One may wonder at the cost of buying a union, well you really can’t buy one like you would buy a used car but, if you’re involved in the filthy factional dealings of right wing politics of the Australian labor party, then you are in a position to slide up to any salesmen dressed as a pox doctor’s clerk and do the deal of a lifetime as long as you belong to the right faction.
Like all officials of the HSUA you were going to have to choose between the “rats with the gold teeth” or the geezer with the cheap suit that’s all over him like a rash
The disgraced and scandal ridden Health Services union was one such case of naming your own price to buy a portion of an industrial organization with a once rich history of representing its members.
Like a dodgy company going broke overnight leaving its employees devastated and without their entitlements and in some cases not paying compensation for employees who have been awarded damages by the courts for deaths and serious injury. Phoenix companies raise out of the ashes ,open another company under a different name under the same directors and continue to trade under the new company name. No entitlements or judgements by the courts under the previous company name and the employees are left high and dry.
The Health Services Union is not unlike a Phoenix company leaving it members without any representation while robbing and plundering the union of valuable financial resources.The cost to the ALP to buy this union was $230.000 The previous leadership of the HSUA behaved in a way that could only be described as having their own personal fiefdom ,excessive wages that even the previous secretary Kathy Jackson described as obscene,and rorting the expenses paid to officials. With apologies to previous officials of this union that represented their members without fear or favour . Jan Armstrong, Joan Beard and Gail Gills come readily to mind.
Asmar was a previous Mayor in the city of Darebin in Victoria but left the post of councillor in rather dodgy circumstances. The Victorian Ombodsmam was in the process of an investigation into the council amid allegations of corruption you could see Dianna slipping and sliding in the shit she had left behind.
The honest members of Darebin council are still waiting anxiously for that report that was completed 6 months ago. Who knows if a deal has been done.
I still reckon that if it looks like a duck,waddles like a duck and quacks it probably is a duck , if the Ombudsman’s report ever sees the light of day you would have to think was there a deal done. Let’s wait and see!
Now Dianna Asmar has turned up as the new secretary of the HSUA number one branch after spending $230.000 from slush funds set up by Ceasar Melham Secretary of the now famous Australian Workers Union , slush fund fame
Melham is known to have set up a fund worth $500.000 to assist right wing unions in their re election campaigns and is the sole signatory of the fund called Industry 2020. Where does $500.000 come from ? well it’s extracted from employers who attend and generously contribute to Melhams fund in order to have only Yellow unions to contend with.
Employers contributed significant funds to Industry 2020 and you have to have serious concerns about employers contributing to have only union officials who are compliant to employers wishes.
When I spoke to Asmar and asked where she was raising the money to do 6 mail outs to members along with 2 cd’s to every member she said that she sold raffle tickets and held the odd BBQ in her back yard – $230.000 worth!!! NO That’s Bullshit!!
This is a union under the same control of the right wing factions of the ALP that chewed up and spat out the old leadership when it suited them, my prediction is that not much if any will change.
The old leadership of Jackson and Balano never delivered for the membership who have not had a pay rise for over 3 years .I can only hope this union membership may reap some benefits after all the union is now controlled by some influential people in the Gillard Government
The sad fact of the recent elections is that a rank and file group made up of totally clean skins working for the the members won the election in the number 3 branch, unfortunately the rank and file groups contesting the number 1 branch were unable to match the massive slush funds contributed by employers and such unions the AWU, the Transport workers and National union of workers and the plumbers union, made sure that workers have no control over the officials of the number 1 branch and no control over its officials.
A sad day for the trade union movement when yellow unions and employers control what is best for union members
I write as I speak although in my younger days I left school in primary grade 6 but I hade a succession of men in white wigs always trying to advance my education by granting me scholarships in Government institutions.
noel marshall says
hello denis dianna asmar has been running hsu number one branch for five months now and so far neither myself nor anybody at my work place has seen anything or heard anything of this lame excuse for a union so the question i need someone to answer is this is their any sign of life at the union office in park st south melbourne ? if i was to visit the union office would i find people slumped at their desks covered in dust and cobb webs would i find them in a state of suspended animation ? is their anyone out there who can shed light on this twilight zone style mystery ?
TBM says
Noel thanks foryourrecent letter about your workplace.
It’s great to hear from you each time . Maintain the rage comrade
Darren says
The whole union is arse backwards becuase it all about the power trip these pricks are on instead of serving the members. There was a delegate called Donna Conquo that supposedly represented workers at the Epworth Hospital when management decided harassment and abuse was in fashion. About ten people left within two or three months with no help from her or her kind. And when I say no help I mean she would have been helping to get rid of these workers in collusion with management. I bet she still has a job as a delegate. They don’t give up fuck about unions or what they represent.
noel marshall says
yes many thanks for this article denis ,for a long time now I have suspected that unions such as the HSU are doing sweetheart deals with management in our age care facility. I am convince thie union is working in with management against the best interests of its rank and file membership. I have tried to contact HSU organizers and officials several times leaving phone messages and nobody ever rings back. And this is all since Diana Asmar has taken over. We are in a precarious situation at work and getting zero help from the union. And this is how I get treated as a 16 year member of the union. i have a serious issue at work and in frustration I have had to engage the services of a gentleman who runs a company called Just Relations., to try and get some help. Fancy any union member having to go to this trouble for some help.
jamesie says
About time someone brought this to the publics attention well done!!!
canada goose outlets toronto says
Major thankies for the article.Thanks Again. Much obliged.