PERTH — Green Left Weekly's ANTHONY BENBOW spoke with the state secretary of the Construction, Forestry, Mining and Energy Union, Bill Ethel; opposition ticket member Joe McDonald; and the Builders Labourers, Painters and Plasterers Union state secretary, Kevin Reynolds, about the CFMEU elections currently under way in WA.
Question: What led to the split in the WA CFMEU leadership?
McDonald: We have no proper representation on sites and our membership has declined drastically. Members are fed up with not being serviced. Our ticket has been called the "right wing" but we're not racist or sexist or homophobic — we have to get the union back to the "bread and butter issues", servicing members. In the past few years Ethel has been working for the union in the east, not doing the job here.
Question: What approach should be taken to better organise the construction industry?
McDonald: We need one big union. We have to integrate with the other main construction union, the BLPPU. This will be an integration with dignity. We will still have a voice in this one big union. We are not calling any shots at the moment anyway. The good conditions on city sites were won by the BLPPU, and we just pick them up.
Question: What is your attitude to ALP affiliation?
McDonald: We haven't given it much thought. There are mixed feelings amongst the membership. The ALP has made some changes in the last nine months, so re-affiliation is not something we'd rule out. We want to take all decisions like this to the membership and let them make the decision.
Question: You've described the anti-nuclear and Swan Brewery campaigns as "yuppie issues". Don't they also affect working people and wouldn't you recommend a point of view to the members?
McDonald: We have to get the union back on track first. These issues are secondary to servicing members, who care most about what happens on building sites.
Question: You've described the relationship between the BLPPU and CFMEU as "disastrous".
Reynolds: Yes, it has been disastrous, which is a big problem as we are amalgamated at federal level and should be working more closely together. In our opinion the CFMEU has caused the problems. They have only about 2000 members, they are unwilling to work with us, and their rank and file organisation is poor compared to ours.
We are openly supporting Joe McDonald's ticket. It is the most progressive. We believe they are better organisers, and they are much keener to see our two organisations amalgamated as quickly as possible.
Question: The CFMEU is at present one of the few unions in WA that is not affiliated to the ALP. What is your view of the ALP?
Reynolds: I would much rather have an ALP government than the one we've got now. I agree the ALP was bad for many workers. In the 1980s we backed many of the wrong people as candidates and that is our mistake. But the ALP is the only alternative — you have to agree, they are much better than the Coalition. We have to support them financially and politically.
The ALP can be reformed and the WA CFMEU is the only branch of ours in the country not in the ALP. They are out of step, we need to all come into the ALP to have more effect.
Question: What effects have the last 13 years of ALP government had on the union movement?
Ethel: The most damaging effect is that we've lost a generation of union activists who know how to get results through industrial strength and organisation, not corporate negotiations. This has become more evident with our current national campaign — there is an enormous gap in experience in our ranks. In such times the priority is training those who step into the fray in the skills of militant, on-the-job organising, which is more than just putting on a picket line, more than you can glean from a TUTA or university course. We have to use all the resources available to the working class — alliances with students, academics, community groups, and so on.
Question: Where is the WA CFMEU at? And what about your role?
Ethel: We have a lot of work to do — not just our union's areas, but the whole construction industry is badly organised. Technology changes mean fewer tradespeople are needed on a building site, and the push for longer hours and multi-skilling, which is the direction the BLPPU have taken, has also had an adverse impact on membership. The split in our leadership worsens the problem, but also illuminates the situation.
A union secretary has key responsibilities — to have a good overview of the industry and its direction, to develop links with allies of the working class, and to identify and fix up weak areas of the union.
Question: What is the relationship with the BLPPU like?
Ethel: The BLPPU have made it harder for us to work together. They cancelled our joint delegates' meetings without a proper explanation, nor do they seem interested in joint executives. We have 56 delegates in the construction division of the union — not four or five as has been reported — but we are the minority union on most sites, and thus often have to ask the BLPPU for support in getting delegates onto sites. Sometimes they haven't supported us, which is ridiculous as more delegates on the site means better organisation.
BLPPU officials are actively working for the McDonald team. ALP links have to be a factor. The ALP has a long history of interfering in union elections. We have made it clear we are not going to get back into the ALP. We prefer them in government to the Coalition, but unions must also take on the ALP when it threatens workers' conditions. I have been accused of being involved with "trendy issues", like the petrochemical plant and the old Swan Brewery, which we opposed because of ALP WA Inc. corruption. We exposed a lot of rorts which would have put working people in this state in even more in debt.
Question: What future direction is needed for the union?
Ethel: We have to redevelop the rank-and-file structures that are our life-blood, with a membership that sets overall policy in mass meetings and takes the initiative in implementing union policy on the job. A union will not work if it's too centralised, if you can't put down your shovel without ringing head office first. The bigger a union gets, the more unworkable that is.