Union takes action over site death

by Rohan Gowland

The Construction, Forestry, Mining and Energy Union (CFMEU) has placed work 
bans on a number of Sydney building sites after it uncovered an "organised 
racket" by employers using illegal immigrant workers at half the proper 
award rate of pay.

"We have a ban on shonky companies that are using and exploiting illegal 
immigrants", CFMEU State Secretary Andrew Ferguson told The 
Guardian.

The union is concerned that some of these "shonky" operators have criminal 
connections and there has been a death threat to one union official and 
threats to builders who, in accordance with union wishes, have ceased using 
these companies.

The union official who received the death threat has had to change his home 
address to protect his safety.

A major company alledgedly involved in the "racket" is Fixton Marble and 
Granite, for whom the "overwhelming majority of their workers were illegal 
immigrants", said Mr Ferguson.

Mr Ferguson said that another major company, Modern Projects, which 
employed about 40 workers, has now gone into receivership. At the same time 
the company folded, three of its former employees were arrested by 
Immigration.

Mr Ferguson said that the union did not see the immigrants as the enemy 
here, but as the "victims of a system that doesn't work — people escaping Špoverty".

"More importantly, they were being paid 50 per cent less than union rates 
of pay. We regard that as unacceptable; workers have got to receive their 
entitlements. If we find any company, with either legal or illegal workers, 
underpaying them, there will be similar action [by the union] taken", he 
said.

The union began investigating the racket after the death of an illegal 
Korean man four weeks ago. The man had no superannuation or death benefits. 
After the union held a meeting to explain the situation to the workers, 
they all walked off the job and banned the company from operating at the 
site until the man's widow and teenage son received death benefits.

After negotiations with the union, the builder, who employed the "shonky" 
contract company for which the man worked, has agreed to pay $150,000. Of 
this $100,000 is for the widow and $50,000 is in back-pay that was owing to 
other workers on the site.

The builder deducted this amount from what he owed to the "shonky" contract 
company.

Mr Ferguson said that the union's investigations were uncovering a wide-
scale problem across the industry.

"It is increasingly apparent that organised rackets are being used by 
employers to bring cheap labour into the country.

"It's very wide-spread in the contract cleaning industry and efforts to 
spread this type of system into the building industry are going to meet 
very fierce resistance from the union", said Mr Ferguson.