We are increasingly seeing employers in industries with heavy union saturation complain of the psychosocial hazards that can result from antisocial and belligerent union behaviour. Those hazards need to be identified and managed like other hazards in the workplace.
Union data says there is a problem
In November 2025, the Australian Council of Trade Unions (ACTU) released the results of its Work Shouldn’t Hurt Survey, which reveals that 1 in 5 Australian workers sustained a mental health injury in the previous year, with this number rising to 1 in 4 Australians under the age of 34. The ACTU are not alone in the union movement for seeking to call out psychosocial hazards. The Australian Services Union has also created a toolkit for mentally healthy workplaces to help people identify and correct psychosocial hazards.
Antisocial and aggressive behaviour is known to be a part of the problem
The primary duty of care under WHS laws to ensure the health and safety of workers as far as is reasonably practicable falls overwhelmingly on employers, not unions.
Unfortunately, there are many public, identifiable instances where unions and their officers and delegates have been responsible for the creation of psychosocial hazards, carrying out the very sort of activity that the union movement states it is seeking to stamp out:
- In August 2024, the ABC aired footage of union members physically blocking vehicles at a Brisbane worksite, and abusing the occupants of the vehicles by swearing and yelling at them. In that case, the occupants of the vehicles were members of a different union. This sort of conduct has a real risk of causing mental injury to the occupants of the vehicles who are subject to the abuse, and to workers who witness such conduct.
- In August 2025, media reported on CCTV footage of a union official in Perth allegedly butting heads with the manager of a construction site and making a throat slitting gesture. This is a psychosocial hazard not only for the person towards whom this behaviour was directed, but also for any employees who witnessed any intimidating or threatening behaviour.
Given the duties WHS imposed on employers, employers should be considering what measures can be taken to protect employees from this type of conduct.
How can employers discharge their duties in the face of dangerous behaviour?
Many employers will be familiar with the process of requiring any persons entering onto their premises to undertake a short safety induction and requiring them to abide by the safety requirements of the site. Site attendees may be required to sign a declaration stating that they have understood the induction, will abide by all safety rules, and that they forfeit their right to be on-site should they breach any safety conditions.
This process can apply to any site visitors, including union officials exercising right of entry, provided that the induction is not unreasonably long or unnecessarily arduous. Critically, there is no reason why any induction, and any conditions visitors are required to abide by while on-site, cannot include an agreement not to engage in behaviour that may cause psychosocial hazards or mental harm to employees and other workers on-site, at the risk of being removed from site. All safety inductions, agreements to abide by safety rules, and examples of actual antisocial, aggressive or other behaviours that violate the required standards should be documented and kept. Of course, any criminal behaviour should be reported to the police.
Treating psychosocial hazards as you would any other threat to the health and safety of employees and other attendees of the workplace is an entirely appropriate, and expected, step that an employer should be taking to ensure the safety of their workplaces.
Source: Lexology
