Liberal Senator takes aim at Labor ties to CFMEU and CBUS board 04:04

Pleased to say Liberal Senator for New South Wales, Andrew Bragg's on the line for us. Senator, thank you for your time. G'day Chris, how are you going? Can you explain to me what CBUS paid the CFMEU $1.25 million for? What was the purpose of it?

Well no one knows. I mean, ostensibly it's for sponsorship. It could be for directives fees. It's a bit of a mystery. But the point really here is that we shouldn't have a system where people's retirement savings is being used for political purposes

certainly not for purposes like supporting sluggish behaviour, bikey, organised crime. And that's what I think is happening. So I think there's a few things that fall out of it, but ultimately the point is that people's hard-earned money is being used to underpin mafia-like behaviour. Have you asked the CFMEU in Senate estimates or under any sort of other questioning as to what that $1.25 million was used for?

Yes, there's currently an investigation by the Australian Prudential Regulational Authority, APRA, into these sorts of payments. And I think it's very important that the regulator enforces the law here because one thing I've observed after five years in Parliament is lots of laws are made and not a lot of law enforcement goes on. So I can see no justification for giving sponsorship benefits

of the Victorian branch of the CFMEU, particularly given what it's been up to. So, I mean, I think APRA have got to do a really, really big job here. Given you've got three members of the CFMEU currently on the CBAS board, does that raise eyebrows?

Well, it raises eyebrows, particularly in the housing space. I mean, the Labor government in Canberra is trying to get the CBUS Superfund to help them with the housing crisis. Now, I think Labor's making housing worse because all their solutions are how they can send more money off to the vested interest of the unions rather than build more houses. I think this is a big part of it, that ultimately here you've got the deputy chair of the CBUS Superfund as a member of the CFMEU.

So the organisation's been ostracised from the Labor movement, but they're still okay to apparently help the government on housing. I mean, it stinks. It does. And what do they want to put in? $500 million or something, Wayne Swan said, from CBUS. Yeah. And the whole point is that these are the people that are trying to bugger it up. I mean, they're the people that are making it more expensive to do construction in Australia because all they want to do is quit the ticket.

And I think the idea that we're going to be left with CBUS having some formal involvement with the Housing Australia Future Fund tells you everything you need to know about the government's priorities. I mean, I would say the central problem with the government is they've got no problem to solve the main issues today because they're so focused on trying to help their favourite vested interests. Before I let you go, Senator, do you think that the indignant behaviour and the faux outrage from...

of the Labor Party and the Labor movement right across the country, not just in Canberra, is all a little bit nauseating? It's absolutely unbearable. Because ultimately, these are the people that help them with their pre-selections, help them with their fundraising, put them into Parliament. And often when you hear them speak in the Senate, it's very unclear whether they're there to do the job for the people of New South Wales or they're there for a particular union. So I find it all unbearable. And let's be completely frank, it's not like these allegations or...

suggestions around criminality within the CFMEU and corrupt behaviour by the CFMEU is breaking news to many in the labour movement. It's been going on in and around the construction industry for decades and people know about it. The ABCC proved that.

That's why I don't know why Jim Chalmers and Julie Collins think hanging out with Wayne Swann, who's president of Labor and the CFMEU, sorry, CBUS at the same time, is a good idea when they're trying to solve big problems like housing. I mean, these are not the people that are going to help. These are the people that are making it worse. Senator Bragg, I appreciate your time. Thanks so much. Thanks, Chris. That's Senator Andrew Bragg, Liberal Senator here in New South Wales.