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Speaker 1: Now the CFMU is in the news and this morning

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Speaker 1: the National Executive held an emergency meeting deciding the National

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Speaker 1: Office will assume all senior executive powers following allegations of corruption,

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Speaker 1: violence and extortion in the Victorian branch. Here in Essay,

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Speaker 1: the Premier is asked Essay Police has ordered Essay Police

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Speaker 1: to investigate any possible links between the union and biking gangs.

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Speaker 1: And this comes in the wake of John Setker's resignation

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Speaker 1: as chief of the Union. Rex Patrick Formeressay Senator was

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Speaker 1: shepherding through Parliament and a piece of legislation called the

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Speaker 1: Insuring Integrity Bill and sadly it failed to pass. He's

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Speaker 1: on the line, Rex Patrick, good morning, Good morning that

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Speaker 1: what would you legislation have done well?

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Speaker 2: The legislation would have allowed for the Federal government to

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Speaker 2: either de register a union editor or to the registered

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Speaker 2: union officials. Now, it was a controversial bill that was

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Speaker 2: first brought into the Parliament because there were fears and

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Speaker 2: there were political fears that the government of the day

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Speaker 2: would use the powers to basically shut down union unions

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Speaker 2: who were engaging in lawful conduct to protect their members.

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Speaker 2: And so I spent numerous hours I can remember being

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Speaker 2: in Parliament House with Michelle O'Neill and other union reps

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Speaker 2: trying to find a pathway to broker changes to the

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Speaker 2: legislation and ultimately we got there. And what we did

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Speaker 2: was we organized that the government agree to have a

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Speaker 2: bill whereby it was a little bit like licensed to

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Speaker 2: merit points, where in order for court action to be

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Speaker 2: taken to de registery union or an official, there had

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Speaker 2: to be a series of events that took place, a

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Speaker 2: series of demerit points lost. It was a paperwork error,

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Speaker 2: it was a very small number of demerit points, it

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Speaker 2: was some sort of other offense. Then it was many

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Speaker 2: more points. And the whole point of that arrangement was

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Speaker 2: to only target unions that were sort of conducting business

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Speaker 2: in a way that was inappropriate. As we're now seen

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Speaker 2: in terms of the allegations that have been made against

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Speaker 2: the CFMU.

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Speaker 1: There are calls for the union to be de registered.

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Speaker 1: Certainly the Australian Industry Group is saying that establish a

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Speaker 1: judicial inquiry or royal commission into the union's activities should

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Speaker 1: that happen.

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Speaker 2: Look, I don't think that will happen. The majority of

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Speaker 2: union and are very good unions they protect workers. They

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Speaker 2: do a fantastic job for workers. This is a union

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Speaker 2: that is the Road Union. And my understanding now is

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Speaker 2: that matters will be referred to I back in Victoria

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Speaker 2: and indeed too the Victorian Police, and that's probably appropriate.

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Speaker 2: There's there's a move you know, the CFMU has basically

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Speaker 2: responded to allegations to be made by in effect entering

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Speaker 2: into administration. I suspect the registration is the appropriate course.

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Speaker 2: I think there's probably a lot of wrong things going

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Speaker 2: on and that in that union and they sully the

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Speaker 2: name of other unions, and it probably does need to

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Speaker 2: be deregistered and a new union formed that will behave

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Speaker 2: in a manner that that that's proper. One of the

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Speaker 2: big problems of the reason AI group and people like

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Speaker 2: the Masters Master Builders. You know, I've struggled for years

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Speaker 2: and years and years with the CFMU is because it

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Speaker 2: just it's caused a massive increase in costs in terms

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Speaker 2: of any buildings that take that have been sort of

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Speaker 2: taking place in Victoria, and there was a risk that

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Speaker 2: that would then flow around the country and you know

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Speaker 2: that also involved productivity concerns. But we could have had

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Speaker 2: legislation in place that was sensible. I remember the day

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Speaker 2: the vote took place in the Senate. Atis Corman was

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Speaker 2: the was the leader of the government in the Senate

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Speaker 2: and thought he had the numbers to get it through,

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Speaker 2: and Pauline Hanson walked into the chamber and sat on

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Speaker 2: the other side of the chamber in contrast to what

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Speaker 2: she'd committed to do with with Matis Corman. So in

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Speaker 2: the end the bill didn't get up. The government then

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Speaker 2: reintroduced it, but never never dealt with it from there.

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Speaker 1: Thereafter the BLF was of course famously deregistered. What the

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Speaker 1: best part of forty years ago, I suppose now in

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Speaker 1: my recollection it was the Hawt government that was involved there. Yeah.

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Speaker 2: Look, and now we've got two labor governments involved. We've

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Speaker 2: got the Albanezy government and of course the Victorian government,

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Speaker 2: which is also a labor government. And maybe in some

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Speaker 2: sense that's more palatable because the moment a liberal government

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Speaker 2: tries to do that, all sorts of thoughts are conjured

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Speaker 2: up about destroying unions, and of course we can't do that.

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Speaker 2: Unions do have a place in our workforce.

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Speaker 1: What about here in Essa, I mean, it's concerning the

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Speaker 1: premier's got to ask police to investigate any links to

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Speaker 1: organized crimes within a union operating here. Yeah.

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Speaker 2: Look, I don't know if the CFMU has done anything

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Speaker 2: untoward here, but what I will say is that if

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Speaker 2: you've got a sister organization that is engaging in that

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Speaker 2: sort of conduct, in a leged unlawful conduct, then there's

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Speaker 2: some chance that the methods that were used successfully in

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Speaker 2: Victoria to get the best possible conditions for their workforce

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Speaker 2: might have been adopted here. Now, again, I've been very

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Speaker 2: careful to say we've got to give the safe and

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Speaker 2: the U here the benefit of the doubt, but I

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Speaker 2: think an investigation here is also appropriate.

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Speaker 1: Well, it can't hurt, can it. That's the end of

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Speaker 1: the day. There's no wrongdoing. There's no wrongdoing, and that's good.

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Speaker 1: But if there is, well an investigation, we'll hopefully get

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Speaker 1: to the bottom of it. Rex, appreciate your time, no problem,

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Speaker 1: Thank you. Rex Patrick, former Senator