On Wednesday 12 August 2026, the Premier of Victoria, Ben Carroll of the Labor Party, announced they were going to be stopping workers being scammed and stamp out hate.[1] In short they announced a new bill to stop hate groups incorporating and also, importantly, preventing "ordinary community associations" from acting as a union by preventing them from being able to incorporate and providing Consumer Affairs Victoria the power to wind up such organisations. This will be done by amending the Associations Incorporation Reform Act 2012[2] ('the Act') with the Associations Incorporation Reform Amendment Bill 2026 ('the Bill').[3] While the target of this bill is the group so called "Red Unions," the wide reaching nature of the bill may mean a potential devastating impact on other organisations, such as the ASF-IWA, especially if there is a change of executive. Before various problems with the Bill can be substantiated upon, it will be beneficial to first briefly outline some of the roadblocks in place to registering and acting as a union as well as restrictions on actions that are traditionally within the role of union "officials".
The Legislative Framework
To become a union an entity applies to the Fair Work Commission to be registered as an organisation under the Fair Work (Registered Organisations) Act 2009 (Cth) ('the RO Act').[4] For an association to be eligible to register, certain criteria that are laid out in the RO ACT must be met. There are various "benefits" for being registered which will not be discussed at length but some to note are that registration allows a union to represent members in front of the Fair Work Commission and allows for application for entry permits to an employer's premises. [5] Further, while it will not be discussed in depth, a registered organisation is also required to have a set of rules, with certain rules being required under the RO Act.[6]
Relevantly, for an employee association to register they must be either an association of employees (i.e. a union) or an enterprise association (in short, a union operating within a single workplace or business).[7] Such an organisation must be:
• a constitutional organisation or have members who are federal system employee (essentially, this covers most people in Australia who are employed, while there are some exceptions, for the purpose of this article, such discussion will be dispensed with);[8]
• be an association for the furthering or protecting the interests of its members;
• be free from control or influence by an association or organisation of employers; and
• have at least 50 members who are employees (or 20 for an enterprise association).[9]
Importantly, with any application of an organisation to the Commission, a copy of proposed rules, must be attached as well as various other documents and pieces of information in order for proper vetting to take place.[10] Once your application is made it must then be accepted and the details of the application made public so any interested party may object to the organisations application.[11]
As part of the vetting of the application the Commission will consider, along with many of the points noted above, if there is a more convenient association for the employee to belong.[12] Essentially, these subsections allow for a monopoly on representation in an area. If there is already an organisation which may represent the employee, which, in the opinion of the Commission, it is more convenient for them to belong and who may more effectively represent them, then the application may be rejected. This means that any organisation which may have eligibility rules which overlap with another union is prevented from registering. The Bill will now allow, at least in Victoria, Consumer Affairs to prevent any organisation, even if not registered with the Commission, from existing as a legal entity. This will place additional road blocks in the way of any community organisation, ASF-IWA included, which may assist workers in workplace issues but may not be registered as a union.
One key benefit of a registered union which is unavailable to other organisations is the ability of officers of a union to acquire a right of entry permit.[13] This allows for an official of a registered organisation to receive an entry permit upon application to the commission by the organisation.[14] This means that is not possible for representative from a non-registered organisation, such as the ASF-IWA (or for another example, RAFFWU), to have any form of right of entry to a workplace. While this does not stop such organisations from being effective, it is an example of the way some tools, which assist labour organisations in being effective, are restricted from organisations not aligning themselves with or cooperating with the political class and thus, helps ensure no actual risk to the power of capital is present.[15] These restrictions on non-registered organisations alongside the legislative framework protecting mainstream unions and their control by the Australian Council of Trade Unions (“ACTU”) will now be provided additional support by the executive by way of further restrictions of the activities of worker led organisations.
The Bill
The stated purpose of the Bill is to provide the power to the executive to refuse an application for registration to an industrial relations organisation and to order that such organisation be wound up.[16] This power encompasses any association whose purpose is the furthering, protecting or representing of the industrial interests of the members of the association.[17] Further, organisations applying for registration or any incorporated organisation, may be required to provide information so that their purpose may be determined by the state.[18] Essentially this means the state can refuse registration to any organisation with an industrial relations purpose and further, order the winding up of any organisation, whether seeking registration or otherwise, with an industrial relations purpose. This means that now, not only are organisations operating as unions prevented from operating or registering, but now that they be wound up.
While the target of the Bill is the group “Red Unions,” the reach of the Bill can extend far beyond them. While there is no doubt that the Red Unions group is questionable and likely sympathising with the capital owning class, this is not an unthinkable situation for a union as many mainstream unions, such as the SDA and AWU, are known for aligning with capital over workers.[19] It was suggested by the Minister, Tim Richardson, that the goals of the Bill was to protect workers from being scammed by “fake unions” who are unable to protect workers and falsely present themselves as unions.[20] However, each of the above points cannot be supported by the evidence when one looks at the actions of any of the relevant parties. For example, despite their questionable nature, even Red Unions notes their lack of registration to members or prospective members, such transparency is contradictory to the claims of workers being scammed.[21] Further, in considering the actions of some “real unions” such as the SDA mentioned above, and the acts of other “fake unions”, such as RAFFWU, the reasoning that such community organisations cannot assist works also lacks any merit.[22] Really, what the Bill does do, is provide reinforcement to the legislated monopoly of trade unions alongside allowing direct government support by allowing any organisation acting as a trade union to be wound up.
The ASF-IWA
The ASF has never registered with the State as a union since our founding in 1986 and has continued to maintain a policy that the only “real unions” are those with workers revolution as their ultimate aim. Reformist unions typically maintain a role of controlled opposition and cooperation between labour and state to allow crumbs to fall to the workers, just enough to prevent actual systemic change. While the ASF has accepted members from reformist unions, this has been as an acknowledgement of the specific situation in Australia in which the ACTU has complete control over unions. Similar bodies are not found in other jurisdictions such as France, Italy or Spain. But what this does mean is that the powers found in the Bill could be readily targeted against the ASF. However, unique to the ASF, in comparison to organisations such as RAFFWU or Red Unions, is affiliation to and support from the International Workers Association.
Conclusion
The ASF-IWA, as part of our core beliefs, will not participate in the process of registration, and in any event, due to reasons outlined above, is not able to. While the Bill may not directly impact the ASF-IWA, at least at this stage, what it will do is potentially place further road blocks in the way of us assisting our fellow workers. The ASF-IWA, and other sections of the IWA, have operated with such restrictions in the past and been able to work around them. Regardless, the Bill is an affront to the respect and dignity that should be awarded to workers in addition to their right to freely associate. It is an explicit limit placed on the ability to organise. Whether such organisation operates within the legislative framework or otherwise, the ASF-IWA always support our fellow workers and their ability to self-organise. The Bill does nothing but further reinforce the ACTU and political class controlled monopoly on trade unions and further limit workers ability to organise.
[1] Victoria State Government, 'Stopping Workers Being Scammed and Stamping Out Hate' (Media Release 260812, 12 August 2026) <https://www.premier.vic.gov.au/sites/default/files/2026-08/260812-Stopping-Workers-Being-Scammed-And-Stamping-Out-Hate-.pdf> (‘Media Release 260812’).
[2] Associations Incorporation Reform Act 2012 (Vic).
[3] Associations Incorporation Reform Amendment Bill 2026 (Vic).
[4] Fair Work Commission 'Becoming a registered organisation' (Guidance Note, GN 058, 26 August 2025) <https://www.fwc.gov.au/documents/organisations/resources/gn058-becoming-a-registered-organisation.pdf> ('GN 058').
[5] Fair Work Act 2009 (Cth), see Div 6 regarding entry permits and s 596 which requires permission for certain parties to represent someone in front of the commission ('the FW Act').
[6] Fair Work (Registered Organisations) Act 2009 (Cth), ss 141, 143, 144, 145 and 149 ('the RO Act').
[7] Ibid, s 18.
[8] The FW Act (n 5), ss 13 and 14.
[9] The RO Act (n 5), ss 18B and 19 for unions and ss 18C and 20 for enterprise associations.
[10] Fair Work (Registered Organisations) Regulations 2009 (Cth), r 21 ('the RO Regulations').
[11] GN 058 (n 4), 7.
[12] Ibid, 8; the RO Act (n 6), ss 19(1)(j), 19(2) and 19(3).
[13] See the FW Act (n 5), ss 481-521D.
[14] Ibid, s 512.
[15] For success of the ASF-IWA see their action against Dominos in which $590,000 was recovered < https://iwa-ait.org/content/victory-dominos-pizza-drivers>.
[16] Explanatory Memorandum, Associations Incorporation Reform Amendment Bill 2026 (Vic), 1; the Bill (n 3), cl 1; see also the winding up power found at cl 11.
[17] The Bill (n 3), cl 4.
[18] Ibid, cls 8 and 10.
[19] See for example the article at <https://www.abc.net.au/news/2015-10-06/coles-employee-takes-legal-action-over-union-deal/6830818>.
[20] Media Release 260812 (n 1).
[21] See the following page from the Red Unions website < https://www.redunion.com.au/en/knowledge/are-you-a-union>.
[22] See the following article noting the preferable outcome following action by RAFFWU as opposed to SDA < https://www.theage.com.au/business/workplace/huge-pay-rise-for-coles-workers-after-scrapping-of-cosy-union-deal-20180811-p4zwwo.html>.