Construction union boss ‘had $100k back-up kitty’

David Hanna may have had up to $100,000 set aside in case Mirvac didn’t cover all costs of completing his luxury house.

The house at Cornubia built by union boss David Hanna.

Union heavyweight David Hanna may have had up to $100,000 set aside in case building giant Mirvac didn’t cover all of the costs of completing his luxury house — even though company staff believed it would be billed back to a commercial project in suburban Brisbane.

As the construction union prepares a legal bid to stop evidence seized in Canberra from being used by the trade union royal commission, Mirvac project manager Mathew McAllum told a hearing in Brisbane that he felt uncomfortable organising tradesmen working at a shopping centre project to carry out work at Mr Hanna’s Cornubia house in 2013.

Mr Hanna was then the leader of the Builders Labourers Federation, and earlier this year resigned as the construction boss of the Construction Forestry Mining and Energy Union.

Among the things Mr ­ ­Mc­Allum did at the home was get quotes for a special ducted “vacuum system” to be installed in the walls of the large four-bedroom, whereby a vacuum cleaning hose could be connected to outlets in each room.

Mr McAllum said there had been a discussion in which it was mentioned that the Hannas had between $90,000 and $100,000 set aside because “whatever couldn’t be acquired elsewhere they would cover the costs”.

“It was during the process of carrying out the work I had mentioned to my wife that I didn’t want to be going there,” he said, after unsuccessfully asking to be excused from testifying. “It’s known in the business that people do favours for people. I just didn’t feel, on this occasion, that way.”

Mr McAllum went as far as removing the Hannas’ names from building plans before sending them to tradespeople, whom he hoped would not realise their work was being done for a union boss and would fail to bill the work to Mirvac.

Later in the hearing, he said: “Did I have an understanding that they wouldn’t charge him? Yes.”

He told the commission he first heard about the house in a meeting with senior Mirvac construction manager Adam Moore in April 2013 at which he was asked to organise tradesmen for the home. “We did have a discussion about payment and being that the Orion (shopping centre) project had some good savings, that (it) could be funded out of Orion.”

Mr Hanna and Mr Moore are set to appear before the commission as early as today.

This comes as the CFMEU seeks an urgent injunction from the ACT Supreme Court to block evidence seized last month by the Australian Federal Police in Canberra from being used.

CFMEU construction division national secretary Dave Noonan said the AFP raid on its ACT branch on August 25 was “unnecessary and unlawful”.

“If the royal commission police taskforce wanted further material, the royal commission could have issued further notices (to produce) rather than storming our office.”

He said the union had complied with all royal commission notices to produce “which it can share with the police taskforce … The police were at our office for nearly 13 hours and our staff assisted them by identifying documents and providing passwords and PINs”.

Mr Noonan said police then used a second warrant to continue the search, “on the basis it was necessary ‘to prevent the concealment, loss or destruction of property’. We say that warrant was invalid because there was no evidence to justify that finding.”

The CFMEU will seek orders that the AFP return all seized mat­erials to the union.