Leaked text messages reveal Labor politicians and insiders sent messages of support to the CFMEU boss as he dealt with domestic violence-related offences.
Labor politicians and insiders sent private messages of support to former CFMEU boss John Setka as he dealt with domestic violence related offences and fallout from statements denigrating campaigner Rosie Batty.
But the leaked texts show some of the private dealings of Mr Setka and his ALP supporters, including Victorian MP Luba Grigorovitch and the former head of Labor’s women’s forum Emily’s List, Tanja Kovac. Emily’s List describes itself as getting “progressive Labor women elected to Australian parliaments to advance our feminist principles”.
Ms Kovac, who had her own communications consultancy at the time, was previously chief of staff to the country’s first minister for preventing family violence, Fiona Richardson, who helped establish the 2015 royal commission into domestic violence. She also referenced Mr Setka’s threat – contained in a leaked recording – that crossbench politicians would “wear the consequences” if they supported Coalition laws to bring in stricter integrity rules for union officials.
That same month, then-RTBU secretary Ms Grigorovitch – who in 2022 would become a state Labor MP with the CFMEU’s backing – repeatedly messaged Mr Setka to offer him support and to tell him she was directing her union to back him amid the fallout from the domestic violence scandal. Ms Grigorovitch also advised Mr Setka to rely on the behind-the-scenes advice of the then-Emily’s List head Ms Kovac to manage his domestic violence scandal. Ms Kovac advised Mr Setka to highlight what she claimed were mitigating circumstances behind his domestic violence.
A day later, on June 26 , Ms Kovac messaged Mr Setka “good luck” and advised him to be “strong, genuine, sorry & the leader I know you are. Thinking of you Tanja.” She did not say who paid her, but said: “Any kind of support or advice that you would have within a trade union environment, there would be some support or funding for that.
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