Australia news LIVE: Coalition calls on Labor to de-register CFMEU; Vatican releases first photo of the Pope​on March 17, 2025 at 3:31 am

Workplace Relations Minister Murray Watt has hit back at the Coalition’s call to deregister the CFMEU, describing the move as a “reckless plan” that would “hand control of the union back to the very criminals we are beginning to remove”.

Earlier today, Opposition Leader Peter Dutton again demanded the construction union be deregistered following another investigation by this masthead that revealed more allegations of misconduct among CFMEU officials.

Watt announced today that he would refer allegations of criminality by CFMEU members to federal police after a bikie-linked man was caught on camera assaulting a woman while on his lunchbreak at a state-funded construction project.

But in a social media post about 2pm, the employment minister pushed back against the Coalition’s proposals for the construction union, arguing they would be counterproductive.

“Peter Dutton’s reckless plan for the CFMEU would hand control of the union back to the very criminals we are beginning to remove. Deregistering the union would allow it to operate without ANY regulation, with the worst elements free to run rampant on construction sites again,” he said.

Watt said the Coalition’s plan would end the CFMEU’s current administration under Mark Irving, KC, which was intended to weed out corruption and criminality. He also suggested the Coalition’s plan to bring back the Australian Building and Construction Commission (ABCC) was flawed, claiming the regulator that Labor abolished merely “prosecuted workers for having union stickers on their helmets” and allowed construction union misconduct to take hold.

“Now the administrator is beginning to clean up the union, and police have established active operations with state police forces and are conducting raids, Peter Dutton wants to recklessly close it all down,” Watt said.

“We don’t need to import an American racketeering law – we already have our own laws to go after ‘kingpins’, such as section 390.6 of the Criminal Code, which already deals with directing criminal organisation.

“Peter Dutton’s reckless desire for a headline puts at risk the investigations and crime-fighting that the Coalition never bothered to commence in their decade in office.”

Treasurer Jim Chalmers has given the Queensland government little reason to be hopeful the annual GST carve-up will be overhauled.

Speaking in Brisbane this morning, Chalmers described complaints from the Crisafulli government that the latest allocation should be ditched as a “story as old as Federation”.

Last week, the independent Commonwealth Grants Commission issued its annual recommendations on how the $95 billion GST pool is shared among the states and territories. Queensland took a $1.2 billion hit to its GST share, prompting the state to demand Chalmers take the unprecedented step of overturning the grants commission’s proposals.

But Chalmers said one of the reasons Queensland had lost GST was because it had benefited from an extra $8.8 billion in coal royalties. The state was also getting extra assistance from the federal government, such as a $7.2 billion promise to upgrade the Bruce Highway.

“It’s not unusual for state treasurers to want more money from the Commonwealth. It is not unprecedented for state treasurers to try and blame Commonwealth treasurers for pressure on their own budgets,” he told reporters today.

“The Commonwealth Grants Commission process is an independent process, a process which takes place at arms length from the government of the day.

“The state government should not be blaming the Commonwealth government. We’ve all got pressures on our budget.”

The new $5 note will not have a portrait on it. Instead, the Reserve Bank announced today the note would be designed to recognise First Nations peoples’ enduring connection to Country.

“We want to try something new,” the bank said, inviting artists to recognise First Nations communities’ contribution to the restoration and conservation of the environment.

“As times change, so do our banknotes.”

In 2023, the RBA said King Charles would not feature on the $5 note redesign following Queen Elizabeth II’s death, prompting outrage from the opposition. The portrait of Queen Elizabeth II first appeared on the $5 polymer note in July 1992 when the Queen celebrated the 40th anniversary of her accession.

The theme for the new design, “Connection to Country”, was selected by the Imagery Selection Panel from more than 2000 submissions from the Australian public. The panel is made up of senior representatives from the Reserve Bank of Australia and Note Printing Australia, along with prominent First Nations business and community members.

The RBA said the theme should be represented in a way that recognises the diversity of First Nations peoples, across Australia and the Torres Strait – and that the artwork should avoid being tokenistic or stereotypical.

“The tone for the banknote is of a hopeful future, where First Nation peoples’ connection to Country is celebrated and respected,” it said.

Treasurer Jim Chalmers has accused shadow treasurer Angus Taylor of “egregious” dishonesty over his claim that income taxes have grown under the Albanese government.

The Coalition released a report today that suggested income taxes were $3500 higher for the average worker in the last financial year than they were before Labor won government in 2022, with Taylor promoting the findings on breakfast TV this morning.

At a press conference in Brisbane today, Chalmers took aim at Taylor’s claim.

“We provided a big tax cut in the middle of last year,” he said of the stage 3 income tax cuts, noting that the figures cited by Taylor referred to a period before Labor’s tax cuts came into effect.

“This is an egregious bit of dishonesty for him to put out numbers from before more than $20 billion a year in tax cuts that are rolling out right now,” he said, noting the Coalition’s opposition to Labor’s expansion of stage 3 tax cuts.

“Our tax cuts are bringing down average tax rates.”

CFMEU National Secretary Zach Smith has pledged to defend his union against “media witch hunts” but acknowledged members have been caught up in the latest allegations against the embattled union.

In a post on the CFMEU’s social media channels, Smith said he understood many members would be angry about the media reporting.

“I know many of you will be … angry that some individuals and some employers have dragged us into their conduct, angry that workers in the union have been blamed when it’s in fact employers, criminals and bikies at the heart of this behaviour,” Smith said.

“I will always defend people against a media witch hunt. But it is true, some of our people have been caught up in this,” he said in the Facebook post.

Smith insisted that the CFMEU is “not a criminal gang”.

“Our members are the real victims of any criminality or corruption in the industry,” he said.

“We cannot let our union or our industry be a safe haven for criminality or corruption. We must hold ourselves to the highest standards. This is what being a strong union is.”

Opposition Leader Peter Dutton has described Victorian Premier Jacinta Allan’s response to the latest reports of misconduct in the CFMEU as “wet lettuce” and “pathetic”, claiming it gives the union a green light to continue operating as it does now.

Earlier today, Allan announced a dedicated Victorian police taskforce had been formed to investigate the misconduct reports, including allegations of violence against women.

Allan’s government is directly in the firing line of the latest report in the Building Bad investigation, accused of covering up rampant and ongoing CFMEU-linked organised crime infiltration and corruption on its multibillion-dollar Big Build infrastructure scheme.

Here’s what Dutton had to say:

Jacinta Allan provided a wet-lettuce response today. It was pathetic. It gave a green light for the CFMEU to continue as they are now. What we’re proposing is a model that will stop the CFMEU in its tracks. It will reduce construction costs in our country, it will reduce the affiliations between the outlaw motorcycle gangs, the biggest distributors of drugs in our country.

It will break that link and close that business model down. We have a serious proposal here and I think the government needs to adopt it. The thing that they can do today, without parliament resuming, is to announce that they’re going to deregister the CFMEU.”

Opposition Leader Peter Dutton will write to Prime Minister Anthony Albanese today asking for drafting resources to introduce new racketeering legislation in parliament next week, with the goal of “stamping out organised crime” in the CFMEU.

The Coalition is proposing new laws that would ensure police can pursue a criminal organisation itself, rather than just an individual, by showing a pattern of behaviour in law-breaking. Opposition workplace relations spokesperson Michaelia Cash invoked the US’s Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organisations Act, commonly known as RICO, when describing the proposal.

“In the United States, the pattern of behaviour is two offences in the last 10 years, so a pattern of behaviour under RICO laws is fundamentally different to the ordinary meaning of the word pattern of behaviour,” Cash said.

“What that then means is this – the organisation itself, regardless of who committed the offence, is able to be prosecuted. It is a fundamental difference.”

Dutton added that he would make it a matter of urgency to get this legislated.

“I’m going to write to the prime minister today, asking for drafting resources and asking for this matter to be dealt with in the parliament next week. I think it has that urgency to it, and I think we have the basis upon which to build the legislation very quickly,” he said.

Federal parliament will return for three days next week, from March 25 to 27, including the handing down of the budget on Tuesday.

Opposition Leader Peter Dutton has described the CFMEU allegations as “the biggest corruption scandal in our country’s history” and says the corruption goes to the heart of the Albanese government.

“We are talking about billions of dollars … that have been paid by ultimately Australian taxpayers through the Victorian government, the Albanese government, for bloated prices, project times have been blown out, the costs are escalating and for every kilometre of road that’s being built, or every hospital that’s being built,” Dutton said.

“The CFMEU has donated $11.5 million to Mr Albanese’s party and to Ms Allan’s party. They are completely and utterly compromised and the corruption here goes to the heart of the Albanese government.

Dutton claimed the Albanese government had known about violence against women, extortion and links to outlaw motorcycle gangs within the CFMEU “for years”.

Read the latest allegations against the CFMEU here.

Coalition workplace spokeswoman Michaelia Cash says the federal government must de-register the CFMEU.

Speaking alongside Opposition Leader Peter Dutton and home affairs spokesperson James Paterson at a Melbourne press conference, Cash said the Coalition would announce a suite of actions “that will quite literally hit organised crime where it hurts and break their business model with the CFMEU”.

Here’s what Cash had to say:

We call on Mr Albanese to work with us because we could do this next week when the parliament sits – is to, once and for all, deregister the CFMEU. Mr Albanese has shown, by putting it into administration, that he will take the weakest possible response possible.

[The government] needs to comprehensively once and for all deregister the CFMEU, but also at the same time ensure that any official that has indulged in law-breaking is never again allowed to hold office in a registered organisation or go anywhere near a work site and represent the workers.

We also need urgently to put back in place the building industry regulator, the ABCC [the Australian Building and Construction Commission], which Mr Albanese, as you all know, his first act of government was to do exactly what the CFMEU wanted him to do, and that was to get rid of the building industry watchdog.”

Opposition Leader Peter Dutton held a press conference in Melbourne with opposition workplace relations spokesperson Michaelia Cash and opposition home affairs spokesperson James Paterson.

Watch here: