United Firefighters Union boss Peter Marshall uses members’ money to pay brother’s business $77,000

Australia’s highest paid union leader used $77,000 of his members’ funds to pay his brother’s business to design the union’s website.

United Firefighters Union secretary Peter Marshall. Picture: AAP

Australia’s highest paid union leader used $77,000 of his members’ funds to pay a business owned by his brother to design the union’s website.

The United Firefighters’ Union paid Quintessential Services Pty Ltd $77,196.26 during the 2019-20 financial year for “website” services, according to public disclosure documents signed by union secretary Peter Marshall and filed with the federal government’s Registered Organisations Commission.

As the documents declare, Mr Marshall — who received a $51,000 pay rise over the same period to bring his full salary to $470,280 — is the brother of Quintessential Services owner Warren Marshall.

The union’s annual financial report, also lodged with the commission, shows it spent $2,151,485 on employee expenses for 12.3 full time equivalent staff members, or an average of almost $175,000 per person, including on wages and salaries, superannuation and other entitlements.

The report shows the UFU’s 4,031 members contributed $5,442,237 in membership subscriptions in 2019-20 — or an average of $1350 per member.

Members also contributed $476,585, or an average of almost $120 per person to a “litigation levy”, down from $1,468,029 in 2018-19.

The levy has previously sparked controversy, with a number of UFU members resigning from the union in protest at what was then a $520 annual levy in 2018.

The union spent $1,422,264 on “legal costs” in 2019-20, amid a secret probe by Victoria’s anti-corruption watchdog IBAC into the state’s fire services, and the relationship between the UFU and the Andrews government.

According to the financial report, the union has total assets worth $9.1m, including $3.4m in property, plant and equipment.

The union spent $770,313 on “social committee expenses” in 2019-20, compared with $105,812 the previous financial year.

The UFU also lists “$136,175” in revenue from “government COVID subsidies”.

A spokesman for Victorian Treasurer and Industrial Relations Minister Tim Pallas said the Andrews government had not provided the UFU with any COVID subsidies, indicating the cash may have come from the federal government’s JobKeeper scheme.

Mr Pallas’s office declined to comment on the UFU’s decision to award the website contract to Mr Marshall’s brother’s company

The UFU did not respond to The Australian’s questions, which included whether or not it ran a tender process to ensure members received value for money when the contract was awarded, and what the “government COVID subsidies” had paid for.

Opposition Industrial Relations spokesman Tim Smith said Mr Marshall “gets away with doing whatever he likes, whenever he likes” due to his “cosy relationship” with Premier Daniel Andrews and Acting Premier James Merlino.

“Not only is he paying himself a fortune, he’s now been exposed as giving his brother a tidy windfall from union coffers,” Mr Smith said.

“Ultimately the real losers are the taxpayers of Victoria who are pouring cash into the UFU through ridiculous industrial agreements signed up to by the Premier and his Deputy.”