The Senate has rejected an Abbott government push to resurrect the Australian Building and Construction Commission, a Howard-era industry watchdog which enjoyed extraordinary powers but was scrapped by the Labor government in 2012.
The body was established in the wake of the Cole Royal Commission, which found in 2003, at the time Tony Abbott was Workplace Relations Minister, that the building and construction industry was plagued by a culture of lawlessness and intimidation.
The resulting Australian Building and Construction Commission was granted extraordinary powers, including powers to interrogate workers and union officials who were denied the right to silence, and was billed as the tough cop on the beat needed to bring the construction industry to heel.
It also isolated building and construction workers by allowing for higher penalties purely by virtue of the industry workers were employed in and broadened the range of circumstances which would attract penalties.
Earlier today Labor teamed up with the Greens and key crossbenchers to prevent the Abbott Government from exhuming the body, which would have forced construction industry participants to adhere to a ‘Building Code’ to be drawn up by the minister.
The decision has been welcomed by the Construction, Forestry, Mining and Energy Union, with National Construction Division Secretary Dave Noonan slamming the legislation as “undemocratic and unnecessary”.
“There are industrial laws that cover all workers in Australia, and construction workers should not be subject to different laws,” Noonan said.
Opposition Employment Spokesperson Brendan O’Connor agreed, arguing that “the ABCC has powers that are excessive, undemocratic and unwarranted in terms of regulating civil laws”.
“Any allegation of serious crime that happens in the workplace by an employer, by an employee, or their representatives, should be investigated by crime-fighting agencies,” O’Connor said.
Labor, the CFMEU and the Greens all dismissed the Abbott government’s push to bring back the industry watchdog as one part of a broader industrial relations stance widely seen as punitive and anti-worker.
Noonan said the union was happy to work with all comers, including the Abbott Government, so long as it drops its “divisive and biased approach” and instead starts to “work in the interests of the workers and businesses who make a living in the construction industry”.
But Employment Minister Eric Abetz said the government will seek to re-engage key crossbenchers in an effort to see the legislation through the Senate, claiming that “no objective observer can deny there is an endemic problem of industrial unlawfulness in this industry”.
Abetz said that “the litany of court judgements and fines against the CFMEU for repeated and unrepentant breaches of the law” provided proof that issues identified by the Cole Royal Commission more than a decade ago persist.
“Since 2005, the courts have imposed fines of over $6.1 million on CFMEU-related unions and officials for proven breaches of the law,” Abetz said.
“This has not been enough to deter the CFMEU from repeated breaches of industrial laws; the current system is simply not strong enough to be effective.”
Abetz accused Senators who voted against the government’s Bill of “choosing to overlook the rampant unlawfulness in the construction industry” and suggested donations from unions to the Labor Party and the Greens may have influenced their decision-making.
However, in a submission to government last year the Australian Law Council raised concerns — similar to those of the Greens, CFMEU and Labor — over the fact that the ABCC inherently involved flouting fundamental principles of justice.
“… even from a preliminary consideration of the [Bill], it is clear that a number of features of the Bill are contrary to rule of law principles and traditional common law rights and privileges such as those relating to the burden of proof, the privilege against self incrimination, the right to silence, freedom from retrospective laws and the delegation of law making power to the executive,” the submission reads.
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Dx2013
Posted Tuesday, August 18, 2015 - 01:31
Greens has sided with Labor in voting down the re-establishment of ABCC because Greens has accepted large amount donation from the trade unions.
Greens should not pretend that it is purer than others.
Watching Q&A tonight, Greens leader Di Natalie's language was shocking. Greens leftists' true characteristics were revealed - they are intolerant, suppressive and hateful.
jexpat
Posted Tuesday, August 18, 2015 - 02:14
Dx2013 reminds me of someone who frequents the American site that even some US Republicans of late have taken to calling "World Nut Daily."
Suffice to say, his post is, err... "factually challenged."
This user is a New Matilda supporter. Mercurial
Posted Tuesday, August 18, 2015 - 10:32
Not to mention gramatically challenged, jexpat.
This user is a New Matilda supporter. nobody456
Posted Tuesday, August 18, 2015 - 12:05
Abetz should lead by example. He should test the rules he wants to apply to unions on his Corporate mates and see what happens.
corvusboreus
Posted Tuesday, August 18, 2015 - 12:34
jexpat,
It routinely slings factless sledges, and never answers refutations.
Not really worth reading or responding to.
corvusboreus
Posted Tuesday, August 18, 2015 - 13:49
Someone in the senate should raise a motion for a federal ICAC again.
That would be an Independent Commission Against Corruption, a form of commission which is demonstrably non-partisan (universally applied), wide in scope and has real powers of subpoena and potential for referral for prosecution.
There are a whole new bunch of senators since the LIB/LAB/NATs voted down the last attempt to investigate corruption in and around federal politics (I do wonder why they are all so loathe to open their lockers for inspection).
Even if the old-boys' club voted such a motion down again, it would at least illuminate where the 'libertarians', motor-enthusiasts and newly liberated PUPs stood in terms of transparency, accountability and basic integrity of conduct.
Enough of these partisan 'royal commissions', there should be an independent spotlight put on all parliamentary perfidities and surrounding skullduggeries.
Federal ICAC now.
This user is a New Matilda supporter. boganbludging
Posted Tuesday, August 18, 2015 - 14:13
Abetz case and hence his real bosses case, the elephant in the room, that of increasing the power of corrupt corporates, is all the more falling apart, now that Abbott's pet projects, the RC into unions and more coal mining, are falling apart, real popcorn moments, watching this chaotic sycophantic clown show lose.
This user is a New Matilda supporter. aussiegreg
Posted Tuesday, August 18, 2015 - 20:25
Be careful what you wish for!
I have said elsewhere on these boards, back when the new Senate proved not to be as supportive of government policy as most commentators assumed, that Abbott would look to a double dissolution on the issue of industrial lawlessness in the first half of 2016.
He now has the first trigger for just such an election, although the electoral impact of the Dyson Heydon Royal commission will be much reduced by the "Liberal fundraiser" smear.
There are a growing number of people who, like me, have personal experience that contradicts the fairy stories we get from articles like this one about how it is all sweetness and light on Australian building sites (unless the employers are deliberately endangering their workers, using slave labour, chinks etc). Many of them, like me, have been the victims of criminal threats which the police ignore because they believe industrial relations matters should be sorted out in the industrial relations arena.
Somehow the thugs and stand-over merchants of the building unions are seen as saints through the rose-coloured glasses of articles like this one, but I suspect the Australian electorate may prove rather more clear-eyed.
I would hope for the sake of the natural environment that Abbott loses, but if he wins it will not be the fault of the usual suspects on these boards, the miners and Murdoch, but rather of those who voted down this legislation in the Senate, and of their cheer squad in the media.
This user is a New Matilda supporter. boganbludging
Posted Wednesday, August 19, 2015 - 09:54
@aussiegreg
A thug is still a thug whether on a construction site or an office.
It's definetly not sweetness and light working construction or many office work places, I've seen too, power trippers are legion and everywhere.
I could tell you stories of the variety of building sites I've worked on, as construction is my main work load and can tell you, only once I ever felt threatened, I was part of a contract group, in a crib hut, cornered by a union mob, the issue was quickly resolved and no residual problems, we overstepped an unknown line and were pulled into line.
I've seen a lot more individual harassment and management harassment by power trippers than anything else, the scum definetly floats to the top of many companies and i think the union needs to play hard ball to deal with these corporate scum bags.
I think your letting your own personal case, probably from long past, blind you, just what Abbott and Cohorts would want, they don't want you to see the much bigger picture, of corporate corruption they want you to concentrate on a microscopic view, while they divide and conquer the unions and create slave labour, as if we aren't already, in the main, wages slaves to the banksters.
The bigger picture of corporate thuggery, is the thugs in suits, the Abbott government.
Just looking at them should tell you this and their actions prove it.