The objective of the trade union royal commission into corruption was to taint the reputation of the union movement, the ACTU says.
ACTU secretary Dave Oliver has rejected royal commissioner Dyson Heydon's findings, released on Wednesday, which say that union misconduct has taken place in every Australian jurisdiction except the Northern Territory.
"We reject any assertion that there is unlawful, corrupt conduct in our unions," he told reporters on Wednesday.
Mr Oliver denied Mr Heydon's assertion that "thugs and bullies" were involved in the union movement, and said "such extreme language" only highlighted the political nature of the commission.
He said the report was politically motivated and that it was no coincidence it came out only a week after the Productivity Commission's report into penalty rates.
"We had the Productivity Commission hand down recommendations to attack wages and conditions of labour workers, as well as going after Sunday penalty rates. "It was always about prosecuting an ideological, partisan agenda," he said.
While workers struggled to make ends meet, the federal government was spending $80 million on a two-year commission that wielded only a "handful" of matters that should be referred for further inquiry or action, Mr Oliver said.
"There are a number of isolated cases that we find reprehensible and those individuals involved should face the full force of the law, but it is wrong to suggest that there is widespread systemic problem across the movement," he said.
"I'll be the first one to stand up in front of those significant issues and say, yep, throw the book at them.
"There is no place for corruption within the movement and we do take a zero tolerance approach to this, whether it's in the union movement or anywhere else."
Commissioner Dyson Heydon on Wednesday referred Victorian MP and former state secretary of the Australian Workers Union (AWU) Cesar Melhem and former Health Services Union secretary Kathy Jackson for possible corruption charges.
The AWU was referred to Victorian prosecutors over deals it made with Cleanevent, Thiess John Holland, Chiquita Mushrooms, ACI Operations and Winslow Constructors.
Mr Heydon also found that their aberrations could not be regarded as isolated, and said it was clear that in "many parts of the world constituted by Australian trade union officials, there is room for louts, thugs, bullies, thieves, perjurers, those who threaten violence, errant fiduciaries and organisers of boycotts".
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