Grievance Debate

Construction, Forestry, Mining and Energy Union

Mr KNOLL (Schubert) (15:10): The SA Branch of the CFMEU is to be put under the control of the national union heavyweights, including Queensland state secretary, Michael Ravbar, and national secretary, David Noonan. According to recent reports, these two officials will join incoming national president, Dean Hall, on a newly created strategic direction committee. This committee will help the SA branch to achieve its goals.

To achieve those goals, the new committee will set budgets, dues, levies and other charges, approve expenditure and manage the financial and physical assets of the union, as may be required from time to time. The committee will have the power to employ and terminate the employment of members of staff. Talk about a hostile takeover. Premier Jay Weatherill needs to tell these people to buzz off, to leave our state alone. The Premier should publicly state that his Labor government will no longer have any dealings with this militant union, especially these interstate intruders.

The SA branch of the construction union has already spent the last few years being dragged through the court on a long list of illegal activities on SA construction sites. Total fines have stacked up now to over $1 million, with a large number of officials implicated. A number of times we have questioned the Premier and the Deputy Premier in this place, and in other estimates forums, about actually taking some action against Aaron Cartledge and his band of thugs, and every single time the government just bats it away like there is nothing to see here.

The last thing our state needs is an interstate CFMEU hierarchy that does not think that the SA branch has gone hard enough and wants to come in and make things worse than they already are for the South Australian construction industry. Mr Ravbar and Mr Noonan have faced serious charges over their behaviour on behalf of the union. Mr Ravbar, as Queensland state secretary, allegedly ordered underlings to stop a crane company's machinery from working on projects worth a combined $1.9 billion because it did not have a union agreement. He and four other officials are facing trial in the Federal Court after the Australian Building and Construction Commissioner alleged they breached the Fair Work Act. The trial continues.

Mr Noonan, the CFMEU and Western Australian officials were fined $277,000 over unlawful blockades at the state's $1.2 billion Children's Hospital site in Perth. Do we really want these men to effectively control and run the South Australian branch of the CFMEU? The answer is no. Mr Weatherill, it is time that you admitted just how much money the CFMEU have contributed to the Labor Party in recent years. Come clean. Tell the people of South Australia how big the fix is. Is there an implicit agreement from the CFMEU for more financial backing for Labor in the coming SA state election?

Unions have a role to play in our society, but they are expected to obey the laws of the land just like the rest of us. We know that this type of illegal behaviour increases construction costs on building sites all across Australia. We know that a single project in Victoria had an extra $10 million worth of costs put on it because of the destructive impact of the CFMEU in that state. In a state that has lacklustre growth, such that we have, the last thing we need is a militant union coming in and making the cost of construction in our state worse than it is. If this happens, things will get worse and it will cost jobs here in South Australia.

Over the past few years, we have had the highest unemployment rate in the country, and a strong, vibrant, growing construction sector is a key way that we can turn South Australia around. Premier Weatherill needs to tell the new controllers of the SA branch of the union that they are not welcome here, to pack their bags and to go back to where they came from; if he does not, all South Australians will pay the price over coming years.