Response to the Australian Council of Trade Unions’ Disturbing Statement in Support of Gaza
Never has the agenda of the trade union movement been laid so bare as it has this week.
To see the Australian Council of Trade Unions (ACTU) launch a misinformed, one-sided, and tone-deaf campaign against the people of Israel at the start of the most holy festival of Passover is shameful and it is telling.
So desperately focused on the big end of town, this latest move demonstrates that the ACTU – once led by likes of Bob Hawke – has abandoned the workers they were established to protect almost 86 years ago.
While Sally McManus and Michelle O’Neil sup at the big end of town in ‘Wokeville’, millions of aspirational Australians in communities like mine are struggling to make ends meet thanks to Labor’s reckless industrial relations reforms and economic mismanagement.
Instead of advocating for workers and in the national interest, the ACTU are calling for Government to squander its sovereignty, security and standing for cheap political means.
I have spent the better part of 30 years calling out the thuggery, corruption and violence of the CFMEU and militant trade unions in the building sector. I’ve seen lives destroyed and livelihoods lost thanks to Labor and the trade unions running roughshod over small businesses and building sites.
Today, the thin veneer of the trade union movement has been shattered, and we see plain-as-day that running through the movement is a virulent hate – against the people of Israel, as well as the business owners, entrepreneurs, regional communities, and people of faith who have spent the best part of 250 years building our nation from the ground up.
They’re happy for Australian taxpayers’ money to fund UNRWA – an organisation complicit in enabling and allegedly committing vile acts of terror.
They’re calling for another $100 million to be provided in ‘humanitarian assistance’ – money which will inevitably find its way into terrorists’ hands.
That’s $100 million which could address the health crisis in our own backyard.
$100 million which could fund lifesaving medicines. $100 million which could re-establish the Coalition’s mental health or telehealth programs. $100 million which could elevate Australia’s domestic medical manufacturing sector.
According to the Fair Work Ombudsman, “A union is a body that represents the interests of workers in a particular industry or occupation.”
When did left-wing academics, big-end lawyers, and career politicians become the voice for tradies, manufacturers, and Australian workers? When did the trade union movement become a foreign policy unit for the Federal Labor Government?
It is not an arm of government. It is not an instrument of diplomacy. So why does the ACTU need “a commitment to a two-state solution” or a position on any foreign policy matter at all?
The ACTU has no right, no mandate, and no reason to even enter into this kind of debate, let alone with such a tone-deaf and ill-informed position.
Anthony Albanese and the Federal Labor Government now have a choice to make.
Will they continue to take their marching orders from the ACTU and the trade union movement, as they have done at every other turn?
Or will they finally listen to the Australian people, quit the woke nonsense and address the issues that matter to Australian families and their businesses – namely the cost of living and housing crisis?
