CPSU Victoria understands what the Victorian Government is trying to achieve through the Associations Incorporation Reform Amendment Bill 2026 and why parts of the union movement might welcome legislation that makes it harder for these organisations to operate. 

So-called “Red Unions” are a genuine problem. The CPSU Vic knows this first-hand. They present themselves to workers as unions while promoting a model of individual representation that is fundamentally at odds with collective trade unionism. 

But this Bill is not the answer. 

CPSU Victoria opposes the Red Unions and their model of unionism. 

But we also oppose this legislation. 

The legislation is much broader than the problem it seeks to address. In attempting to deal with the organisations we believe undermine collective unionism, it risks restricting the ability of workers to establish and maintain genuine worker organisations of their own choosing. 

RAFFWU demonstrates the problem. Whatever disagreements exist within the union movement about its status or approach, RAFFWU has spent almost a decade organising retail and fast-food workers, bargaining, taking industrial action and challenging agreements and practices that disadvantage workers. 

There is a fundamental principle at stake here. Workers have the right to organise. 

They should be free to join unions, build unions and participate in them. And when workers are dissatisfied with their union, they should be able to organise to change it. 

CPSU Victoria has some experience of that ourselves. 

In 2025, CPSU members dissatisfied with the direction of our union organised within it. We argued for a more democratic, member-led and organising union. We contested the union's elections and put that proposition to the membership. 

Members decided. That is trade union democracy in action. 

And that is ultimately our answer to the Red Unions too. 

The answer to bad unionism is better unionism. 

The union movement should be prepared to confront the uncomfortable question underlying the growth of alternative organisations. Why are some workers looking elsewhere in the first place? 

Some workers are being sold a lie, like cheaper union fees and vague promises of better representation and outcomes that aren’t based on fact - that isn't genuine collective unionism Some workers look elsewhere because they feel frustrated and unheard. Others don't feel like they have meaningful influence of, or input into their union. They don't believe their union has enough power to win. 

We cannot solve those problems by legislating away the competition. We solve them by organising, by becoming more democratic, and by building the industrial power necessary to actually win things for workers. 

Governments have a role in that too. 

Australian workers operate under an extraordinarily restrictive system governing industrial action. The circumstances in which workers can lawfully withdraw their labour are narrow, and aspects of Australia's industrial laws have repeatedly attracted criticism from the ILO's supervisory bodies for restricting freedom of association. 

That should be the direction of reform. 

Rather than further restricting workers' capacity to organise, governments should be expanding it. Strengthening freedom of association, removing unnecessary restrictions on industrial action, supporting collective bargaining and giving workers a meaningful right to strike. 

Indeed, there is another step Ben Carroll can take if he is serious about defeating Red Unions. Call on the Federal Government to legislate a genuine Right to Strike. 

Because you cannot spend decades restricting workers' industrial power and then be surprised when workers become frustrated that their unions appear powerless. 

Established unions should not need governments to protect us from dissatisfied workers. Our job is to give workers a reason to join us, participate in us and stay with us. 

That means building unions that are democratic and member-led. Unions that organise rather than simply service. Unions that build power in workplaces. Unions prepared to fight when necessary. 

And, ultimately, unions that win things for workers. 

CPSU Vic Secretary, Jiselle Hanna