CFMEU inquiry day two: Union misconduct claims to be examined as inquiry continues in Queensland

Before we say goodnight, here’s one detail from today’s proceedings that has sparked a strong response from another Queensland union.

Just before lunch, CFMEU administration investigator Geoffrey Watson referred to what he described as a memorandum of understanding involving “the police association” and the CFMEU.

“It was almost that the police would stop at the boundary [of a work site], and that was something to do with the memorandum of understanding … I didn’t understand,” he said.

Some thought this might be a reference to the Queensland Police Union, but its president Shane Prior said he was not aware of the existence of any such memorandum.

“I find it offensive and outrageous any insinuation suggesting police who have sworn an oath to disrupt and stop criminal behaviour would not act where required by law and jeopardise their own integrity,” Prior said in a statement.

“Police put their lives on the line every day and they are proud of their ethics. Mr Watson is wrong to suggest the QPU has signed any agreement with the CFMEU. I will forever defend the integrity and moral code of Queensland Police Officers.”

This wraps up our coverage for today. Please join us again for continuing coverage tomorrow.

Ruth O’Gorman KC, counsel for ousted CFMEU officials Michael Ravbar and Kane Lowth, wraps up the last substantive part of today’s hearing with a brief cross-examination of CFMEU administration investigator Geoffrey Watson SC.

O’Gorman gleans some further detail from Watson about the nature and scope of the supporting documents behind his Queensland report – particularly around interviews.

Watson says he took handwritten notes, but did not make recordings to ensure those he spoke to did not “clam up”, and that these had all been provided to the inquiry via a summons.

Electronically typed versions of most of these interviews were also made.

With that, and some logistical discussion about future hearings when O’Gorman may seek leave to cross-examine Watson more thoroughly based on what further detail of his investigation may be shared, today’s session comes to an end.

The inquiry resumes tomorrow morning with evidence from CFMEU administrator Mark Irving KC.

CFMEU administration investigator Geoffrey Watson now tells the inquiry, after some questions from Commissioner Stuart Wood, that there is evidence of “bad employers” in Queensland with links to outlaw motorcycle gangs.

“I fear that a number of the worst of the delegates, I think you’ll find that they’ve been hand-picked by some of the organisers, and the contractors have been told to employ them,” Watson says, referencing Desmond Savage and Richie Atutolu, who were among those revealed in one of the reports tendered to the inquiry today.

“I think it would be incredibly rare that a decent employer would be putting on and keeping on with people who were misbehaving as employees.

“But there occasionally might be, I fear, of a couple of bad employers up here in Queensland. I didn’t know enough about this, and I looked into it, but only from the outside.

“There was a labour hire firm that [was] supplying labour, I think mainly to BMD, and there were reasons to doubt that labour hire firm.

“Can I just say, that was all AWU stuff. I only asked a few questions about it. I got unsatisfactory answers, and all I can say is, there are, there is evidence that there are some bad employers that may be run by bikies, who may be bringing in bikies.”

CFMEU administration investigator Geoffrey Watson SC tells the inquiry he believes it should probe a memorandum of understanding he saw during his work between police and the union relating to industrial sites.

Pressed on the matter by counsel assisting Mark Costello KC, Watson says while he did not have a firm recollection of the parties to the agreement, he is “confident that it involved the police association” and the CFMEU, though not limited to it, covering police action on “industrial sites”.

“It wasn’t really within my remit. But it was of great interest to me that there’s all this going on, why the police weren’t engaged,” Watson says of one high-profile incident detailed in his report, in which CFMEU members blockaded non-union workers from accessing a site.

“But it was almost that the police would stop at the boundary, and that was something to do with the memorandum of understanding.

“I didn’t understand. I thought that the criminal law was across, up and down, and everywhere in Australia.”

Turning to instances of union hostility towards contractors and employers, counsel assisting Mark Costello takes Geoffrey Watson SC to the Cross River Rail “hotspot” for CFMEU violence.

In one incident, an industrial relations representative for one of the project’s contractors – a category Watson says has been a particular target – was told by a CFMEU official “there’s a bullet with your name on it”.

Speaking about a personal campaign towards another industrial representative, Watson says the person had spoken with him for a while and was “very open” before he was contacted by a private law firm acting for contractor CPB and “all of a sudden, they all clammed up”.

“A lot of the major contractors, they just will whinge from the sidelines but they will not assist in finding solution,” Watson says – with the exception of one which he says did not wish to be named.