Would you knowingly trust your financial future to the tender mercies of the Australian Workers Union? Bill Shorten’s former union, the AWU, that has been one of the stars of the Royal Commission into union shonks, is heavily involved in the superannuation industry. Not that its name appears anywhere in the TV advertisements exhorting us to put our retirement nest egg in their ‘safe hands’. The AWU has its union officials spread in influential director/trustee roles not only in union-dominated Industry Super funds, but also in ‘servicing companies’ hired by some of them at fees that generally don’t see the light of day. And that’s because the governance that the law requires for corporates, especially financial ones, simply doesn’t cover the $2 trillion super industry that has boomed since Paul Keating made super compulsory at 9 per cent going on 12 per cent.

So at a time when the AWU is making headlines for dudding workers it is supposed to protect, there is a lot to be said for ensuring that the superannuation savings of Australians are not at risk. Last week there was the Chiquita mushroom scandal where the AWU reportedly collected $150,000 in exchange for agreeing to replace permanent workers with less expensive part-timers. The AWU’s mushroom guru was assistant secretary Frank Leo who is on the board of the AWU’s financial servicing company, Chifley Financial Services, along with fellow AWU officials Scott McDine, Ben Swan and Stephan Bali. This followed news that Bill Shorten’s anointed successor as AWU Victorian branch secretary, Cesar Melham had to stand down as Victorian Labor’s newly appointed Government Whip after accusations of cheating low-paid workers to the benefit of the Union, with the employer expressing his gratitude by paying union memberships for unsuspecting ‘phantom’ workers in order to boost AWU numbers and voting power in Labor Party forums. Before he followed the trusted path from union boss into (state) parliament’s upper house, Melham had been not only a director of the giant CBUS industry fund, but also of the AWU’s substantially-owned Chifley Financial Services. And Chifley gets paid commissions; it has been a big earner

Being on these boards is also rewarding, judging by the court case where the ETU’s Dean Mighell sued Bernie Riordan for the $1.8 million in director’s fees he reckoned Riordan had pocketed as a director of its super funds and Chifley Financial. And there are plenty of AWU board members, although we don’t know what they are paid. On CBUS, the AWU is represented by its national vice-president Michael Zelinsky, with alternate Ben Davis, the AWU Victorian branch secretary. On Prime Super, which is unusual in having a majority of independent directors, it is AWU NSW state secretary Russell Collison. And on the big daddy of them all, Australian Super, Bill Shorten’s old spot has been taken by Scott McDine, AWU national president, with two union alternates. Then there is Queensland, which runs the local AWU its way – and where its heart and soul really reside. For all its bluster and fury, Victoria has fewer than 20,000 members against Queensland’s 45,000. But typical of the way these union-dominated funds have been able to ‘gear-up’ their operations with non-unionists, their Austsafe Super Fund, with three AWU directors on four-year terms, has almost 100,000 more clients than AWU members. Australia-wide the AWU has only 104,000 members, yet through its Industry Fund activities it has an influential role in the management of billions of dollars in hundreds of thousands of Australian superannuation accounts. This has been especially so after Shorten, as a minister with a clear conflict of interest in the Rudd/Gillard/Rudd government, gave his Industry Funds the near monopoly of ‘default’ status under the Fair Work Act that dumped thousands of customers into their laps.

But fear not. Assistant Federal Treasurer Josh Frydenberg last week outlined legislation to fix up this mess. His reform of the Superannuation Industry, particularly forcing corporate-style governance and independent directors on the union-dominated Industry Funds, will be subject to roars of protest from Labor, as demanded by the unions. Surprise surprise!