PETER VAN ONSELEN: The two simple acts Albo could take to eradicate his CFMEU union stench: ‘Borderline embarrassing’

The ongoing scandal surrounding the CFMEU threatens to derail Anthony Albanese’s re-election campaign.

The prime minister must go to the polls before May next year, but he had hoped to go to the polls this year, possibly as early as late next month, before the bad economic news began to emerge.

But that strategy is in danger of going up in smoke, now that the shady left-wing construction union is facing all kinds of accusations: from accepting bribes to money laundering and ties to organised crime.

The allegations have yet to be proven, but the evidence is mounting and the stench is getting worse by the day.

It’s almost embarrassing to watch a conga line of Labour politicians march past cameras and microphones, hand on heart claiming they had absolutely no idea the union was in such deep trouble.

If that were true, it only underscores their willful blindness.

The CFMEU’s actions have long been controversial and questions about its conduct as a trade union affiliated with the Labour Party have been the worst-kept secret in the corridors of power for years.

The Labor Party is now trying to isolate the CFMEU by decoupling it from the party, but it is too little, far too late. It should have happened a generation ago.

Union leaders, from premiers to the prime minister, have happily accepted millions of dollars in campaign contributions from the union.

The left-wing faction within the party has abused its ties with the CFMEU to get more people into the state and federal parliaments.

Helping the left gain control of state branches such as the Victorian Labor Party, where the CFMEU is at its strongest and, arguably, most questionable.

So far, the Prime Minister and the ACTU have resisted calls to formally deregister the CFMEU.

Union leaders, both at the state and federal levels, say they will no longer accept donations from the scandal-plagued union. That’s not good enough. What about the many millions already received?

Workers at both the state and federal level should donate the money they receive from the CFMEU – potentially funded by crime – to charities where they can do good.

But that will not happen, because the Labour Party has relied on possible ill-gotten gains for its electoral success in recent years.

So the two sensible things that Labor and the ACTU could do – deregister from the CFMEU and refund charitable donations received – are simply not enough.

Instead, they will puff out their collective chests and whine about what the union has done. Express their disgust. Say that the union’s ties with the Labor Party should be severed. All gestures designed to put the scandal behind them.

When the Prime Minister spoke to the media this morning, he even tried to blame the CFMEU’s failures on the coalition, as some of the events took place during the coalition’s term in office.

Is he serious? Is this prime minister not ashamed at all?

The CFMEU is affiliated with the Labor Party. Former union officials serve on the party’s parliamentary staff and donate millions of dollars to the party. They use their party power to win primaries for candidates who support the party. They also play a role in securing leadership positions for those same supporters, where possible.

CFMEU union members hold a protest to block access to a construction site in Brisbane, above

And Albo is trying to shift the problems within the union onto the coalition? How utterly ridiculous.

The rhetorical gymnastics are actually a sign that Albo does not take the problems within the union seriously, if he is prepared to make such an absurd claim.

It is a sign that he is primarily concerned with the political position on the union, rather than the serious work of taking responsibility for what a union with ties to his party has done, as the most senior figure in the country’s Labour Party.

The Labour Party is likely to win the next election, despite the growing list of scandals and problems during its first term.

But only because Australians are historically a generous people and give governments that have served one term a second chance by re-electing them. That has been the case since 1931 – the last time a first-term government lost a re-election bid.

So I predict that Albo will get a second term, but he and his party are doing everything they can to jeopardize that historic record.