By Byron Kaye
SYDNEY, Oct 16 (Reuters) - Two of Australia's largest trade unions said on Friday they planned to merge, continuing the consolidation of worker rights organisations as they face widespread allegations of wrongdoing in a parliamentary inquiry.
The tie-up of the Construction Forestry Mining and Energy Union (CFMEU) and the Maritime Union of Australia (MUA) will strengthen their influence over the opposition Labor party.
The two groups have frequently campaigned together, and joined hands in opposing Australia's free trade pact with China.
The move would also shore up membership for the CFMEU, which has faced damaging allegations in a royal commission reaching as high as current Labor opposition leader Bill Shorten, himself a former leader of the Australian Workers Union.
Shorten and other union witnesses in that inquiry have denied wrongdoing.
Combined, the CFMEU and MUA would have 135,000 members, or about 1 percent of the country's workforce, making it the second largest union by membership.
"This is a huge decision that hasn't been taken lightly, but discussions to merge with the like-minded CFMEU will help us fight the ever-pervasive anti-worker and anti-union attacks on workers," MUA leader Paddy Crumlin said in a statement.
Australian unions have been merging steadily, including those originally joined to create the CFMEU and MUA, to shore up bargaining power with employers and the Labor party, as membership declines in an increasingly flexible workforce.
With many employee rights now entrenched in law, the percentage of Australian workers in trade unions reached a record low of 17 percent in 2013, down from nearly half in 1990, official data show.