Cash blames Labor, unions for court order

FEDERAL Jobs Minister Michaelia Cash claims she is being bullied by Labor, after deciding to challenge a court order to give evidence over raids on Australian Workers’ Union offices.

However, Labor has accused the minister of avoiding scrutiny, as two agencies revealed they had already spent more than $600,000 of taxpayers’ money on the case.

The court case relates to two raids in October on the AWU’s headquarters in Melbourne and Sydney.

Senator Cash went on the counter-attack yesterday after being issued a subpoena to give evidence in the Federal Court on August 1 and provide documents by June 20.

“Today is just another effort by the union movement to protect Bill Shorten,” she said.

Senator Cash will apply to have the subpoena, which she says is a union stunt, set aside.

The raids stemmed from a Registered Organisations Commission investigation into a $100,000 donation from the AWU to activist group GetUp in 2006.

Senator Cash said Mr Shorten had questions to answer over the donation, given he was secretary of the union and a director of GetUp at the time.

The raids drew scrutiny after the media arrived at the offices before police, thanks to a tip-off from Senator Cash’s media adviser, David De Garis.

Mr De Garis has also been issued a subpoena, along with Fair Work Ombudsman employee Mark Lee and Registered Organisations Commission official Chris Enright.

The AWU says the raids and investigation were unlawful.

The Federal Court found the AWU had a legitimate reason to see documents from Senator Cash’s office to determine if there was political motivation for the raids.