Sacking of CFMEU rank and file reps a wake-up call for all workers

Written by: Ned K. on 28 August 2024

(Above: CFMEU members take to the streets in Melbourne)

The new industrial laws enabling the CFMEU to be put in control of an Administrator are a wake-up call for all Unions and all workers.

On the first day of his new job, the Administrator sacked over 200 elected construction worker union representatives, most of whom are workers, not Union Officials.

A few weeks earlier, industrial Awards and the Fair Work Act included Delegate Rights to be inserted in Awards and to apply as a minimum standard in enterprise agreements.

The Delegate Rights were hailed by the federal government as evidence of its support for democracy for workers in their workplaces. They now had the right to elect their workplace Union representative. Many workers support the new Delegate Rights as a step towards organizing in their workplace and across whole industries and sectors of the economy.

Many must now be thinking the new Delegate Rights will be at risk, along with their whole Union, if the employers and their governments think workers' leadership on the job and collective strength is getting too powerful.

Workers are getting the government's message loud and clear - "You can have your Union, but we and the employers hold the upper hand. We can appoint an Administrator and prevent all your active workplace Delegates from being on committees of management or councils of the Union ".

It is true that bosses have always tried to terminate workers' leaders in workplaces who are effective and who cannot be "bought off" or moved out of harm's way to some isolated position in the workplace. However, the new industrial laws aimed initially at construction workers take the armoury of laws and measures aimed at diluting or destroying the collective bourgeois legal rights to another level.

The new laws are showing workers the limitations of official Union organizational structures, even at the workplace level where workers elect their own Delegates. The current situation for CFMEU members is that while they may still have a Delegate in their workplace, the official organization of the Union across worksites and the whole country is now dismantled. 

The rallies held by CFMEU members and supporters on Tuesday 27 August in capital cities showed that construction workers are determined to remain united as CFMEU members. They will find appropriate ways to organize to protect pay and conditions.

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