Corruption and criminality in the CFMEU didn’t start during the time of John Setka’s reign. The 1986 deregistration of Norm Gallagher’s Builders Labourers Federation (BLF) is probably the starting point. They were deregistered by the Hawke government because of their industrial recklessness,thuggery and corruption.
Gallagher was jailed for taking kickbacks from developers to build his beach house. His union used extensive industrial action to get the big construction companies to influence the government to release him. Not exactly how our judicial system works.
When the BLF was deregistered,other building unions recruited tens of thousands of BLF members in NSW,Victoria and the ACT. In the early 1990s,the building unions formed the new super union,the CFMEU.
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As part of that process,the federal industrial relations minister,Peter Cook,was keen for the non-deregistered BLF branches in Western Australia,South Australia,Queensland and Tasmania to join the new union. A sticking point was what to do about some former BLF officials from Victoria. The BLF branches and Cook were keen for the CFMEU leaders to let them in. Protracted negotiations,which I participated in,led to former Victorian official John Cummins coming onto the books of the CFMEU.
Agreement could not be reached about a young Setka because of his past behaviour. History shows that within 18 months,Cummins secured Setka a job in the Victorian CFMEU.