National Labor vice-president and Transport Workers Union head Tony Sheldon requested that an international money transfer be used to send $20,000 to his political allies in another union.
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The unusual payment method was revealed at the Royal Commission into union corruption by the Victorian and Tasmanian secretary of the TWU, Wayne Mader.
The inquiry heard that the leadership of the TWU’s Victorian and Tasmanian branch controlled two funds that now hold cash of about $400,000 and had been used to intervene in the elections of the disgraced Health Services Union and a bid by Mr Sheldon to become ALP president.
Mr Mader admitted that one of the funds, known informally as the Team Fund, had no written reports, rules or deed. It was a Commonwealth Bank account that has three signatories including Mr Mader.
Mr Mader said in 2012 that Mr Sheldon, who is the union’s national secretary, had asked that the $20,000 be moved from the Team Fund to an officers fund in the Electrical Trades Union.
Counsel Assisting Jeremy Stoljar accused Mr Mader of having given ‘‘false evidence’’ as he had earlier told the inquiry he had no memory of any donations to other union battles besides to the HSU. ‘‘It wasn’t false, it was the best of my recollection,’’ Mr Mader said.
A TWU spokesman said Mr Sheldon, who will be a witness at the commission this week, could not remember why he asked for an international cash transfer to be made. "The point must not be lost that election funds are contributed to voluntarily for democratic purposes."
The Team Fund has been in operation since the late 1960s and was funded through deductions from TWU officials and employees, the inquiry heard.
In 2009, Mr Mader said $15,000 in cash was given to Pauline Fegan, who had a ticket in elections in the HSU Victoria’s No.1 branch
That bitter three-way contest included candidates backed by Labor factional heavyweights Stephen Conroy, Bill Shorten and David Feeney.
Mr Stoljar put it to Mr Mader that he had tried to limit the production of documents and records from the fund to the Royal Commission. Mr Mader said the Team Fund was an account controlled not in his role as the secretary of the union but rather as the bank account holder.
‘‘I believe we produced those matters that were the union’s activities,’’ he said.
Mr Stoljar, in his opening comments, said examining the adequacy of governance rules for accounts such as the Team Fund was a ‘‘central focus of this commission’s inquiry’’. He said some of the practices were ‘‘not straightforward’’.
The inquiry was also told that in 2010, then Treasurer Wayne Swan, was the guest speaker at Moonee Valley racecourse for the first function of the Transport, Logistics, Advocacy and Training Association.
That Association, set up in 2010, has among its officers Mr Mader and two other TWU officials. Guests, including employers, paid $500 a ticket or $5000 for a table of 10 at its two functions.
Its stated purpose, Mr Stoljar said, is to promote greater awareness and understanding of transport logistics in Australia’s future and to support training of transport workers and conducting events and fund-raising to ‘‘pursue these goals’’.
Earlier this year it held $142,000 in cash. In 2011 $5000 had been withdrawn to support Mr Sheldon’s bid to become ALP federal president. It also paid $10,000 in 2012 to a slush fund linked to Mr Sheldon called the McLean Forum.
