Piers Akerman: Nod to Kitching sinks Shorten’s credibility

Kitching may be the ticking time bomb needed to ­finally shred any skerrick of credibility Shorten retains.

Piers Akerman.

OPPOSITION leader Bill Shorten wilfully distorted Immigration Minister Peter Dutton’s straightforward and factual account of the unprecedented and disproportionate representation of Lebanese Muslims among Australia’s convicted terrorists to distract the media from his own flawed choice.

With the government finally cracking down on union corruption, Shorten was in the firing line over his “captain’s pick” appointment of Victorian Labor Senator Kimberley Kitching.

Now, Kitching may be the ticking time bomb needed to ­finally shred any skerrick of credibility Shorten retains.

The inclusion of Kitching in any company would be an ­insult to all other participants, but Labor MPs and senators have to grin and bear it while Shorten still has the numbers.

While much of the media has been fascinated by the challenge to One Nation Senator Rod Culleton’s candidacy, too little attention has been paid to Shorten’s total, unalloyed support for Kitching who still faces an unresolved recommendation for possible criminal charges arising from the Royal Commission into Trade Union Governance and Corruption.

In his interim report, royal commissioner Dyson Heydon said the federal Director of Public Prosecutions should consider whether Kitching should be prosecuted for “aiding and abetting” after allegedly unlawfully doing the workplace right-of-entry tests of six HSU No. 1 branch officials, including HSU branch secretary Diane Asmar ­(another Shorten favourite).

Securing permits to enter workplaces is essential for union officials so they can speak to members and investigate member complaints. Under the criminal code, the offence of knowingly or recklessly giving false information carries a maximum prison term of 12 months.

Kitching was found by Graeme Watson, one of the Vice-Presidents of the Fair Work Commission to have ­illegally completed the workplace right-of-entry testing (when Shorten was Workplace Relations Minister), on behalf of other union officials to gain right of entry permits.

The Fair Work Commission specifically found that her evidence was not truthful or ­reliable. The vice-president said: “I do not accept (her or Asmar’s) denials as being truthful or reliable.”

Tasmanian Liberal Senator Eric Abetz said Kitching went on to brag about her actions which put union leaders into workplaces, pretending that they had done the safety tests and understood the safety standards that were necessary to go into those worksites, but knowing that they did not meet those safety standards.

Shorten appointed Kitching to the Senate seat vacated by former Senator Stephen Conroy, over both the objections of Conroy and, it is understood, the shadow Attorney General Mark Dreyfus, who holds the seat of Isaacs.

According to media reports last week, Dreyfus actually threatened to resign if Kitching was appointed to the casual Senate vacancy. Dreyfus, proving himself again to be one of Labor’s major blowhards, didn’t follow through with his threat but significantly Dreyfus has not denied he made it nor did he claim to have been misrepresented last week after the manager of government business, Christopher Pyne, loudly attacked Shorten and Kitching over the appointment, while challenging Dreyfus to deny his threat to resign.

Tellingly, she does not enjoy the support of Shorten’s only rival for Labor leadership, Anthony Albanese.

The HSU’s ties to Labor ­became notorious when former Prime Minister Julia Gillard offered her unequivocal support for former HSU boss and former Labor MP Craig Thomson, who was found guilty of    theft   from the union in ­December 2014, following lengthy legal battles over the revelation that he had used union credit cards to pay for prostitutes.

Kitching and her husband, Andrew Landeryou, are both former bankrupts. Landeryou used to operate the scandalous, libellous and frequently defamatory website Vexnews, from which Kitching never dissociated herself. The website was used to launch wild and baseless attacks on those who might be seen as enemies to Shorten and his faction.

Both Kitching and Lander-you enjoy the continuing ­patronage of Victorian Labor MP Michael Danby. Shorten’s brazen support for an individual the subject of findings that she should be considered for prosecution in relation to workplace safety standards is not surprising given his propensity for selling out the workers for the benefit of union bosses, again as evidenced by the royal commission into trade union corruption.

Under a 1998 enterprise agreement signed by Shorten’s AWU branch with cleaning contractor Cleanevent, around 5000 workers lost as much as $400 million in wages and benefits. Another union-friendly deal Shorten struck with mushroom farmer Chiquita Mushrooms saw permanent workers replaced by temporary employees and Shorten’s AWU branch receive $150,000 in tax-free payments.

Labor friendly media mates do no favours for their clients by their failure to explore the deep failings of Bill Shorten’s character.

He has sold out the workers Labor has claimed to champion, he has inflamed racist debate with his outrageous charges against Dutton’s accurate assessment of the historical failure of ill-educated, illiterate Lebanese migrants to assimilate, and he has now placed a person alleged to be dishonest in the Senate.

This record should shake even the most rusted-on of True Believers unless they, too, are prepared to sacrifice their integrity for sewer politics.

Originally published as Piers Akerman: Nod to Kitching sinks Shorten’s credibility