Renee Coffey (Griffith, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

Unions have long been one of the most important forces for fairness and safety in Australian workplaces. They've fought for rights many take for granted now—the weekend, paid leave, safer work sites and fair pay. When unions work as they should, they give workers a voice, uphold dignity and protect lives, because every worker deserves to go home safe at the end of the day. So much of the work done in our construction industry is inherently dangerous. Every day workers, often young and often vulnerable, put their health and safety on the line to build the infrastructure our communities rely on—roads, hospitals and housing. It's hard, risky work, and these workers deserve to be paid fairly and treated with respect. Employers have a duty of care to keep their workers safe, not just because the law says so but because it's the right thing to do. Families should never have to worry about whether their loved ones will make it home from work.

Close to my community of Griffith, we've seen the heartbreaking consequences when those protections fail. In 2023, 29-year-old worker Daniel Sa'u lost his life when temperatures reached a sweltering 36.1 degrees Celsius while working on the Cross River Rail site in Moorooka. His wife described Daniel as a wonderful father to their three children, a loving son and someone deeply missed by all who knew him. And earlier that same year ,17-year-old Tyler Whitton was placed in an induced coma and died the next day after a fall at a construction site in West End. He had been working for just three months before he died, and he was so proud to be able to help support his family. Tyler's grandfather wrote of his beloved beautiful grandson that 'words cannot describe the pain and complete numbness we are all experiencing, knowing that we needed to let him go'. These tragedies show the real and ever-present risks faced by construction workers. They deserve safe workplaces, proper protections and the confidence that their employers are looking out for them. Every worker in Australia deserves that.

Last year, Australian investigative journalists exposed horrific practices in parts of the construction industry, alleged links to organised crime, misuse of union roles, as well as reports of violence, intimidation and misogyny. Criminality has no place in the union movement. Workers deserve a union they can trust and be proud of. When I knocked on almost 15,000 doors during the last campaign, I can tell you the CFMEU was raised with me every single day. Deputy Speaker Haines, I will leave it to you to surmise why that was. My community made it very clear to me they do not support corruption and criminality. They do not support standover tactics, bullying and sexual harassment. They do not support intimidation or abuse of power. Those behaviours have no place in any workplace, not in construction, not anywhere. In thousands of conversations across Griffith, I consistently heard people want representatives who stand up against thuggery and corruption, not stand on the same stage as it.

The Albanese government has been clear from the outset that there is no place for criminality, bullying, thuggery and intimidation in any workplace, including in the construction industry. The construction division of the CFMEU clearly failed to act in the best interests of its members and urgent action was needed, which the Albanese Labor government has delivered. We could not stand by and allow a once-proud union to be infiltrated by bikies and organised crime, or have bullying and thuggery part of its day-to-day business.

These problems did not appear overnight. They were deeply embedded and decades in the making, and we are determined to clean them up, which was why the construction division of CFMEU was placed under administration. Already, the administration has achieved more progress in 15 months than the former coalition government's failed and discredited ABCC managed in an decade. More than 60 staff have been removed or resigned, a new national code of conduct is in place, a clear statement of expectations now sets out where the union stands on gifts, organised crime and menacing behaviour, and what the consequences are for crossing that line. Investigations are ongoing into state branches, financial misconduct and cultural failings. The work is challenging, detailed and essential to restoring integrity in the sector, because all workers deserve unions that represent them honestly and protect them fearlessly, not ones that exploit or intimidate them.

Employers, contractors, unions all have a role to make this industry safe, fair and productive. That is why we have established the national construction industry forum to bring together unions, business and government around one table. We will keep doing the work with law enforcement regulators and people across the country to return construction to what should be—a sector where workers like those in our community can feel safe, respected and supported. That's the standard my community expects, it is the standard I expect and it is the standard this government is committed to delivering.

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