Julia Gillard was present at a meeting where a secret union 'slush fund' was named, a royal commission into union corruption has heard.The former prime minister has always maintained she knew nothing about alleged impropriety surrounding the Workplace Reform Association.The secretive entity was set up by the Australian Workers' Union WA branch in the early 1990s to help union officials win elections, and its money also allegedly paid for renovations at Ms Gillard's Melbourne home.Evidence at the second day of the Royal Commission into Trade Union Governance and Corruption claimed Ms Gillard was present at a 1993 meeting, at the Melbourne office of her then employer Slater and Gordon Lawyers, where the fund was named.Ms Gillard's then boyfriend AWU secretary Bruce Wilson, Ms Gillard's then boss Bernard Murphy and Mr Blewitt also attended.

slush fund...

don't know what ever that could mean..

durrrr...


for one she lied about it.. two, she damn well knew money came from that fund to renovate her home... etc etc etc

she didn't even keep proper procedure on the "legal" file..

she was in it up to her neck... 

True Blue... wrote on May 13^th, 2014 at 8:12pm:


The fund was named the "Workplace Reform Association" not the "Slush Fund".....There was no suggestion at the royal commission that Ms Gillard, who acted as an AWU lawyer, knew the fund's real purpose, despite being party to its naming....As for the other allegations you made about not keeping proper procedure on the "legal" file.....I saw nothing about this in the article.....Do you have any evidence to support this claim???

philperth2010 wrote on May 13^th, 2014 at 8:25pm:



phil  she was a lawyer... she was the LAWYER..

it was her job to read the fine print.. as the saying goes...

you cannot have a bite each way...she was either acting as the lawyer.. or she wasnt..

if she was.. then she knew exactly what she was doing....

if she didnt she wasnt much of a lawyer...

lawyers know all the pitfalls.. and cover ups.....sorry mate... but go back and read about the Widows Fund....she was all over it..

True Blue... wrote on May 13^th, 2014 at 8:12pm:


The fund was named the "Workplace Reform Association" not the "Slush Fund".....There was no suggestion at the royal commission that Ms Gillard, who acted as an AWU lawyer, knew the fund's real purpose, despite being party to its naming....As for the other allegations you made about not keeping proper procedure on the "legal" file.....I saw nothing about this in the article.....Do you have any evidence to support this claim???

JULIA Gillard admitted to law firm Slater & Gordon during an internal probe that she should have opened a file for the controversial legal work that she had done for her then client and boyfriend, union boss Bruce Wilson. 
 
A transcript from a tape-recorded interview with the firm's senior partner at the time, Peter Gordon, on September 11, 1995, shows that Ms Gillard, an industrial lawyer, said she had not billed Mr Wilson or the Australian Workers Union for her work on a legal entity for him.

The transcript, heavily redacted to prevent breaches of lawyer-client privilege and obtained by The Australian yesterday, is the only record of Ms Gillard answering questions in detail about her conduct in a union scandal that has dogged her for 17 years.

The existence of a transcript, an internal probe and other events - which led to the law firm considering terminating Ms Gillard's employment as a salaried partner because her relationship with the other partners had "fractured, and trust and confidence evaporated" - were not known until revelations at the weekend.

In the transcript, Ms Gillard was asked by Mr Gordon why the file was not opened on the firm's system. She said there was not "any great scientific explanation for that". durrrr 

"I didn't have any intention to charge on it, and from time to time I've done bits of work on files that I haven't opened up where I've just done relatively small jobs for unions that I wasn't intending to charge for," she said. "Ordinarily, they would be kept on the union's file ... This was a more substantial job than that and really ought to have been opened up on system, but I think, well, I don't have a specific recollection of thinking to myself should I open it on system or shouldn't I open it on system, but apparently I didn't."

The legal entity Ms Gillard established for Mr Wilson, the AWU Workplace Reform Association, was subsequently used by Mr Wilson and his then friend, AWU bagman and West Australian branch head Ralph Blewitt, to allegedly corruptly receive hundreds of thousands of dollars.

Ms Gillard's failure to open a file on the firm's system meant the partnership could not have been aware of the work she had conducted.

It was a significant irregularity and one of the factors related to her AWU work that contributed to the partnership taking "a very serious view", carefully considering Ms Gillard's termination as a salaried partner, and causing her to leave.

philperth2010 wrote on May 13^th, 2014 at 8:25pm:


just because you are ignorant doesn't mean im wrong..


Quote:

Former Australian Workers Union assistant secretary Ralph Blewitt told the royal commission into union governance and corruption he did not write a statement he provided to the Victorian police in relation to events at the AWU.

Blewitt was cross examined on Tuesday after giving evidence on Monday that he was instructed by the former AWU secretary Bruce Wilson to pay renovators working on a house owned by former prime minister Julia Gillard.

Blewitt spoke with Victoria police last week, and he was being cross examined on that evidence by Wilson’s counsel.

When questioned on the statement he gave last week, Blewitt told the commission his statement was provided to him by the retired lawyer Harry Nowicki.

“I didn’t write this statement, I didn’t type it,” he said. “I glanced at it.

“I accepted it at face value from the person who provided it to me prior to attending the Victorian police.

“If I have perjured myself in this matter by stating this is a true and correct statement then I apologise to the court.”

Nowicki is a retired personal injury lawyer from Melbourne who has been researching a book about the AWU. His connection with Blewitt appears to have begun when he interviewed him as part of his research for the book.