Administration’s control of the CFMEU ratcheted up further in November with Zach Smith, the Victorian Branch Executive Officer, putting all 30 Victorian organisers’ jobs on the line.
Eleven organisers have now left, some reluctantly.
According to media reports, Smith told CFMEU delegates that, “The Administration, in my view, is going to move far more ruthlessly than ever before.” Omitting to say he is part of Administration.
Administrator Mark Irving has already purged organisers in the Queensland, NSW and SA branches.
Admin is systematically sacking organisers to remove anyone employed by the former democratically-elected officials.
It wants compliant organisers, loyal to the Administration, who won’t challenge the anti-union laws of the Fair Work Commission or stand up for the right to strike. Irving wants to make sure that no one associated with the old CFMEU, or its militant traditions, are around to challenge the Administration, or contest elections after Administration ends.
At the Queensland LNP government’s Commission of Inquiry, Irving said he is considering expelling a shopping list of removed officials, organisers and delegates, to eliminate them from the unionised construction industry.
The purge has even extended to office employees. An ACT branch employee was recently sacked when they refused to sign an “Agreement” pledging absolute loyalty to Admin.
Irving and Smith’s purge in Victoria comes in response to a media offensive claiming the Admin is failing to tackle corruption.
Smith, on $376,000 a year, is hoping this will save his skin after media exposure of his decisions as an Administration employee.
These included sending an organiser to meet alleged organised crime figure Mick Gatto to discuss an industrial dispute.
Smith had also appointed a long-term organiser, John Perkovic, to his new Victorian leadership team as a “co-ordinator”, to curry favour with delegates and members loyal to the old elected leadership around John Setka.
Perkovic had corruption allegations hanging over him dating back many years. A Victorian delegate appointed as an organiser in Sydney by the Admin had also allegedly previously assaulted a CFMEU official.
Once the media got a hold of this, Irving was quick to force the two to resign.
Former NSW Secretary Darren Greenfield and his son Michael Greenfield were recently jailed for taking bribes, although their charges date back years prior to Admin.
But 16 months on from the hysterical media claims about the union’s “massive infiltration by bikie gangs” no charges have resulted.
Far more evidence has come to light about building contractors either run by crime gangs or using organised crime than about bikie gangs in the union.
Earlier this year, The Age reported that at least seven fire bombings of construction companies in Victoria over the past two years were linked to a bikie gang.
In October, the paper revealed that three men, including the son of a Grocon executive, had been charged over trying to extort $6.6 million from a construction company.
Without a hint of irony, Irving admitted there was a problem where, “Employers in construction continue to use organised crime figures and outlaw motorcycle gangs representatives in the industrial relations system.”
Dissent
The Administration is using authoritarian measures against anyone who stands up to it.
In late October, Admin phoned Ralph Edwards, a former president of the Victorian branch before Administration, to inform him he was “banned” from the union office, where monthly branch meetings take place.
Edwards’ “crime” was to be a trustee of a long-running CFMEU fighting fund, which Irving could not get his grubby hands on.
For over 20 years, the fund grew from donations by members to campaign in union elections, not through funds from the union.
Irving wants to stop any challengers in future union elections having access to those funds against his “preferred leadership”, when the union leaves Administration.
Edwards defied the Admin order by attending the October branch meeting. While he is a retired member Admin could still expel him from the union. A motion condemning Admin for “banning” Ralph and reaffirming his right to attend branch meetings was passed unanimously by 170 members and delegates.
Yet days later Smith told a mass delegates’ meeting that CFMEU members had to “understand the Administration is NOT the enemy”.
Currently, a strike at CSR’s Gyprock plant in Melbourne is another test of whether the union can operate effectively under Administration.
CFMEU members at the plant walked out on strike in mid-November for a 4 per cent pay rise.
If CSR takes a hard line Admin’s meek compliance with Fair Work laws will undermine an effective picket line.
Rank-and-file organisation, independent of Smith and Administration, will be key to maintaining the CFMEU as a militant, fighting union.
By Tom Orsag
