Vic: Building Industry Taskforce launches federal court action

AAP General News (Australia)
12-08-2004
Vic: Building Industry Taskforce launches federal court action

MELBOURNE, Dec 8 AAP - The Building Industry Task Force has launched Federal Court
action against construction giant Multiplex, a key building union and 11 workers who were
allegedly paid while they were on strike.

The task force's statement of claim lists 11 individual workers, the Construction,
Forestry, Mining and Energy Union (CFMEU), Multiplex and a CFMEU official, John Setka.

It is seeking penalties against the parties for allegedly breaching the Workplace Relations
Act and dispute procedures in an enterprise agreement.

A court directions hearing has been set for December 17.

The CFMEU said the writs, served on the union and the building employees who were working
on the Concept Blue site in Melbourne in August last year, was an "insensitive and gross
misuse of power".

"I have been around a long time and seen many things, but even I am shocked by how
far the task force has gone this time," CFMEU Victorian secretary Martin Kingham said.

"They are taking individual workers to court for having a meeting to organise a collection
for the widow of their fellow worker."

The workers allegedly stopped work after the death of construction worker Andrew Schouten
in August last year.

Mr Kingham said it was an agreed practice in the industry for there to be stopwork
meetings to meet the immediate needs of the family of deceased workers and for safety
audits of the site to be carried out.

The CFMEU members are being prosecuted for allegedly accepting payment for periods
of industrial action and for allegedly breaching the dispute settlement procedure in the
certified agreement.

The action follows a failed attempt by the task force in the Federal Court in October
to access the bank account details of Multiplex workers.

The task force sought access to bank records as part of an investigation into union
practices following the death of a construction worker that month.

The task force wanted to prove members had been paid during the period of a site safety
audit on August 5 and 6.

Site safety audits are held after a worker dies on a worksite. They are called by the
union and the task force considers them to be unlawful strike action.

The task force had sought the documents from Multiplex with a notice under the Workplace
Relations Act.

But Justice Shane Marshall denied the action.

AAP bw/gfr/cjh/bwl W

KEYWORD: BUILDING

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