Michael Keenan (Stirling, Liberal Party, Minister for Justice) Share this | Hansard source

I thank the member for Bowman for his question. The Royal Commission into Trade Union Governance and Corruption found one thing very clearly after its 21-month investigation, and that was that there is widespread lawlessness amongst some in the union movement. The new secretary of the ACTU, Sally McManus, confirmed that on her first day in the job, when she said it was all right for unionists to break laws that they did not agree with. When that happened the member for Moreton and the member for Batman took to Twitter to claim that that made her a cross between Rosa Parks and Martin Luther King!

This government is not prepared to stand by and watch lawbreaking from any section of Australian society. You need to look no further than the state secretary of the CFMEU in Victoria, John Setka. He heads up the CFMEU—the bikie wing of the union movement. He has been charged and convicted in relation to 40 separate charges—five times for assault, seven times for wilful trespass, five times for resisting arrest and five times for assaulting police. Where did we last see John Setka? In 2016 at Bill Shorten's election night party.

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