The ACTU is preparing to train affiliates to comply with the more stringent governance requirements under the Turnbull Government's rules for registered organisations, as the new regulator develops plans to increase awareness of protections for reprisals against whistleblowers - which extend to imprisonment.
The HSU says it is unlikely to pursue former national secretary and ex-Labor MP Craig Thomson for the repayment of about $378,000 because it would incur further legal costs with little chance of recovering the money.
The prosecution has reworked its case against former HSU leader Kathy Jackson, who now faces 164 charges that mostly relate to alleged theft and fraud from her time as a union official.
A Senate inquiry has recommended an employer who gives a union official a $20 bottle of wine for speaking at a conference be exempted from sanctions in the corrupting benefits legislation that is before the House of Representatives today.
The Federal Court has today ordered former TWU WA branch secretaries Jim McGiveron and Rick Burton to pay more than $65,000 in penalties, mostly for their roles in purchasing two "luxury utes" for their personal use and arranging a redundancy payment of almost $400,000 to McGiveron.
Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull has this afternoon introduced legislation that outlaws payments of "corrupting benefits" to unions and imposes penalties on those who provide or receive such payments.
The NUW has today asked its former NSW leader Derrick Belan about evidence he gave to the Heydon Royal Commission, as it defends his brother Nick's unfair dismissal claim in the FWC.
A court has refused to summarily dismiss a general protections claim instigated by two former CFMEU construction and general division NSW branch organisers who maintain they were driven out of their jobs for whistleblowing.
The FWC has ruled that the NUW can rely on evidence given to the Heydon Royal Commission by former official Nick Belan in its defence of his unfair dismissal claim, because the Commission is not a court.
