Union spent $60,000 on national campaign targeting BMD company directors at their homes
A commission of inquiry heard the CFMEU targeted the homes of company executives as part of a $60,000 national campaign against Queensland construction giant BMD.
Wednesday’s evidence revealed the union’s campaign against BMD extended well beyond industrial disputes on major projects; It also included billboards in Brisbane, social media operations, sports sponsorship protests, targeted text messaging, a dedicated anti-BMD website and plans to distribute flyers in neighborhoods linked to the company’s board members.
Senior counsel assisting the investigation, Eddy Gisonda, KC, described the Centenary Bridge project as the focus of four overlapping campaigns: a “desire to target” the project itself, a campaign against the Australian Trades Union, a campaign against the Queensland government’s procurement policies and a fourth campaign against BMD.
Documents submitted to the inquiry showed senior CFMEU officials discussed a national strategy against BMD from late 2023.
In a May 2024 email, deputy national secretary Andrew Sutherland suggested “hitting” BMD with a letterbox drop in the suburbs where board members live. The proposal included the distribution of approximately 37,500 flyers.
“Perhaps a more customary tactic is to post political flyers in local representative constituencies, but now these flyers are only posted around executives’ homes,” Gisonda said.
Records presented to the investigation showed that the billboard campaign and mailbox drop ultimately cost $61,652.
The inquest heard the anti-BMD campaign was formally approved at a CFMEU divisional conference in October 2023, with delegates deciding to organize a national campaign targeting the contractor.
The commission heard the campaign included anti-BMD posters and stickers, the creation of an anti-BMD website, billboard advertising across Brisbane and flyer distribution at matches of BMD-sponsored rugby league clubs the North Queensland Cowboys and Wynnum-Manly Seagulls.
The inquest heard the Centenary Bridge project became a flashpoint after the BMD-Georgiou joint venture signed the contract in December 2022.
Giving evidence on Wednesday afternoon, Georgiou Group senior project manager Leigh Hahn told the commission the CFMEU campaign had accelerated and there had been a marked increase in “aggressive and assertive” union visits to the Centenary Bridge site between 2023 and 2024.
“There could be one a month for most of 2023, sometimes several a month,” he said. “But by 2024, we were getting multiples a week.”
Earlier evidence revisited the procurement process for the project, which was the first major Transport and Main Roads initiative to implement the state’s controversial Best Practice Industry Conditions framework at the time of tender.
Internal department documents suggested officials were grappling with the cost implications of the policy as early as 2021.
A November 2022 briefing stated that an additional $54.5 million was needed for the project due to increased costs and implementation of procurement requirements. The investigation heard about $22 million of this increase was attributed to BPIC-related measures.
The hearing also revisited allegations that information about shortlisted bidders had come into the hands of CFMEU officials during the procurement process, but the lawyer said it remained unclear how this happened.
The most striking evidence concerned the events at the Centenary Bridge site on April 23, 2024.
Body-worn camera footage from private security guards shows CFMEU organizer Hayden Turner-Davey and other union representatives arriving at the site and engaging in lengthy discussions over the terms of entry to the site.
The videos show security personnel insisting that union officials comply with the login procedures, and then the police intervened in the incident.
Officers were heard telling security staff they would not generally intervene unless criminal behavior occurred and described the dispute as a workplace health and safety or industrial matter.
“As long as there are no complaints of assault from your staff, we don’t need to be here anymore,” a police officer on duty told company representatives.
“If things start to get argy-bargy again and there are attacks, that’s when we step in.”
Gisonda said the footage showed the difficulties contractors faced in managing union campaigns following the abolition of the Australian Building and Construction Commission.
“There is a general opinion that [Workplace Health and Safety Queensland] “He’s getting caught,” he said.
“There is a general view that the police cannot or will not help, and the court system is slow and… by the time resolution is reached two or more years after the incident, remedies lose their effectiveness and sometimes the case is dismissed anyway.
“Mr [Tom] Ellis [workplace health and safety manager at civil construction firm JF Hull Holdings, who gave evidence on Tuesday] One of the things you can do is take reasonable precautions to prevent someone from coming to the site, the CFMEU said, but how do you do that? [has] Do you have a full-fledged campaign on your site?”
The inquest also heard evidence from a separate incident in February 2024, when a convoy of CFMEU supporters confronted AWU officials in a vehicle near the Centenary Bridge project.
Gisonda presented photographs identifying the nine CFMEU organizers and delegates who allegedly attended this protest: Turner-Davey, Christopher Clarkin, Brodie Wood, Clinton Davis, Bon Maui, Stephen Garbutt, Michael Hawkins, Shannon Hall and Trent Oliver.
“These were the nine guys at the front of the pack,” Gisonda said.
“There were more people in the back there; they were supporters, but they weren’t as actively involved as the people here.”
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