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A senior Department of Transport official says she was “terrified” during a fraught meeting with CFMEU leaders to discuss the impact of employment policies on projects, she told the commission of inquiry into the union.
She described the meeting, during which former CFMEU leaders Jade Ingham and Michael Ravbar sat down the end of a large table in a boardroom, as a “very tense environment”.
The union leaders swore at government officials, the inquiry was told, and were aggressive, arrogant and dismissive of department concerns.
Transport and Main Roads chief procurement officer Deanne Hawkswood oversaw the sector’s response to the state government’s workplace entitlement conditions created by the union, dubbed Best Practice Industry Conditions (BPIC).
Hawkswood said it quickly became clear the framework represented an “impossible policy” for transport infrastructure, as it was designed to the requirements of the building sector, rather than the civil sector.
These concerns were raised with key state government portfolios, including the Department of Housing and Public Works and the transport minister, as well as the CFMEU.
Hawkswood said she and other senior TMR officials met with Ingham and Ravbar at the union’s headquarters in May 2020 to discuss concerns about BPIC.
“We were there to talk about how we were going to be able to approach the implementation [of BPIC] and what some of the barriers would be,” Hawkswood said.
“[Ravbar and Ingham] were quite aggressive, and said things along the lines of, ‘Don’t come here and start telling us what you’re not going to do’.”
Hawkswood said she was in disbelief after hearing the language used towards TMR director-general Neil Scales and deputy director-general Amanda Yates, who were also in attendance.
“As I was watching how they were behaving towards two of our most senior people in the department, I was scared,” she said.
“I wanted to say something, but I was too chickenshit to say anything. I didn’t want to be targeted by them.”
Hawkswood said TMR aired concerns about how BPIC would impact transport projects as early as 2019, and communicated potential issues with former transport minister Mark Bailey and former public works minister Mick de Brenni.
“We really wanted to make sure they did understand … the nuances for the transport infrastructure program and what this [BPIC] decision would mean to the department,” Hawkswood said.
“Our preference would have been that this, the BPIC, just stayed within the building sector. They were more mature in terms of dealing with industrial relations [than] the civil space.”
Hawkswood said former premier Annastacia Palaszczuk’s office expected minimum conditions to be practised on transport projects as soon as possible, and instructed TMR on the consultation process, including to meet with the CFMEU.
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