WORLD WORLDWIDE AUSTRALIA MELBOURNE - (en) Australia, Melbourne, MACG: Defend the CFMEU (ca, de, fr, it, pt, tr)[machine translation]

 The attacks on the CFMEU have more to do with the interests of capital

than any organised crime within the union. ---- The capitalist media in
Australia have launched a massive propaganda attack on the Construction
& General Division of the Construction, Forestry & Maritime Employees
Union (CFMEU). Though initiated by Nine Entertainment, the battle has
been joined by all organs of the media, from the ABC to the Murdoch
gutter press. The capitalist class sees an opportunity to smash the
strongest union in the country and drive down wages for the best paid
section of the working class, with inevitable flow on effects for all
workers. This is class war.

Grainy footage leaked by the cops and a handful of workplace delegates
who are former bikies have been woven up to create a story of a
thoroughly corrupt union. We'll be honest - there are corrupt union
officials, and they should be disposed of. Any official who takes a
bribe should have a black mark against their name for eternity. But the
attacks on the CFMEU are not about union corruption, they are about
breaking the wages and conditions of construction workers. Governments
have been happy to let developers rip vast sums off buyers in high-rise
residential towers that were never fit for habitation and allow
standover merchants to settle disputes between contractors, so they
can't be believed when they say they want to root corruption out of the
CFMEU.

It is the job of members to organise against corruption in the union
movement and root it out. "Unions" like Shop Distributive and Allied
(the SDA) routinely collude with big business to hold down the wages of
retail and fast food workers.

The Australian Workers Union (AWU) undermines wages and safety in civil
construction, cleaning, road works and more. The ACTU and ALP affiliated
unions routinely put the electoral interests of the ALP ahead of workers.

The CFMEU's real crime is that they have achieved a de facto closed shop
over the state government's "Big Build" and much of the city's high rise
development. In theory, the AWU have coverage over civil construction,
but the CFMEU drove them out by delivering much better wages and
conditions. This is a good thing. ACTU coverage rules allow Australia's
Worst Union to operate by undercutting wages and safety conditions in
order to get preferential treatment from the bosses. When the capitalist
press says "we all pay" for the CFMEU, what they mean is that
construction workers wages should be lower.

Image by Leonard J Matthews
The last Liberal government launched a Royal Commission into Trade Union
Corruption, targeted squarely at the CFMEU. No substantive prosecutions
resulted. They re-established the Australian Building and Construction
Commission (ABCC), tasked with fining the CFMEU out of existence. They
did not succeed. They passed laws to enable the Fair Work Commission to
place unions into administration, but they didn't dare use them.

The Labor government, ever keen to demonstrate their reliability to
capital, has now moved to crush the CFMEU. In less than a week, Albanese
has moved to do what the Liberals never could.

The Federal Labor government has asked the Fair Work Commission to apply
to the Federal Court to place branches of the CFMEU into external
administration. An administrator would be able to act as the union,
taking over its assets, firing union staff, purging members, removing
delegates, and ousting officials.

But the real prize of administration is the ability to rip up Enterprise
Agreements (EBAs). Labor have made clear they are prepared to pass
special legislation to give any administrator "full powers" to "act in
the public interest". An administrator appointed by the Fair Work
Commission, acting as the union, will have little trouble applying to
the Commission to terminate union agreements and drive union members
down to the award (industry specific minimum pay and conditions) -
which, in construction, is vastly below industry standards.

Stay in touch!

Government administration of a union is an affront to the very concept
of unionism. Workers build unions in order to build their collective
strength, and coordinate their collective action. We fight to defend
unions as organisations built by workers, consisting of workers, and
democratically controlled by workers. In the face of union corruption,
we have to organise and overthrow corrupt or self interested officials.
The only people who should be "cleaning the house" are union members.

The ALP is historically a party of the trade union bureaucracy. Through
the ALP, the trade union bureaucracy attempts to negotiate a compromise
with capital on the overall management of capitalism in Australia. In
2021-2024 the CFMEU gave $4.3 million to the ALP, stumping up a sizeable
portion of the funding to get Anthony Albanese elected. Albanese and the
ALP are now moving to destroy the CFMEU. There is a lesson in this. The
interests of individual union leadership (let alone any group of
workers) will always come second to the collective interest the ALP has
in perpetuating its own position as a party of government within
Australian capitalism.

The treacherous nature of the trade union bureaucracy can be seen in the
actions of the ACTU. Faced with a frontal assault on the principles of
trade unionism, Sally McManus and the ACTU executive demanded that "the
leadership of the CFMEU ... support the appointment of an independent
and external administrator and to cooperate with such an
administration". CFMEU representatives on ACTU executive were not even
permitted to argue against the motion!

Far from supporting a government administrator, the members of the CFMEU
should fight it with every tool at their disposal and call on their
officials to follow them. There should be a campaign of complete
non-cooperation with any government appointed administrator. The hard
won pay, conditions and strength of tens of thousands of construction
workers is at stake today and that of the rest of us tomorrow.

Sally McManus said she could count the unions opposing the CFMEU's
suspension on one hand. It's up to the rank and file of every union to
make sure that number grows. Members of every union must organise in
solidarity with construction workers and their union.

https://melbacg.au/defend-the-cfmeu/
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