The Australian on the TURC's AWU dodgy invoices
Saturday, 30 May 2015
Note the 2007 timing! Here's the link to Mark Coultan's story published in The Australian today.
Builder BMD paid same for services as AWU union dues
The Australian Workers’ Union sent a construction company a bill for occupational health and safety services for exactly the amount it would cost to pay for the union fees of its employees, the trade union royal commission has heard.
Construction group BMD gave the AWU Victorian branch $18,900 that it could have awarded to its employees, counsel assisting the commission Jeremy Stoljar SC said.
The commission is investigating whether the union received lists of employees and payments from companies to artificially inflate its membership numbers and thereby gain a bigger say in the ALP.
In 2007, the union’s Victorian branch entered into an industrial agreement with BDM, in a separate agreement from the one it used in the rest of the country.
It then sent the company, which advertises itself as one of Australia’s largest privately-owned building companies, an invoice for $14,300 for “OH&S inspection at various work sites in Victoria”.
Shortly afterwards, 44 BMD employees were listed as union members. They included David Brick, who has told the commission he had never been an union member. In 2010, when the agreement was renewed, the union sent an invoice for “OHS training” for $19,800.
Mr Stoljar said this was exactly the amount of the AWU adult membership fees of $450 multiplied by the number of employees at BMD. The union had been unable to produce any evidence of OHS training.