While the Federal Government has been returned, uncertainty remains over whether it will get its Australian Building and Construction Commission (ABCC) legislation through the new and untried Senate. Its failure to do so previously was a trigger for the election.<\/p>\n
The Government\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s stated aim for restoring the ABCC includes combating unlawful and corrupt activity within the construction industry \u00e2\u20ac\u201c particularly involving the Construction, Forestry, Mining and Energy Union (CFMEU).<\/p>\n
In an article in the latest issue of Workplace Review<\/a><\/em>\u00c2\u00a0(Winter 2016, Vol 7 No 2<\/a>), Rita Mallia, NSW Branch President of the CFMEU, tackles the allegations against the CFMEU head on.<\/p>\n She argues that the Government\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s real agenda is \u00e2\u20ac\u0153to curtail the industrial power of the CFMEU and weaken the union movement\u00e2\u20ac\u009d, while treating \u00e2\u20ac\u0153corporate \u00e2\u20ac\u02dclawlessness\u00e2\u20ac\u2122\u00e2\u20ac\u009d with laxity.\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0 Ms Mallia says industry regulators fail to pursue employers over safety breaches, the improper winding up of companies to avoid payment of debts, and the non-payment of $137 million annually in wages and superannuation in the construction industry.<\/p>\n She\u00c2\u00a0argues that restoration of the ABCC with strengthened industry policing powers threatens \u00e2\u20ac\u0153a gross erosion of civil liberties\u00e2\u20ac\u009d. Specific measures she identifies, include denying construction workers the right to silence and to legal representation of their own choice, and compelling them to produce documents or information relevant to an investigation. She notes concerns expressed by the Law Council of Australia about the ABCC legislation, including in relation to the burden of proof and the privilege against self-incrimination.<\/p>\n For Rita Mallia, there is even more at stake in the dangerous construction industry which can experience scores of fatalities in a year. Hindering the CFMEU from taking industrial action over safety issues in the workplace, including with the possibility of it incurring $180,000 fines, could potentially put workers\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 lives at risk.<\/p>\n However, \u00e2\u20ac\u0153while our members\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 safety and lives are at stake,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d says Ms Mallia, \u00e2\u20ac\u0153the CFMEU and its members will continue to take action to have improved safety on site.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<\/p>\n If you want to keep up-to-date with the people, practice, cases and trends that are making news in workplace relations, you can get your copy of\u00c2\u00a0Workplace Review\u00c2\u00a0<\/em>here<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n Workplace Review<\/em>\u00c2\u00a0articles are available on request by\u00c2\u00a0completing the\u00c2\u00a0Individual Article Sale<\/a>\u00c2\u00a0order form\u00c2\u00a0and emailing it to\u00c2\u00a0tlranz.journal.orders@thomsonreuters.com<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" While the Federal Government has been returned, uncertainty remains over whether it will get its Australian Building and Construction Commission (ABCC) legislation through the new and untried Senate. Its failure to do so previously was a trigger for the election. The Government\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s stated aim for restoring the ABCC includes combating unlawful and corrupt activity within […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":19,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[38,161],"tags":[8407,8217,2858,8220,8408,7750,8224,8409,8410,1939,8411,8412],"class_list":["post-8738","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-journals","category-workplace-review","tag-erosion-of-civil-liberties","tag-abcc","tag-cfmeu","tag-corporate-lawlessness","tag-fatalities","tag-law-council-of-australia","tag-rita-mallia","tag-safety-breaches","tag-senate","tag-superannuation","tag-unlawful-and-corrupt-activity","tag-workers-lives"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.thomsonreuters.com.au\/journals\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8738","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.thomsonreuters.com.au\/journals\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.thomsonreuters.com.au\/journals\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.thomsonreuters.com.au\/journals\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/19"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.thomsonreuters.com.au\/journals\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8738"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/sites.thomsonreuters.com.au\/journals\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8738\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.thomsonreuters.com.au\/journals\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8738"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.thomsonreuters.com.au\/journals\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8738"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.thomsonreuters.com.au\/journals\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8738"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}