The case for black-listing the CFMEU is clear-cut

It’s reassuring to hear that Scott Morrison is “looking very seriously” at deregistration of the lawless outfit that is the Construction Forestry Maritime Mining and Energy Union. It was in the news yesterday because of an abusive tweet directed at the building industry watchdog by Victoria’s CFMEU boss John Setka, who included a photo of his children holding the sign “GO GET FU#KED”. Setka deleted the tweet after a public outcry but it was all too typical of the CFMEU — defiance of civilised norms, personal abuse, a pirate captain-like rallying of the crew before battle and plunder.

The Prime Minister says he “won’t rush” deregistration. It’s true the ground has to be carefully prepared, reminding the public of the CFMEU’s record and marshalling the numbers in parliament. The new Industrial Relations Minister, Kelly O’Dwyer, will have to rise to the challenge. She has not inspired confidence to date. And the Coalition has been gun-shy on labour reform ever since Labor’s 2007 Work Choices campaign helped unseat John Howard. But the case for CFMEU deregistration is clear-cut and strong. Its record of lawlessness is legendary. Bob Hawke has acknowledged the parallel with his 1986 decision to wind up Norm Gallagher’s rogue Builders Labourers Federation.

Mr Setka’s tweet specifically targeted Australian Building and Construction Commission chief Stephen McBurney. The CFMEU has a long history of personal intimidation. It uses standover tactics against managers of public companies just as it threatens the livelihood of family-owned subcontractors. Last year Mr Setka talked of “exposing” the home addresses of ABCC inspectors.

Yet the struggle is ultimately an institutional one. The CFMEU is an anti-competitive rent-seeker and its structural rorts build higher costs into projects across Australia. It regards fines as simply the price of doing union business and shows contempt for the law that binds the rest of us. That is why last month CFMEU organiser Joe Myles was ordered to personally pay a $19,500 penalty for an unlawful blockade at the Regional Rail Link project in Victoria in 2013. Experience shows that a specialised enforcement agency — the ABCC — is needed for there to be any hope of efficiency and the rule of law in the building trade. Last month Federal Court judge Richard Tracey slammed the CFMEU for its “disgraceful and shameful” history of law-breaking, observing that “the union has adopted the attitude that it will not comply with any legislative constraints … with which it disagrees. Such an approach is an anathema in a democratic society.”

But Bill Shorten promises a Labor government would abolish the ABCC. The CFMEU bankrolls his party. Mr Setka was a prominent guest at his election night event in Melbourne in 2016. And the union delivers crucial numbers for him at Labor’s national conference. Seeking to skirt the Setka affair yesterday, Mr Shorten mangled his metaphors, saying: “Mr Morrison has leapt on the tweet like a drowning man will grab at a fig leaf.” Well, the building industry needs the CFMEU like Gotham City needs a Trojan horse.