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AUSTRALIA
Judge slams ABCC

18 October 2008

The Queensland Plumbers Union says the Australian Building and Construction Commission (ABCC) is a gross waste of taxpayers’ [money] and called for it to be scrapped after a case against the union was thrown out of court.

The union said ABCC Queensland manager Wayne Jenkinson and ABCC investigator Steve Lovewell should be dismissed for wasting taxpayers’ money and public time.

Federal Court judge, Justice Spender, stated in his judgement on October 8, “The case … was misconceived, was completely without merit and should not have been brought.”

State secretary of the Plumbers and Gasfitters Employees Union of Australia, Bradley O’Carroll, said the case showed how the ABCC protects big business and property developers.

“The union was standing up for workers who were being scammed by Gold Coast plumbing company Underground. But the ABCC came after us. Even Judge Spender pointed out that if the ABCC was even handed, charges should have been brought against the company.”

The case related to a union meeting in 2007 at Rap Civic Southport Central Construction Site. The union was called in by site workers after they had not been paid their super or redundancy as agreed in their collective agreement.

“This is a victory for the union movement and for rights on site. The government needs to realise the game is up, and move to abolish this overtly political attack dog of the failed Howard Government”, said O’Carroll.

[Abridged from LaborNET. Visit http://www.labor.net.au/news.]