Despite the Construction Forestry Mining and Employees Union (CFMEU) administrator and the Master Builders Association threatening to charge workers, thousands of building workers marched on NSW Parliament on November 12.
They came out to demand that Labor’s new anti-CFMEU law be overturned.
The CFMEU has been forced into administration by the Fair Work (Registered Organisations) Amendment (Administration) Bill 2024, which the Australian Council of Trade Unions supported.
Brad Dunn, Maritime Union of Australia Sydney branch assistant secretary, chaired the rally.
Loukas Kakogiannis, from Retail and Fast Food Workers Union spoke first; followed by Jackie Moreira, a Meat Employees Union organiser; Chris Seet, Assistant Secretary of the NSW Plumbers Union; Allen Hicks, NSW secretary of the Electrical Trades Union; Abigail Boyd, Greens Member of the Legislative Council; Darren Greenfield, sacked CFMEU NSW Secretary; and Denis McNamara, sacked CFMEU delegate.
Hicks told the rally he was “proud” of those who turned up, despite a concerted intimidation campaign by the Master Builders Association. “Have a good look ’cause we’re not going anywhere.”
“You can threaten people with imprisonment; you can threaten them with taking their money off them, but you are not going to stop our democratic right to protest every single day of the week,” Hicks said.
He thanked the Greens for refusing to support the new law, which Labor only got over the line with the support of the Liberals and Nationals.
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“Let’s remind ourselves what the federal Labor government and Albanese had to do: they went and did a deal with the devil — the Liberal Party — to get this legislation up.”
Hicks said the Master Builders’ accusation that the CFMEU had been pressuring workers to turn up to the rally was “a crock of shit”.
Even with this “shit legislation”, Hicks said, “we are still a democratic country and we will fight every day of the week to turn up to political protests and have our say about bad legislation”.
“We will not stop until the evil law is repealed,” he added. The High Court will hear a challenge on December 10–11 from former CFMEU officers who were expelled under the new law.
Hicks urged “every single rank-and-file member of every trade union” to go to Canberra to support those officials when they walk into the High Court.
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Boyd told the rally that the anti-CFMEU law is “dangerous”, that it “will see people killed”, is “against international labour rights” and is “against everything that democracy stands for”.
She said in the middle of one of the “largest industrial build-outs of our time”, the industry lobbyists are “knocking on our doors” calling for corners to be cut, including “ripping up EBAs”.
She said Labor is putting out the red carpet for them, telling them they will “remove this obstacle to your profit”.
Boyd criticised NSW Labor for issuing more anti-protest laws. “They are trying to erode our democracy. Labor has turned its backs on workers and the union movement.”