Mike Smithson: CFMEU scandal evokes memories of South Australian Gas Company rort in the 1970s

Sharks are circling as the nation’s largest construction union, the CFMEU, goes into administration amid a barrage of negative publicity.

The Feds have just announced they will legislate to come down hard on the union’s construction arm and the Fair Work Commission is also on the warpath.

Various State governments are exploring serious allegations raised about links to organised crime and dodgy infiltration onto major building sites.

There’s little goodwill for union officials to fall back on.

The sudden departure of heavyweight union boss John Setka doesn’t help the union’s optics.

It appears something is horribly wrong, allegedly straying into thuggery, violence, extortion and corruption.

How much worse can it get for the union, developers and taxpayers?

It makes you wonder what’s gone on in the past with other trade union activity and the lining of pockets at taxpayers’ expense.

The current generation probably can’t believe what it’s hearing.

But these claims aren’t anything new and I’m speaking from experience dating back to the early-1970s when I was a teenager.

My late father was a senior executive at the old South Australian Gas Company.

It was the monopoly supplier of gas to the State under regulation from the State Government.

In those days it literally had money to burn as the State grappled with laying a natural gas pipeline network from the fledgling Moomba gas field.

Our gas was also being piped to Sydney for vast profits and everyone knew it.

SAGASCO had a fully unionised workforce of gas fitters, many working on taxpayer-funded jobs.

They were all members of the now-defunct Plumbers and Gasfitters Employees Union (SA).

It was the hardest of hard-core unions run by officials who looked every part a militant and non-compromising outfit.

At the drop of a hat, the union could, and would, order all members off work sites for the most trivial of reasons.

My father would be constantly treading on eggshells on a variety of issues, most of which were discussed around our dinner table.

The most appalling claim that stuck in my mind, and which subsequently played out in the SA Parliament, was hard to beat as blatant corruption.

Select union members who were nearing retirement age or simply looking to get out of that line of hard yakka had an easy path to rich redundancy packages.

They could receive a full month’s pay for each year of service plus entitlements.

Union officials would go to SAGASCO and provide names of their members to be included on the elite list.

If the company didn’t comply, there was more than a perceived threat of strike action.

But there was a catch. In return, the worker was required to deliver a bag to the inner-suburban union office, almost adjacent to the gasworks. The brown paper bag had to contain $2000 in cash, otherwise the redundancy deal wouldn’t proceed.

In those days that was a king’s ransom.

The member was told there would be no receipt and was strongly advised to keep their mouth shut.

If they didn’t fully comply, there was usually a menacing night-time home visit by a union organiser to remind them of the unwritten code.

But most happily went along with the plan, as they’d still become wealthier than in their wildest dreams.

As is often the case, no-one lost any sleep because it was the mug consumer who ended up footing the bill.

Given the circumstances, the cash either lined the pockets of union officials or went into a grubby slush fund.

Take your pick.

Fifty-one years ago, I thought it was far-fetched, but had far more important thoughts occupying my mind, so the ugly allegations went to the grave with my father.

Courageously some of the gas workers embroiled in the scandal got the guilts and spoke out in 2012.

Channel 7’s Today Tonight aired the same details and allegations I’d heard decades earlier.

All the major players involved have passed on, so there’s no accurate way of verifying the allegations.

But SA parliamentary records will record this smelly affair forever.

I have no doubt that many paper bags were slipped across the desk in a darkened room and that crooked union officials got away with fraud, mixed with extortion.

Turn forward to 2024 and I doubt much has changed in some quarters.

A Federal Police sting, with a hidden camera at CFMEU headquarters in Sydney, suggests grubby cash is still king, although the union official charged denies any wrongdoing.

Mike Smithson is chief reporter and presenter for 7NEWS Adelaide