Di Natale tells Acoss conference unions should be politically independent

Greens leader says ‘dedicating resources to robocalling constituents’ does little to advance workers’ interests

Richard Di Natale has criticised the union movement for “robocalling constituents” and said unions were strongest when they were independent of “one side of politics or another”.

The comments were made at the end of a speech at the Australian Council of Social Services conference in Melbourne on Tuesday. Asked how he saw the union movement surviving in the future, the Greens leader said unions functioned best when they were “independent.”

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