The Abbott Government’s Royal Commission into Trade Unions is an irrevocably political exercise. Every Liberal PM in my lifetime has had at least one Royal Commission into trade unions. It is just something they do.

Today’s announcement by an embattled Victorian Premier and his “friend” the Prime Minister illustrates the point perfectly. Despite a police taskforce to assist the Royal Commission being flagged in February, just days before the caretaker period starts, they announced that Victoria would participate in a police taskforce targeting unions. The Commissioner for Victoria Police was only asked to participate in the taskforce yesterday. It is beyond coincidence.

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It’s no secret that the Liberal Party does not like unions.

Nobody believes that the government has established this Royal Commission in the interests of union members, or in the interests of stronger, more effective unions.

In defending their abuse of power, the Liberals argue that “good unions have nothing to fear” and that the conduct examined by the Commission so far justifies the Royal Commission. But that is just not true.

The reality is that the narrow terms of reference for the Royal Commission and the $50 million thrown at it are intended to bolster the Government’s industrial relations agenda. An agenda which restricts the ability of unions to fight for the people they represent and which prevents workers from political participation through their unions.

In talking about the Royal Commission the Liberals have adopted the shorthand of “widespread” allegations. It is oft-repeated yet completely misleading.

More than half of women experience discrimination during pregnancy, parental leave or when returning to work. Photo: Shutterstock

Let me tell you what is widespread: More than half of women experience discrimination during pregnancy, parental leave or when returning to work. Forty percent of the Australian workforce is employed in insecure work. A worker is seriously injured or killed every six minutes in the industries the CFMEU covers.

The truth is that most unions have had no contact with the Royal Commission whatsoever. Even in unions directly targeted, only a minority of Branches have been involved. Even in those Branches, only a minority of union members have had allegations made against them.

Unions, like the rest of society, are not immune from people doing the wrong thing. I suspect that if you threw $50 million and coercive powers at eight corporations in Australia that had recently been reported negatively in the media, you would find wrongdoing; but probably not the same breathless conclusion that it was widespread.

Suggestions of corporate misbehaviour, however, have been treated with incredulity or as irrelevant to the terms of reference, and the evidence not received. Employers have been summonsed by the Commission to provide evidence about unions and unionists.

The Commission’s questioning of employers – why they would contribute to a training fund, why they would sign up to industry superannuation funds, why they would buy insurance products other than in the commercial market – implicitly assumes that they are rolling over in the face of an illegitimate exercise of power.

But it is not wrongdoing. It is not corruption. It is bargaining.

In the absence of understanding solidarity and collective power, the Commission views union power as inherently illegitimate, and sees conduct through the prism of competition law; cartels and collusion.

In the absence of understanding that unions are industrial, campaigning, political organisations of workers, the wrong conclusions may be drawn about the credibility and motivations of complainants who have lost out in those political contests.

If the commission sees the role of elected union officials and elected committees of management, mostly volunteers, as akin to the shallow gene pool appointments to corporate boards, they will misunderstand the challenges of union governance. The union movement has been working to address these challenges since it convened the Independent Panel on Best Practice for Union Governance, supported the previous government’s changes to the Registered Organisations Act, and rolled out training to nearly 4,000 people in 18 months.

Counsel Assisting the Royal Commission Jeremy Stoljar SC. Photo: AAP

On Friday, Counsel Assisting the Royal Commission, Jeremy Stoljar SC, made his closing submissions. This was his take on the evidence presented so far, and the policy recommendations he believes will address the problems he has defined.

The Liberals didn’t wait to hear those closing submissions before creating a new police taskforce.

But then they didn’t need to. Like us, they were in little doubt what those submissions would say.

I have little doubt that most of these recommendations will be inconsistent with the concept of free, independent, member-controlled trade unions with the ability to win for workers.

But we will not be distracted by this politically motivated Royal Commission. We will keep the focus on the attack by Liberal Governments on our living standards – our wages, our conditions, our superannuation; our access to universal health care and universal education.

Tim Lyons has been the Assistant Secretary of the Australian Council of Trade Unions since 2008. He is a member of a range of government committees in relation to workplace relations, the economy and superannuation. He is a Trustee Director of HESTA superannuation fund, and sits on various superannuation industry bodies including the board of the Industry Super Network. He is also the Australian representative on the Global Unions Committee on Workers’ Capital.