May well be some one has this subject on the way if so no need for mine.
Ostrich is my name for some of unionism head in the sand saying she,l be right mate.
How many times have I lambasted this union ? hundreds?
How many times have I said the word solidarity is now unclean a word made filthy by its miss use covering up things best fought and aired.
The announcement this morning is not news to me.
My union official days saw me at war more often with them,than bosses.
It saw them more intent on damaging honest unions than fighting for workers rights.
I too saw to their eternal shame, managers of some of our biggest construction firms buy protection from the CFMEU by stalling other unions [with far more members] at every chance.
Watch this issue it may be the one.
One day intent on *solidarity* the whole union movement will have to confront rank and file membership require much better.
Unionist need to see the true revulsion they have for such as the CFMEU and HSU in the words and actions of their unions

Belly, same old same old eh?
Yeah I've been in the industry since 1988 and come from an anti union family, when my dad was a foreman in the 1970's we used to have men coming around to our house in the middle of the night trying to break in and attack him, when I started work I was ostracised because I bore his name and we'd be slandered in every issue of the union magazine.
The only interactions I've ever had with the BLF and it's successors the BWIU and CFMEU have been heated or openly violent to the point that the Police were called. One time when I was leading hand on an inner city site the foreman, the builder, his secretary and I were held hostage in one of the units for half an our before the cops arrived as four union goons screamed threats and obscenities at us, the only thing that kept them out was the steel framed fire door which they tried and failed to kick in.
And bikies? They used to be the easiest ones to deal with as long as you didn't purposely aggravate them, were scaffolding and steel fixing always a bikie gig where you lived?

Belly, you open the door for the band of usual suspects on here to engage in some good old fashioned union bashing. I have expressed to you in the past my utter contempt for the likes of Craig Thomson and Michael Williamson and how they used and abused the low paid members of the HSU. the old expression "May they rot in hell" certainly applies to this pair. I told you that my partner, a long standing active member of the HSU resigned in disgust at the goings on within, she has since rejoined and is again an active delegate working for the benefit of the membership. That is a part of what unionism is all about. The union is not the president, its not the officials, its the membership, the solidarity of that membership, brothers in arms.
Today's allegations in the Herald, which I have read, about the CFMEU are indeed shameful and deserve the fullest of investigation and the application of law where and if required. There is no lower man on the planet that one who will would betray another's trust. These individuals and others like them do more damage to the cause of the worker than any boss will ever be capable of doing.
Not withstanding all of this I still believe unions and unionism has been a positive good for the working men and women of Australia.

http://www.abc.net.au/news/2014-01-28/union-accused-of-ties-to-crime-figures-kickbacks-for-jobs/5221234

Dear Belly,

I can understand your frustration when the unions
do their job badly and or are corrupt.
However, most people support
without reservation the right of all working
people to join together so as to preserve and
protect their livelihoods. Of course more unions
need to be honest and more sensitive to the
realities of modern economic conditions. Sectarian
attitudes and greed serve the cause of labour badly.

What political donations have the Greens and Labor received from the CFMEU and the Commancheros?

What prevented the previous Labor-Greens government from taking action to stop or at least investigate the corruption and crime that is now being unveiled by the media?

The Greens throw their weight around in the Senate. How come they have never said anything about this?

Paul,
You mean the 15% of the workforce who belong to unions? Yeah, I'm sure the payoff is great if you're not overly bothered by a conscience, that is to say union members who are benefiting from these agreements are parties to corruption, standover and violence.
Not every Bolshevik was a Commissar and not every Nazi was a Gauleiter but they all benefited and grew fat by turning a blind eye to the real cost of their prosperity.