Once a rat

Nigel Hadgkiss' sudden entry into the world of paid 
advertising has renewed calls for the scrapping of his Building 
Industry Task Force. The Task Force chose just six days before a 
Senate Committee is due to release its report on the Building and 
Construction Industry Improvement Bill, to advertise a service to 
workers. The Construction, Forestry, Mining and Energy Union 
(CFMEU) smelled a rat.

"These advertisements are run under the banner of the Task Force 
but merely divert people with a complaint to Wage Line — a 
service already offered by the Department of Workplace 
Relations", said the CFMEU's Dave Noonan.

"It's an admission by the Task Force's own marketing department 
that it refuses to prosecute employers who rip off workers. The 
Task Force claims to have zero tolerance for breaches of the law, 
but will not prosecute bosses who steal workers' money."

Mr Noonan pointed out that in the year and a half the Task Force 
had operated under Hadgkiss, it had not prosecuted a single 
employer, anywhere in Australia, for short changing a building 
worker.

He contrasted that with evidence placed before the Building 
Industry Royal Commission that showed the CFMEU, alone, had won 
more than $30 million for underpaid members over a six-year 
period.

He noted that the timing of the Task Force ads, run in 
metropolitan newspapers, was "no coincidence".

"The Task Force has been embarrassed by revelations in the Senate 
Committee. The ads are a bit of political spin just days before 
the Committee report becomes public."

Hadgkiss told the Senate Inquiry he wanted greater powers which 
would flow from the Building and Construction Industry 
Improvement Bill.

However, the inquiry heard allegations that Task Force members 
were already paying apprentices for information, and covertly 
recording conversations on building sites.

Hadgkiss told the inquiry it was legal for "anybody" to secretly 
record conversations in WA.

The issue of covert recordings comes a year after former 
undercover policeman, Michael Kennedy, told a lower house inquiry 
that when Hadgkiss had been senior investigator for the Wood 
Royal Commission into police corruption in WA, it had routinely 
engaged in illegal communications intercepts.

Kennedy told the Standing Committee on Legal and Constitutional 
Affairs he had been fitted up with the help of covert recordings 
for falsely accusing police officers of corruption.

"I was convicted because I pleaded guilty. I was absolutely done 
over", Kennedy said.

"Those people from the Joint Drug Task Force were all exposed in 
the Wood Royal Commission as being corrupt. The man who charged 
me was Nigel Hadgkiss. The man who revealed them years later was 
Nigel Hadgkiss."

Kennedy said he had lodged formal complaints about the "criminal 
and illegal activities of Hadgkiss" and others, at the time. 
Hadgkiss was subsequently exonerated of wrong doing but Kennedy 
alleged evidence and witnesses he put forward were never tested 
or interviewed.