Victorian Premier Jacinta Allan on Thursday responded to allegations her Labor government looked the other way as the state branch of rogue union the CFMEU was infiltrated by organised crime and bikies.
Building sites became drug distribution points, criminals were hired and strippers employed as stop-go staff as the Victorian government "did nothing", the report from barrister Geoffrey Watson found.
Ms Allan, the minister responsible for transport infrastructure during John Setka's reign as state CFMEU boss, said her government cracked down immediately after the union's widespread "rotten behaviour" came to light in mid-2024.
"I want to make it absolutely clear that I and my government has zero tolerance for this alleged behaviour," she told reporters in a tense media conference.
"Indeed during my time as minister when allegations were raised with me, I referred allegations to the relevant authorities."
She issued an apology to construction workers subjected to the union's thuggish tactics over the years and slammed the use of strippers and drug trafficking on work sites as disgusting.Â
"Those reports are absolutely sickening," Ms Allan said.
Pages from the report perceived to be highly damaging to the Victorian Labor government were initially redacted at the request of CFMEU administrator Mark Irving KC.
But the deleted sections were unearthed and published by a Queensland commission of inquiry into misconduct in the construction industry on Wednesday.
In one of the removed chapters, Mr Watson conservatively estimated the cost to taxpayers of government inaction to curb CFMEU-generated crime and corruption as part of Victoria's $100 billion Big Build to be $15 billion.
Ms Allan said the figure was "unsubstantiated" and the specific allegations levelled at her Labor government were not "well-tested or properly founded".
But she would not commit to testing the claims through a state royal commission or personal referral to the Independent Broad-based Anti-corruption Commission.
Victorian Attorney-General James Newbury wrote to the state corruption watchdog on Thursday to request an urgent investigation into Mr Watson's report findings and the deleted sections.
"The corruption uncovered to date is of a scale that makes it the worst seen in our country's history," he wrote in a letter seen by AAP.
"I would therefore hope that you would urgently agree that it would be frankly inappropriate for our chief anti-corruption agency not to act."
The Victorian corruption watchdog has been contacted for comment.
The fallout from the report came as ex-CFMEU official and bikie Joel Leavitt, 32, was arrested along with another two men on Thursday morning.
Detectives from Taskforce Hawk, a dedicated Victoria Police unit investigating criminal behaviour linked to the construction industry, made the arrests over allegations a demand for $663,000 was made at a west Melbourne property on January 19.
Mr Levitt, a patched Bandidos member, was described as a "brutal criminal with a bad criminal record" in Mr Watson's report.
The arrests showed Victoria Police was acting on allegations and insisted "bad actors" were no longer in the union, the premier said.
Mr Watson told the Queensland inquiry on Wednesday that criminality ran unchecked within the union's Victorian branch until the establishment of the dedicated police unit in July 2024.
The Queensland branch had yet to plumb the same depths, he added.
"The CFMEU under John Setka - the Victorian CFMEU - (was) a crime organisation," Mr Watson said.
"I do not see Queensland being anything like as bad ... Victoria was completely out of control."
The inquiry continued to hear evidence from Mr Watson on Thursday afternoon.
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