HSU whistleblower Kathy Jackson told the Heydon Royal Commission this afternoon that she once handed over $7,000 from a union political fund to David Asmar - a former staffer of Labor Senator Stephen Conroy - for "ALP memberships".
Former HSU leader Marco Bolano has told the Heydon Royal Commission this morning that he was "surprised" to discover that tobacco giant Philip Morris had contributed funds to his 2009 election campaign and "stunned" that political "enemy" Bill Shorten had done likewise.
Future Prime Minister Julia Gillard told a Melbourne builder in 1993 that AWU leader and her then boyfriend Bruce Wilson was paying for her home renovations, the Heydon Royal Commission has heard.
The Master Builders Association has called on Canberra to act to give its proposed building watchdog the power to deal with secondary boycotts, which unions are using as a "weapon that has the capacity to send Master Builders' members to the wall or inflict sufficient damage to warrant complicity".
Fair Work Commission member Ian Cambridge, a former national secretary of the AWU, will appear this week before the Heydon Royal Commission, which will resume its hearings into the union’s Workplace Reform Association "slush fund".
FWC President Iain Ross has this afternoon flatly rejected a suggestion that his involvement in superannuation funds "25 years ago" means he has a conflict of interest in sitting on the expert panel's review of default funds.
The construction watchdog's review of "cold cases" has identified another 14 cases where penalties were agreed through negotiation or discontinued, a Senate Estimates hearing has been told. Meanwhile, the Fair Work Ombudsman has rejected suggestions that it "washes its hands" of 457 visa complaints.
