Mick Gatto secretly backed John Setka during the storm over allegations that the powerful construction union leader had stalked and terrorised his wife, newly published extracts reveal.
While the Australian Council of Trade Unions and senior Labor figures publicly urged Setka to resign, Gatto advised him to reject a guilty plea and told him: “Without you the union is gone.”
Setka, then head of Australia’s construction union, a division of the CFMEU, had been accused of harassing and intimidating his wife, Emma Walters. Police analysis of his mobile phone found that he had called her 25 times and sent 45 messages during one evening, including a series of abusive insults.
A former female judicial officer who knew Walters gave a sworn statement saying Setka’s anger had left her “extremely distressed”, according to the account.
The case became public after details were leaked to the media, alongside disparaging comments Setka had made about domestic violence campaigner Rosie Batty. Sally McManus, the ACTU secretary, said no one was bigger than the union movement and argued that Setka’s conduct had damaged its reputation.
Large unions representing teachers, nurses and truck drivers also criticised him. Anthony Albanese, then Opposition Leader, and Daniel Andrews, the Victorian premier, joined calls for Setka to step aside.
John Setka’s private backing
Behind the public criticism, however, Setka received messages of support from male and female Labor politicians and union figures, according to the extracts from Building Bad: The explosive inside story of the CFMEU by Nick McKenzie and Ben Schneiders.
Victorian MP Bronwyn Halfpenny told Setka she was thinking of him and hoped everything would be all right. “You are a great comrade to working people so the establishment will always want to bring u down,” she wrote.
Luba Grigorovitch, then secretary of the Rail, Tram and Bus Union and now a state Labor MP and minister, also offered repeated support. “We will get through this John xx,” she told him, promising to direct her union to back him.
Grigorovitch advised Setka to seek guidance from communications specialist and Labor political adviser Tanja Kovac, who also led EMILY’s List, an organisation promoting Labor women into parliament.
Kovac warned Setka that he needed to manage both his criminal case and the public reaction. She said he should be seen to support discussion of “family and gendered violence” and advised him to be “strong, genuine, sorry & the leader I know you are”.
Gatto took a markedly different approach. He urged Setka to reconsider pleading guilty and said governments and the “establishment” had targeted both men.
“Sorry you are going through all this nonsense. If I was you I would reconsider pleading guilty,” Gatto wrote.
He also thanked Setka for defending their friendship and said: “I do love ya. Without you the union is gone.” Setka replied: “Thanks brother. I really appreciate the support and I’ll never forget it.”
Setka ultimately pleaded guilty to harassment and breaching a family violence order. He later appeared outside the Melbourne Magistrates’ Court with Walters and publicly said he took responsibility for harassing and intimidating his wife.
Despite the case, he returned to the CFMEU headquarters and remained the union’s most powerful official, according to the account.
Gatto’s link to a later CFMEU scandal
The book extract also links Gatto’s influence to the later case involving Faruk Orman, his former driver. Orman had spent 12 years in prison after being convicted of murder, but his conviction was quashed when a court found he had been denied a fair trial because of serious misconduct by his lawyer.
After his release, Orman appeared at the Supreme Court next to the Melbourne Magistrates’ Court. His criminal case had little in common with Setka’s beyond both men’s close connection to Gatto and the future support they received from the CFMEU.
According to the extract, Orman’s eventual visit to the union helped sow the seeds of one of Australia’s biggest corruption scandals.
Building Bad: The explosive inside story of the CFMEU is due to be published on Tuesday.
