John Setka left his home at 8am to take his two little kids to the local markets. He and his wife Emma aim to get to the markets early because the later it gets, the harder it gets to manage with two small kids and all the shopping.
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But what happened next on that Sunday in December 2015 was utterly terrifying for the young family and has left two young Australians scarred and frightened of police. Setka, Victorian secretary of the CFMEU, was arrested on charges of blackmail and now, two years later, those charges have been dropped.
The arrest should never have happened and this government must take responsibility.
Setka was tracked from the minute he and his young family left home. Tracked while he ordered coffees for the adults and babycinos for Kate, now six; and Johnny, five. Followed through the markets for three hours. Followed and then pulled over by two unmarked police cars, lights flashing. When the police emerged from the cars, Setka says they had shoulder holsters and canisters strapped to their sides.
The transcripts of the recordings of that day, from the wires worn by police, make clear the kids were crying in the background, crying and crying.
Later that day, long after Emma had tried hard to console their darling children, the police released Setka.
"I must have been such a threat to the community, they even offered to drive me home," he said. "But I'd spent enough time in police cars for the day."
Those charges may have been dropped but it's unlikely those shocking images of the arrest of their father will ever disappear from the memories of those small children. These days, Kate and Johnny see the police and immediately fear their father will be taken away.
This government loves to pull stunts when it comes to leaders of unions and you can only imagine Setka's arrest was just another media stunt devised to make unions look bad (turns out that while Setka was being interviewed in the police station that Sunday, a press release about his arrest was distributed to the media). Remember the ludicrous AFP raid on the offices of the AWU last year? That's the one when failed minister for employment Michaelia Cash pretended her staff knew nothing about the raid and then threw a staffer under a bus by 'revealing' he had tipped off the media.
The bad news for the federal government is that their attacks on unions are failing and flailing. The worse news for the government is that since the change in the leadership at the ACTU to a young woman, Sally McManus, there has been a dramatic increase in membership inquiries, supported by the remarkable #changetherules campaign. Setka too says that whenever it looks like the government is targeting the CFMEU, his union also experiences a rise in membership.
Unions matter. It can be hard to explain to those who have never benefited from being in a union why union membership matters. For some, the idea that you are better off negotiating with your employer in a big group doesn't make sense. Those are the ones who've never had conflict, who've never had to rock the boat, who've never campaigned for domestic violence leave.
I've been that person, the one who thought I could do it alone. I dropped out of my union after my third child was born because I was freaking out about money and that seemed like a quick way to save a few dollars a week. It was the single-most shortsighted action I've ever undertaken and it didn't take me long to realise I needed to rejoin. For those sins, I am now a member of two unions. By the way, those union membership fees are tax-deductible.
The money thing is a common excuse. Indeed a colleague told me she wouldn't join the union because of her mortgage yet she's pretty happy to take the pay rises which come as a result of the work of her union. It would not be possible to get those pay rises, those improvements in conditions, without working together.
And here's why this matters now. Australia is experiencing record low wage increases – so low that even that renowned socialist, the governor of the Reserve Bank Philip Lowe, says employers have to loosen their purses. As he said earlier this month, "Sustained low wages growth diminishes the sense of shared prosperity that we have in Australia."
Thing is, they won't unless they see collective pushback by workers. As my old mother used to say, if you don't ask, you don't get. I'd also argue that the more you ask, the more you get.
This government has tried to undo Australian unions. Instead, it has embarrassed itself and failed miserably. They look like liars, cheats and fakers, orchestrating one disaster after another. Ask yourself why it stalled on establishing a royal commission into banks but enthusiastically supported its failed royal commission into unions. And the answer should be, this government is not on the side of workers of any kind but on the side of big business.
Union membership is increasing but it is not increasing at a fast enough rate to fix wage growth.
Maybe you could lend a hand?
Jenna Price is an academic at the University of Technology Sydney and a Fairfax columnist.
