In the autumn of 2022, two labour hire companies, BK and CCL, donated to the Victorian branch of the Australian Labor Party at the urging of the CFMEU.
Within weeks, the union had forced both firms onto the Gap Road level crossing project in Sunbury at the expense of their less expensive commercial rivals, who were promptly removed by the project’s major contractors at significant cost to Victorian taxpayers.
The apparent shoehorning by the CFMEU of the two firms onto the Gap Road project followed a relentless industrial campaign at the site by the union.
This campaign was detailed by the royal commission into the building industry on Monday in a prelude to two weeks of public hearings in which the key players from the site will presumably be called as witnesses (their identities are suppressed until they appear in the box).
But this commission is not merely probing the union’s use of militant industrial tactics and their lawfulness.
While there was no mention of the CFMEU- facilitated donations from BK and CCL to Labor in Monday’s hearing, it is highly likely they will be of interest to the commission as it investigates whether state government officials – either by direct actions, their failure to act or something in between – supported the construction union in its takeover of the Gap Road site.
The shadow of the Labor government’s relationship with the CFMEU loomed large over Monday’s hearing.
This elephant in the room made its presence felt when razor-sharp counsel assisting the inquiry, Chris Young, KC, read into evidence a confidential memo Gap Road contractor John Holland had prepared about the industrial relations operating environment in Victoria when Daniel Andrews was premier and Jacinta Allan the minister for the Big Build.
“It is worth noting the significance of the CFMEU’s relationship with the Andrews government in Victoria and the impact this is having and will have in the future with respect to client relationships with the Victorian government,” the memo states.
It also describes how the union movement played a “critical role” in the election of the government, organisationally and financially.
“The premier is factionally aligned with the Socialist Left, and the CFMEU is the key industrial organisation involved in that faction. We also understand that the CFMEU have unprecedented access to ministers and other key Victorian government stakeholders,” it reads.
The memo also flags that the CFMEU would likely have a “substantial amount of knowledge around proposed government tenders”.
This last statement goes to the heart of one of the allegations the commission will likely seek to unpack this week or next: whether, as The Age previously reported , the CFMEU threatened John Holland and its contracting partner CPB with losing a future tender on the Melbourne Airport Rail project if it didn’t agree to union demands at Gap Road.
It has also been previously revealed that John Holland and CPB believed the union had the imprimatur of the office of then-minister Jacinta Allan as the union escalated its Gap Road demands.
If the CFMEU was making threats to influence future Big Build tenders, it suggests some within union headquarters believed it could dictate not only which smaller subcontractors could win work on government sites, but which top players would become preferred Labor government contracting partners.
As the commission has already made evident, such demands cost the state dearly , although Victorians are many months away from finding out just how much they paid as the Big Build gradually fell under almost complete CFMEU control.
In noting that BK and CCL’s rates were between 15 and 80 per cent higher than those of the firms they replaced, Young commented that he did not know if these price hikes made their way into the pockets of ordinary union members.
What is obvious is that both BK and CCL secured potentially lucrative contracts at Gap Road they wouldn’t have otherwise obtained.
What business did a supposedly left-wing union have in filling the coffers of private companies?
BK isn’t just an ALP donor. The firm has extremely close ties to the Irish faction of the CFMEU.
BK closed its doors earlier this year after police raided its Port Melbourne offices as part of an investigation into suspect cash withdrawals made by it but criminally concealed in its formal accounts.
Another less well-known fact is that BK hired arguably Victoria’s most infamous bikie gang member turned-CFMEU figure, Joel Leavitt.
When The Age first revealed how the underworld had infiltrated the Big Build back in 2024, the union circulated a memo identifying Leavitt as among the CFMEU “Shop Stewards and Occupational Health and Safety Representatives who belong to or are associated with Outlaw Motorcycle Clubs”.
This document, aired at a Queensland inquiry, identified Leavitt’s one-time employer as BK Labour.
CCL, meanwhile, employed another notorious gang member turned CFMEU official, Johnny “Two Guns” Walker.
Answering the question of what role, if any, the Labor government played in the CFMEU’s Gap Road shenanigans, and whether this role ultimately led to taxpayer dollars going where they shouldn’t have, is the most essential work of the royal commission.
On Monday, Young forensically laid the groundwork to begin calling witnesses who will assist the commission in reaching that answer.
And all just weeks out from an election. Little wonder many stalking the halls of power at Spring Street are holding their breath.
You have reached your maximum number of saved items.
Remove items from your saved list to add more.
You've used all of your gift articles. 3 more will become available on the 1st of every month.
