This type of conduct is not out of alignment with how Shorten conducted himself at Beaconsfield.
The AWU does not give a toss about it's members. The union officials are all about looking after themselves Unions Royal Commission: AWU approved deal that saw cleaners paid well below award wages
By Nicole Chette
Updated 45 minutes ago Related Story: Royal commission to investigate artificial inflation of AWU membership Map: VIC
The Australian Workers Union (AWU) approved a deal that saw cleaners paid well below award wages while working at prestigious events, in exchange for $25,000 a year in "membership fees", an inquiry has heard.
A Sydney hearing of the Royal Commission into trade union governance was told Clean Event, that services venues including the Sydney Opera House, the Sydney Royal Easter Show, the Melbourne Cup and the Australian Formula 1 Grand Prix, paid workers $18 dollars an hour under a WorkChoices agreement negotiated in 2006.
At the time, the award was up to $45 an hour on public holidays.
Earlier the commission heard the company wanted to extend that employment agreement in 2010 because savings on penalty rates and labour costs amounted to $2 million dollars a year.
Counsel Assisting Jeremy Stoljar SC asked the company's former Human Resources Manager Michael Robinson if the AWU was happy to go along with the deal, that affected between 4,000 and 5,000 cleaners employed as casuals by Clean Event across Australia.
"Well the bargaining got to a point where both parties agreed so I assume so," Mr Robinson said.
Mr Robinson agreed that the $25,000 was pursuant to the side deal and it was a small price to pay for the commercial benefit to Clean Event.
In a statement tendered to the commission Mr Robinson said part of the reasons cleaning services company Spotless bought Clean Event five years ago was the rates of pay made possible by the deal.
"It was very commercially important to Clean Event to maintain the rates of pay contained in the 2006 EBA," he said in the statement.
"The beneficial pay rates and overall agreement terms were very attractive to Spotless and one of the reasons it acquired the Clean Event business in 2010."
A spokesman for the commission confirmed the former State Secretary of the Victorian Branch of the AWU, Cesar Melham, was due to give evidence next week.
Mr Melham appeared before the commission on a separate matter last year involving his management of a union "slush fund".
The hearing before Commissioner Dyson Heydon continues.
