QUEENSLAND POLICE-SERVICE . ·:·· · ;;:~,4~ 1
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STATEMENT OF WITNESS
QP0125
01/06
.6.15
Occurrence #:
Statement no.: 1 ·
------------------·--------------------------- Date: 27/08/2015
Statement of
Date of birth:
Edward Keith
Age: ·60
Occupation: · Self Employed Company
Director
Police officer taking statement
Name: MESSER, Rodney James
Rank: Detective Sergeant
Region/Command/Division: State Crime Command
Reg.no.: -
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Station:
Trade Union Task
Force
Statement:
Edward Keith BUTLER states:
1. My full and correct name is Edward Keith BUTLER and I am 60 ye~rrs old, my
date of birth being the - I currently live at an address lmown.to the
police.
2. I am the Director and Owner of Marveldale Pty Ltd trading as East Coast
Concrete Contractors, this peing a concreting company for both eommercial
and Government Contracts.
I have been the Owner and Director of this
business since 1981 i The business premises is situated at - -
~ith contact number ( 0 7 ) 3. The ABN number for my company is 20 050 411 366.
4. I am a licenced contractor with the Queensland Building Construction
Commission (QBCC) and also registered in New South Wales with the office
of New South Wales Fair Trading.
5. My background is that I am a qualified concreter, completing my
apprenticeship about 44 years ago.
6. I commenced contracting in 1981 for the Barclay Brothers up in the mines out
___,__
of Moranbah. The next proj ect I did was that I built the town of Glenden, just
out of Collinsville. I did all the concreting for the town.
/:'(Witness's signature)
QP 0125 Statement of Witness
(Justice of the Peace (Qual.)/
Commissioner for Declarations's signatUre)
Page 1 ofS
CONTINUED STATEMENT OF: BUTLER, Edward Keith
7. I came back to the Gold Coast from the mines in 1983 and worked on and off
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with other house builders and· i:tf··late 1983 ·ot'·l984 with Roh ·McMaster ,
Constructions and worked on the. Anchorage at Tweed Heads, then Bayview
Harbour at Runaway Bay. We were at this site for 5 years from 1985 to 1990.
This really launched me into commercial building, with large construction
companies conta9ting the company with jobs and didn't need to advertise.
8. Presently the company employs approximately 120 staff and sometimes more.
It still is a family run company with my sons, daughter and wife all
contributing. I have stepped back from running of the company the last few
years due to health reasons. We are the biggest concreting company in South
East Queensland.
We specialise in Government work and work on large
construction site, not the general house slabs.
9. Back in late 1989 I got behind paying my blokes superannuation. The union
. back then, Builders Labourers Federation (BLF), wanted to see my books and
because I was behind I was out of favour with union jobs. At the time I was
doing 14 high-rises and kicked off 12 ofthem. Because ofthis I had to go back
and do smaller jobs around northem New South Wales. After 9 years of doing
smaller jobs I was approached by Transfield and did a bridge in Tweed. From
this the company managed to get back into larger civil jobs not under the
control of the BLF within Southeast Queensland.
10. The company currently has Enterprise Bargaining Agreement (EBA) with the
Construction, Forestry, Mining & Energy Union (CFMEU).
11. The company generally works by word of mouth, I have been in the industry
for so long now, I am well lmown by all of the builders. I have advertise
through yellow pages on occasions.
12. I know the persons, David and Jennifer Hanna. I have known them for over 10
years. I knew David back when he was with the BLF. I believed that when I
first met David he could have been the Assistance Secretary for the BLF.
13. I have gotten to know David quite well over the years I would descried him as
a pleasant type of a guy I have even had him come to a suite that I have with
the Titans Football.
14. I also know Jenny, she's employed at a business called Red Roo which sells
work shirts, our company just buys the shirts through them, the service and
quality are very good and I have never had a problem with them. I think
(Witness's signature)
QP 0125 Statement of Witness
(Justice of the Peace (Qual.)/
Commissioner for Declarations's signature)
rst
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Page 2 ofS
CONTINUED STATEMENT OF: BUTLER, Edward Keith
met Jenny at an awards night dinners. It would have been at a Construction
·· · Skills Trade Centre awards night. · Some of our company trainees have got
awards in the past and also our company has received awards as well.
15. Back in 2005, I went and got tested because my wife wanted me to have a 50
year old check-up and found out I had Hepatitis C. This was from a blood
transfusion I received when I was 18 years old. Following this I subsequently
cirrhosis of the liver which attracted cancer, eventually needing a liver
transplant, went to America to the Mayo Clinic for testing and upon returning
to Australia I ended up getting a new liver on the 6 December 2014. Preceding
getting the new liver I would say the previous 2 years were pretty hazy to me
due to the illness.
16. I do have a memory of having a coffee with David Hanna in 2013 at the
Barracks in Brisbane. I don't know exact dates of this and the exact wording of
the conversation but it was along the lines of the following.
17. David told me that he had bought some land around Cornubia and was going to
build a house. He wanted to get acreage for his kids for motor bikes and things
like that. I know a bit about David and he is a family oriented bloke, coming
from a family of 12.
18. David asked me if we could do his concerting on the house and I thought to
myself I'm not going to do this for nothing. David didn't ask me for any
favours at all but I thought him being the Union representative that he may
have hit me up, but he didn't.
19. I told David that we wouldn't be cheap because the company isn't geared to do
domestic works. David asked me if we could do the job 'off labour'. This
means that the labour is paid for by another job. That is to say that the boys
may do a job in the morning and the wages for them were covered for the day.
Then the boys would go and do David's job. This is common practice within
the industry. David told me that he would get the slab ready as well and be
able to scrape up a few blokes to help as well. I told him that I didn't know
anyone that had excavator and David told me that he had bought one, being on
a bit ofland and he could do all that. I said to him that we'd do the job and bill
him.
20. Our company does have concrete pumps but I do know that we didn't do the
concrete pumping on David's house. I'm pretty sure that we only sent a£ w
(Witness's signature)
QP 0125 Statement of Witness
(Justice ofthe Peace (Qual.)/
Commissioner for Declarations's signature)
Page 3 of5
CONTINUED STATEMENT OF: BUTLER, Edward Keith
workers out to this job and most probably after them finishing a job at another
site. .·It could have been atourtd the time we were working on· the Logan
Hospital and they did a small job like a ramp or verticles, something like that
and they went off from there.
21. I remember around the time it was getting close to getting back onto the
transplant list and coming back from America. David came down to my house,
I'm pretty sure that· at this tiine David made payment for the concreting on his
house. At the time my son, Conan was there as well. Conan is the manager but
I still have the overall say on what jobs the company goes ahead with. I think
that David and Conan spoke about the payment details for this job and came to
an agreement. I don't have a great recollection of this time due to my illness.
22. Since this time David and I have spoken. We would talk the phone, catch up
for coffee. Following my operation David and Jenny even sent me a get well
gift as well. I have never had any issues with either David or Jenny. To me
they seem to both be genuine family couple.
23. Our company has only recently started contracting for MIRVAC. This was
through their construction manager Timothy Booth contacting us as Timothy
knows both myself and Conan through the business and knows Conan from
outside sports.
24. I do not know personally either Adam Moore or Matt McCullum. I only know
of Moore because I heard Conan talking about his past history at MIRVAC.
25. During our association, David has never hit me up for anything. David and my
relationship has always been very good and gotten on well.
26. On the morning of the 27 August 2015 police from the Royal Commission
Task Force came to my home and executed a search watTant. I was asked if I
would provide a statement about the work our company provided to David
Hanna on his house build.
27. I then was taken to the Coolangatta Police Station and provided this statement
to Detective Sergeant Rodney Messer of the Trade Union Royal Commission
TaskForce.
28. During this process Detective Messer showed me an East Coast Concrete
Contractors, Tax Invoice (Invoice Number 14801) for the work at David
Hanna's house.
The agree quotation on this job was for $39,800.00 with
approved variations of$21,613.00, with the adjusted :lue of$18,~87.00.
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QP 0125 Statement ofWitness
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(Justice ofthe Peace (Qual.)/
Commissioner for Declarations's signature)
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prepanng statement)
Page4 ofS
CONTINUED STATEMENT OF: BUTLER, Edward Keith
29. Also I was shown Progress Claim Valuation dated 31 December 2013. This
was a breakdown on the work provided and variations~ On saying this the total
invoice amount for work provided came to $20,005.70 including GST.
Edward Keith Butler
Justices Act 1886
I acknowledge by virtue of section 110A(6C)(c) of the Justices Act 1886 that:
(1)
This written statement by me dated 27/8/2015 and contained in the pages numbered 1 to 5 is tme to the best of my knowledge
and belief; and
(2)
I make this statement knowing that, if it were admitted as evidence, I may be liable to prosecution for stating in it anything that I
know is false.
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....... ,............................................................................................. Signature
Signed at Coolangatta this 27th day of Augnst 2015
(Witness's signature)
QP 0125 Statement ofWitness
(Justice of the Peace (Qual.)/
Commissioner for Declarations's signature)
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