DODGY ABBOTT’S DODGY COMMISSION = DODGY BOSSES OFF THE HOOK

Tony Abbott’s new Royal Commission into unions is following a script that will be very familiar to anyone who paid attention to the Cole Royal Commission a dozen years ago. And once again, it looks like dodgy employers will be let off the hook, writes JIM MARR, author of First The Verdict.

SUSPECT employers who poured hundreds of thousands of dollars into Liberal Party coffers won’t be called to account by Tony Abbott’s corruption Royal Commission.

The Prime Minister’s terms of reference, released in February, make it clear that Royal Commissioner Dyson Heydon will not be asked to examine businesses that have left workers and small businesses high and dry after tipping six figure sums into Liberal Party accounts.

This will be a relief to operators of Queensland-based Walton Construction who paid $430,000, as “rent”, to an LNP-linked trust before leaving sub-contractors millions of dollars out of pocket when it collapsed, last year.

And to those behind Steve Nolan Constructions which, Australian Electoral Commission records show, tipped at least $200,000 into NSW and federal LNP accounts in the two years before it went belly-up, owing workers and contractors more than $30 million.

As Abbott announced his latest taxpayer-funded Royal Commission, hundreds of former Steve Nolan employees picketed two Sydney sites in a bid to retrieve some of their money.

Other employers Abbott appears to have deliberately written out of his Royal Commission script include Leighton Holdings, mired in allegations of bribery and corruption on a grand scale, and Australian Water Holdings (AWH) the outfit accused of fleecing a publicly-owned utility while delivering hundreds of thousands of dollars into Liberal Party accounts.

AWH, of course, was also the company that paid Cabinet Minister and leading Liberal Party fundraiser Arthur Sinodinis a cool $200,000 for less than 50 hours’ work.

Terms of reference explicitly target unions
In an interview with ABC Radio, Abbott insisted the Royal Commission, that opens in Sydney this week, would be a fair dinkum investigation of organisational corruption and that unions would not be unfairly targeted.

“This isn’t declaring war on anyone, it’s declaring war on wrongdoing,” the Prime Minister said. “It’s declaring that there are certain standards in our society and whether you’re a company official or a union official, you’ve got to obey the law.”

Speaking the same day, Attorney General George Brandis said any suggestion of corruption in the business community would be investigated by the royal commission.

These claims are hard to square with the fact that the government has named the inquiry the Royal Commission into Trade Union Corruption and Governance, and written terms of reference that order the investigation of five specific entities – The Australian Workers’ Union, the Construction, Forestry, Mining and Energy Union, the Communications Electrical and Plumbing Union, the Transport Workers’ Union and the Health Services Union.

There is simply no mention of businesses alleged to have gouged taxpayers or ripped off workers while topping up Liberal Party funds.