CFMEU were unfounded.

“The facts are clear: the charges were laid by Victoria Police in 2015 and prosecuted by the Victorian Director of Public Prosecutions thereafter – Victorian authorities under a Victorian Labor government,” Senator Abetz said.

“Any suggestion that Mr Abbott, Premier Andrews, myself and my then counterpart were involved in some conspiracy to have charges laid and prosecuted by Victorian authorities is not only implausible but completely laughable.

“Given the ACTU’s new-found demand for all to accept the rule of law in this case, I trust they will equally demand the CFMEU accept and follow the rule of law following the dozens of court findings against them for law-breaking that have resulted in more than $14 million in fines.

“It is noted that witnesses in court last week confirmed that they did not tell me nor my office of any alleged blackmail. The first my then ministerial office became aware of such allegations was when issues were placed on the public record in the Heydon royal commission.

“This is a smear on the professionalism of the Victorian Police and the Victorian Director of Public Prosecutions and I trust that the Victorian Labor Attorney-General will immediately come out and defend them against these unfounded allegations which besmirch their independence and professionalism.”

Jobs Minister Michaelia Cash said it was “absolutely not” embarrassing for the government that the charges were dropped yesterday.

“Absolutely not. It is a matter for the Victorian police,” Senator Cash said.

“Look at the behaviour that was uncovered by the royal commission. Disgraceful behaviour,law-breaking behaviour.

“The unions, the CFMEU itself has been fined, now $14 million of their members’ money has gone because courts have fined them for breaking the law that each one of us has to abide by.

“In relation to that particular dispute, the Grocon dispute, the union actually had to pay money to both Grocon and to Boral.

“It is absolutely not allowable to break the laws, and the CFMEU need to wake up to that, as does Bill Shorten, because, let’s face it, Mr Setka is Mr Shorten’s biggest backer.”