HE boasted of signing up top sporting stars to the ranks of the Australian Workers Union.

Except there’s a problem with union chief turned Labor leader Bill Shorten’s bragging — it never actually happened.

As AWU national secretary, Mr Shorten claims to have pioneered the strategy of signing up celebrity athletes.

But that has come under scrutiny in the Royal Commission into Trade Unions, which last week found those athletes — including top netballer Liz Ellis and later Melbourne Cup winning jockey Michelle Payne — were never actually proper members. In 2005, Mr Shorten spruiked the arrangements in a press ­release titled: “Australia’s top netball stars have joined the AWU in a new alliance to improve the incomes and health and safety conditions of netball players.”

Mr Shorten said: “The AWU’s experience in representing other elite sportspeople such as horseracing jockeys will help us to better represent the interests of some of the most talented women in Australian sport.

“We look forward to working with the new leadership of Netball Australia to make it a better sport for fans and players.”

By 2011, four years after Mr Shorten left the union, the AWU’s membership lists during this time included various high-profile jockeys, ­including Peter Mertens, Greg Childs, Steven King, Kerrin McEvoy and Payne.

But according to the royal commission the athletes themselves were never members, with their industry organisations simply making ex-gratia payments to the AWU.

“Were the netballers ever members of the AWU? Clearly they were not. No membership applications were completed and the required membership contributions were not made,’’ the final report states.

According to the AWU’s John-Paul Blandthorn, the arrangement was negotiated by athletes on behalf of the Australian Netball Players Association and the royal commission found that it was never reduced to writing.

“What, if anything, did the ­arrangement require of the AWU? This is quite unclear,’’ the commission report states.

“John-Paul Blandthorn said that his understanding was that the netballers who became members of the ANPA did not fill out any membership application forms to become members of the AWU. Cesar Melhem did not ­recall whether any such forms were provided. The commission has sought production of AWU membership application forms in respect of ANPA members listed on the invoices. No membership forms were produced.’’

In June, Mr Blandthorn gave evidence to the royal commission that linked Mr Shorten to the “ex gratia” payments to the AWU.

“I want to put this to you: in or about 2008, Mr O’Keeffe (of the Victorian Jockeys Association) had a conversation with you whereby he said, ‘Look, you really need to be compensated in some way for all the work that you have been doing and has been done by your predecessor, Mr Shorten, for the Jockeys Association’.

“You then said, ‘Look, I won’t accept any money for doing what I do, but you could make a payment to the AWU in return for the services that I provide,’ or words to that effect. Would you agree that that conversation took place or could have taken place?”

Blandthorn: “Yes. Yes.”

The government has described the arrangement as a “dubious deal’’ which enabled the AWU to add the names of netballers and jockeys to its membership list.

Mr Shorten’s spokesman pointed out that a number of leading jockey associations had praised the Labor leader’s contribution to improving conditions.

http://www.dailytelegraph.com.au/news/nsw/royal-commission-into-trade-unions-bil...

macman wrote on Jan 3^rd, 2016 at 7:19am:



oh I see you didnt see where over 70 recommendations for CHANGE were put forward.....and more than 20 people to be investigated...for all sort of corruption...

and yes I agree to have to spend all that money... that should be spent on  better things.. is a disgrace..

for the UNIONS>...why dont they keep their own paddock clean....??????????????????

macman wrote on Jan 3^rd, 2016 at 7:19am:


No, not in the least. But you clearly are.

Looks not much more than they had done all the background work and then not followed through to get all the memberships in place properly.

Quote:


Improving conditions would indicate that the union was doing work for members in this industry.

Quote:


So employee membership payments were being made by the organisation.

Pretty ugly and certainly a poor process but the reality is that the union was being payed membership dues and they were also doing work representing members. Had anything gone wrong these people would have been supported by their union.

A lot needs to be fixed with this sort of lazy process but I see nothing that looks corrupt in it.

Armchair_Politician wrote on Jan 3^rd, 2016 at 7:40am:



no membership forms were produced to the royal.....

so that never happened........all B.S. words are cheap when you dont have to back them up..

Armchair_Politician wrote on Jan 3^rd, 2016 at 8:08am:


I agree it isn't the right think to do but I would think it unusual to consider being given industry improvements and services for free as being fraud.

Fraud normally works the other way, you normally expect to be disadvantaged when the victim of fraud.

Armchair_Politician wrote on Jan 3^rd, 2016 at 8:36am:


I doubt very much the AWU did anything in return.


Quote:


Seems you are wrong again ?

Armchair_Politician wrote on Jan 3^rd, 2016 at 8:58am:



and since you admit you have no friggen idea, you can't say they did nothing