Attack on CFMEU attacks every Australian worker

Written by: Clarrie Broz on 17 August 2024

 

When examining a media frenzy, it is useful to first investigate who stands to gain from the story presented. Blackrock, the biggest United States investment firm in construction has $8.7 trillion in assets. The second highest US investment firm is Vanguard group who have $8.6 trillion in assets.

These obscene profits and levels of commodity accumulation come largely from the labour of Australian construction workers. This is indisputable – without the workers, the sector stops.  Construction workers have engaged in relentless struggle for union member input on their wages and conditions. It is instructive to quote from Paddy Malone, who was elected as Secretary of the Victorian Builders Labourers’ Federation in 1941, who wrote the following in a letter to construction workers:

“Your day to day struggles referred to are never ending due to the present cruel system of capitalist exploitation. The constant drive for profit by employers and especially by the big monopolies intensifies with each passing month and therefore the living standards of you and your family are continually being depressed.

"Because of this we must continue to build strong organisation on the job so that we can effectively fight to maintain and improve our living standards; but still more important is the need to begin in a more conscious way than ever before to strike blows at the root cause of our day to day problems, and that means to challenge the social system of capitalism itself.       

“Only by doing so and by taking part in the wider working class struggle to establish working class political power shall we be able to have things organised for the benefit of the people and not for a few billionaire organisations.”

The struggle to defend the union of construction workers is deeply tied to opposing the biggest criminals in Australian society – not the small-time alleged bikies, ex-convicts or thugs on construction sites given a trial by media – but the parasites at the top of Blackrock and Vanguard Group who pull the strings behind the scenes.