Paul Howes is surprisingly quite young for a senior union official - only 29. He's spent almost all of his working life as a union official. No problems there...but most likely highly ambitious with designs on following Shorten into a safe pre-selection some point I would assume.
However despite this I find him a deeply unimpressive character. I dislike his Svengali overtones. He gives the impression that he somehow has the right to call the shots as an unappointed powerbroker in the democratic process. The AWU has 150,000 members -about 2% of the workforce. The AWU as a right wing union is obviously a major donor to the ALP - but what does that buy? If the Rudd and others are more beholden to types like this and the people who elected then it does not say much about the ALP.
