Michaelia Cash (WA, Liberal Party, Minister for Women) Share this | Hansard source

In answer to Senator O'Sullivan's question: yes, I am, and yes, they do. Whilst I answer this question, perhaps those on the other side might just want to pause for a moment and think, 'What if it were my son or daughter that Senator Cash was referring to when she read out the evidence in relation to the answers to this question?'

If my son or daughter were being spoken to in this way in the workplace, I can almost assure them I would be up and condemning the employer and asking for action to be taken.

The Federal Court found that, at the Common Ground project in Brisbane, CFMEU official Paul Cradden said to a member of Grocon staff, 'I think you'd know better than to go against the unions,' and, 'You know when all this [expletive] is over, it's just beginning for you then isn't it, the union covers the whole of [expletive] Australia.' The court also found what Mr Cradden told a subcontractor who asked, 'What are the consequences to my business if I bring my boys on site?' One would think that is a legitimate question to ask. This is what Mr Cradden told the subcontractor: 'You want to know what the consequences are? You would be committing industrial suicide.' In a penalty judgment, the Federal Court said that 'there can be no doubt' the CFMEU’s behaviour in this case:

… was neither unique to that site or to those times. Rather, it displayed a paradigm example of behaviour described by the Honourable Terence Cole … in the Final Report of the Royal Commission into the Building and Construction Industry.

Yet those opposite would still have us believe that there is no unique culture of lawlessness within the construction sector in Australia.