Ralph Blewitt was a sophisticated property investor with the independent means to buy an apartment, sight unseen, on the other side of Australia from where he lived.   He was introduced to Slater and Gordon by its Industrial Unit partner Julia Gillard.   Andrew Grech, the current managing director of Slater and Gordon (he was an employed lawyer in the firm at the time of the AWU Scandal) recently wrote that Julia Gillard acted directly for Ralph Blewitt in his purchase. of 1/85 Kerr Street.

Only Ralph wasn't really buying,  Bruce the boyfriend was.   Gillard's reputation with the firm was at stake, having introduced this business.   She'd be keen to make sure that Ralph's  money hit the firm's Trust Account exactly as planned - otherwise her partners might say she had bad judgement about people.   She'd do her homework and make sure the money was there, surely.

On Monday, 11 March this year I posted this article substantially written by Spin Baby, Spin.   Spin is a legal industry professional with distinctive competence in conveyance, mortgage and the management of money into and out of Trust Accounts in property and other commercial transactions.   http://www.michaelsmithnews.com/2013/03/for-all-those-who-operate-trust-accounts-in-victoria-and-for-those-who-can-remember.html?cid=6a0177444b0c2e970d017c3789d946970b

The next day I recorded an interview with Ralph Blewitt and posted a letter from a lawyer with copies of the law that regulated lawyers' trust accounts in the 1990s.   http://www.michaelsmithnews.com/2013/03/-a-letter-from-a-learned-friend-in-victoria-about-some-lawyers-trust-account-rules.html

Clearly, Slater and Gordon should have written out a receipt for $67K that hit its trust account as the proceeds of the AWU WRA cheque.   I'm told that the bank transmits the drawer of the cheque in its TT and that the drawer of the cheque and the Slater and Gordon client account to whose benefit that money was applied should have been noted on the receipt.   Spin Baby thought it significant that no receipt has surfaced, then or now, so did I - so Ralph undertook to write to Slater and Gordon and get a copy.

Spin Baby, Spin dropped this note a day or so ago

Spin Baby, Spin said:                           

NEW DEVELOPMENTS WE ANNOUNCE TODAY

Ralph wrote to Slater and Gordon's MD on 1 April this year.

From: ralph_blewitt
To: @slatergordon.com.au
Subject: FW: Request for Trust Account Receipts
Date: Mon, 1 Apr 2013 17:06:10 +0800

I thought this sentence largely stood out.

Unfortunately it appears the firm largely no longer holds trust account receipts for the early 1990's given the expiration of time.  

So Slater and G0rdon says that in 1994 it printed off copies of the Trust Account Ledger so it could include those copies in the file, which it then archived.   At that time it was obliged to retain its Trust Account Receipts for the next 6 years , one year having expired..   It was obliged to create and issue a receipt for any money deposited in its Trust Account, showing who paid the money in and to which client account the monies were allocated.   So if Slater and Gordon met its obligations in issuing Trust Account Receipts, presumably copies were filed with the conveyance file, that would be logical.   Then, given the expiration of time, some one must have gone in and largely taken the trust account receipts out of the file - cause they're largely not there.   But the Ledger is!    More analysis on the General Ledger in a moment.  

Now back t0 Mr Higgins of Slater and Gordon and his letter to Mr Blewitt.  Here are Mr Higgins own words about the $67,000 cheque drawn on the AWU-WRA and deposited to Slater and Gordon's Trust Account. 

"You are aware you deposited those funds at a Commonwealth Bank Branch in Western Australia. As previously advised to your lawyers there is no reference in your conveyance or mortgage file concerning where you sourced those funds."

 I'll bet there's no reference to it!   The file has been exhaustively screened to make sure there's no reference to it - I'm not suggesting subterfuge, rather that it has been scoured to find references to the drawer of the cheque.  It would be a killer blow if Slater and Gordon had received from the Commonwealth Bank on its 1993 standard telegraphic transfer form the details of the drawer of the cheque that was negotiated into the Trust Account.  

Higgins says "there is no reference in the conveyance or mortgage file concerning where you sourced those funds."   There is also no copy in the conveyance file of the Trust Account.   A receipt that if completed with all the information available would have noted the drawer, or owner of the cheque account from whence the funds came, and the Slater and Gordon account, Ralph Blewitt (no middle name) to whose benefit the money went.

Just for completeness, here is the Slater and Gordon conveyance file as sent to Ralph Blewitt last year by Slater and Gordon
http://www.michaelsmithnews.com/2012/11/the-slater-and-gordon-property-and-mortgage-files-in-case-you-havent-seen-them.html

And here is the Trust Account Ledger, printed off for inclusion in the conveyance file, but either not accompanied by the Receipts, or the Receipts were removed from the file after 7 years.   It is interesting to see that where money did come from Ralph, it's recorded as RE & JA Blewitt, that is the drawer of the cheque.  When the $67K hit the Trust Account for Bruce's house, it's recorded as coming from Mr Ralph Blewitt.http://www.michaelsmithnews.com/2012/08/the-awu-scandal-the-slater-and-gordon-trust-account-general-ledger.html

Finally, there's one more major matter involving this file.   The AWU under the leadership of Ian Cambridge subpoenaed from Slater and Gordon all its files and documents on the conveyance and mortgage for Kerr Street.   As I note in the post below, what Ian Cambridge received and Exhibited to his Affidavit was a tiny fraction of the actual documents that were in the file.   The late Geoff Shaw and  Julia Gillard's mentor and former Socialist Forum Comrade Jon Rothfield are recorded on the front covers of the conveyance and mortgage files as being responsible for determining what documents were in and what were out in answer to the Federal Court's subpoena.   Lots was out.   And that includes the Trust Account Receipt for $67,000 which actually came from the Gillard created slush fund.http://www.michaelsmithnews.com/2012/12/the-subpoena-to-slater-and-gordon-for-the-conveyancing-and-mortgage-files.html

Ralph's been out and about today walking through the rubber plantation at Long Tan - the area of operations he patrolled as an Australian Army rifleman in his country's service in 67/68.

Tomorrow morning Ralph will be at the dawn service at the Long Tan memorial in the rubber plantation where 18 Australian men were killed in action.   Lest we forget.

To thine own self be true.   It's all you can ask of yourself in matters of principle and truth.   Be careful about fashionable opinions and things that can be summed up on Twitter.

I published this piece (below) on 26 November last year after police confirmed to me how seriously they were taking my complaint about Gillard's apparently criminal behaviour.

Grace Collier "got it" and pursued and reported the investigation into Gillard accurately.   Grace has  copped heaps by way of sniggers and snide "Brucer" nutjob remarks for doing that.  Good on Grace for her grace, guts and singular regard for the truth in the face of a media pack in Australia that always knows better.  Hedley Thomas, Steve Lewis, Mark Baker and some other notable independent thinkers have formed their own views on the facts as well, uninfluenced by the safe adoption of the party line.

But as for the bulk of the institutions we used to rely on for investigative analysis and critical reasoning  - well they let us down badly and as a direct result of that failure, we've had to endure Gillard for much longer than is healthy.

So here's this blog's published story of 26 November, 2012.

Note to editors/journalists - Julia Gillard is currently facing very serious allegations and Victoria Police are investigating those allegations

Michael Smith News, published 26 November 2012

The government's approach to The AWU Scandal is for each Labor member to parrot a line.

"No allegation of wrongdoing has been made against the Prime Minister".

Here are just a few examples of the mantra trotted out over the weekend.

Tony Burke, the environment minister, "there is no actual allegation for Ms Gillard to take on."

Defending Ms Gillard, Attorney-General Nicola Roxon said none of the matters raised added up to any substantive allegations.

I recorded this editorial about 11 this morning - and then decided not to publish it. I didn't think it added much.

At the time )this morning) I thought that the misreporting and spin were secondary to the important new developments reported today.   Hedley Thomas and Pia Akerman report Waye Hem's statement to police about money going into Gillard's bank account  - and Steve Lewis and Carly Crawford's piece about the police forensic accounting investigation into the distribution of the proceeds from the sale of Kerr Street Fitzroy and some commentary about renovations to Gillard's house.

Having now seen the news devel0p and in light of Ben's very clear further editorial today, here's what I said at 11 this morning by way of explanation about how the stories were mixed and spun.

Ben Fordham, "The Prime Minister of Australia, Julia Gillard is under investigation by police, this is fact.   They are real police, this is a real investigation and yes, the Prime Minister really is under investigation."

http://www.2gb.com/audioplayer/8646

I first published this article exactly one year ago today.   Means more to me each year.  

Lest we forget.

Here's my granddad Percy Leo Smith and his brothers Leslie John and Gerald Peter Smith.   The boys somehow managed to get leave in the Christmas of 1917 an they met up in London - grandad and Les from the 3rd Division on the Western Front in France, and Gerald from HMAS Warrego based at Brindisi in Italy.   They had a singular mission - to get a photo all together for my great grandma Catherine Smith, then widowed, who was waiting in Sherwood Street Richmond for her boys to come home.   Les and Grandpa had already been wounded, Les seriously, you'll see his wound stripe and the scar from the Gun Shot Wound to Face Penetrating Eye that's recorded on his war service record.   A few weeks later he was shot and killed in action in the German's Michael Offensive on 30 March 1918.

When my great grandma received a note from the War Memorial some years later for Les's notations on the Roll of Honour, here's what she wrote about her boy.

My dad Geoff was one of 11 surviving children of Percy Leo and Myrene Smith.   Dad's brother Jack was in the tail end of the New Guinea campaign in WW2 and Leo was in the RAR as an infantryman who saw active service in Korea.   My dad was a nasho, an artilleryman at Holsworthy.

Dad's brother Les married Nancy Ryan of Bibbenluke, near Bombala.   When I was a kid we'd holiday at her family's place at Bibbenluke and I was fascinated by her dad George Claude RYAN MM who'd never drove a car and had draught horses all his life to help people caught on the ford that floods a bit at Bibbenluke.  Claude had a distate for machines after seeing machine guns up close for too long.   He won the Military Medal for cleaning up some Germans in an entrenched machine gun nest, they killed a lot of Claude's mates you see.

Claude signed up in Bibbenluke with Olive Allen's boy Les.   Olive Allen was still around at Bibbenluke when I was very little.   Les didn't come home from the war.   Last night I recorded this poem as I drove home.   I always get a bit wistful near Anzac Day, it means a lot to me to remember them.

I'll put up a synopsis of the new developments mentioned in the two newspaper reports from News Limited today, along with a summary of some of other developments and enquiries that are still outstanding.

In the interim there are some really insightful blog comments  coming in today and I thought I'd post a few here in this thread you can see them on the front page.

Seeker of Truth re Wayne Hem - I've always wondered why Bruce Wilson would have Julia Gillard's bank account details.

I've always wondered why Wilson would have Julia Gillard's bank account details.  Bank account details are very personal information.  They are usually not shared among people, even those in close relationships unless there is a special circumstance.  It wasn't as if while Hem was in the room, Wilson phoned Gillard to get the account details. Wilson already knew these details.  He them written down.  Why would Wilson need to have these details?   This is the newspaper report in November 2012 "......National AWU head Ian Cambridge, now a Fair Work Australia Commissioner, recorded in his 1994-1996 diary allegations by union employee Wayne Hem that Mr Wilson, after a night at a casino, had given him a wad of cash totalling $5000 along with Ms Gillard's bank account details and told him to deposit it." "Mr Hem provided further detail on the allegation in his statutory declaration to The Australian, saying he had been asked to attend Mr Wilson's office. "I went down and he handed me about five grand," Mr Hem said in the report. "Then Bruce handed me a piece of paper with the account number and a name on it, and it was Julia's name. "He said 'Go put this in Julia's account'. I said 'OK'. "He (Wilson) made a comment about not saying anything. I just went down to the bank, put it in, came back, gave him the receipt. http://www.couriermail.com.au/news/national/the-5000-question-claims-julia-gillards-ex-boyfriend-bruce-wilson-put-cash-into-her-account/story-fndo1uez-1226516225113 If anyone needs me to put money into their bank account on a one off occasion, it's not like I keep those bank account details in my top drawer in case I might need to use them again. Another point that raises suspicion, is Hem was asked not to tell anyone about it.  Why???

Spin Baby, Spin said:        The conveyance file on the sale of Kerr Street                   

                                Thought this was interesting and worth a separate post. While the official file may be destroyed, Police should still be able to access the financial information from the trust account of the real estate agent - ultimately who got the cheques: Police have also sought the conveyancing file from the sale of the property from real estate agents. A senior figure from real estate agency Collins Simms told News Ltd that police had been in contact with the firm seeking a copy. The agency told them they did not have it because they did not keep records from so long ago.  http://www.heraldsun.com.au/news/national/pm-denies-awu-investigation-claims/story-fncynkc6-1226627400297 Also of interest is that the Police should be able to access a copy of the conveyance file from the Purchaser who bought the property from Wilson/Blewitt.  That will have yet more damning evidence of who exactly that law firm dealt with and who ultimately received cheques at settlement.  I doubt very much the Purchaser's solicitor will have destroyed their file.   Every touch leaves a trace.

"Dear everyone, we are going so badly it's not funny.  We've got buckley's of hitting that surplus target, the border control campaign is non-existent and we are all going to get sacked us at the next election.  So I'm pleased to announce an increase in your bonus payments to compensate you for any negative feelings you might have in hearing about your performance."

The bonus payments apply to ministerial staffers, the John McTernans and the like.

This story is from today's Daily Telegraph

Incentive for Labor staffers not to quit

 

SENIOR federal Labor staffers have been given a golden handshake worth up to $6000 each to stop them from jumping ship before the election.

In an admission the government is convinced it will most likely lose the election, about 400 ministerial staffers have been granted an extra two-week taxpayer-funded payout should Labor lose.

The doubling of the termination provisions for staff who lose their jobs following a federal election, will be worth between $3000 and $6000 each for staffers, depending on their seniority and salary.

A memo was sent to all staff yesterday from the office of Special Minister of State Mark Dreyfus notifying them of the surprise salary bonus.

Some staffers said they believed the golden handshake was approved to keep senior staff from quitting and finding other employment before the September 14 election.

Others said it was simply the government rewarding Labor staffers for their loyalty.

There's more to the story at The Daily Telegraph here.

It's pretty basic for most people - good behaviour, good results, good performance - should be rewarded.

Bad behaviour, bad results, bad performance should bring negative consequences - like say the sack.

Hedley Thomas has more news on the range of enquiries Victoria Police are making including this report about Wayne Hem, the man who put $5,000 into Gillard's account.

Again Ben's statements of fact are diminished and Gillard's statements are presented as repudiations of the substance of Fordham's statements - when those responses from Gillard are nothing of the sort.   Unless she knows what phone calls and emails police are making and sending, she shouldn't be presented as someone with a factual basis for "denying a claim" made by Fordham.  It's analogous to Eddie Obeid sending in a statement to the paper and as a result the paper splashing a headline "Obeid not the subject of ICAC enquiry"   The ICAC has claimed that it has conducted investigations into the affairs of Eddie Obeid.  Those allegations made by the unreliable ICAC were vehemently denied by Mr Obeid who says no such enquiry is underway at all. So the ICAC can claim all it likes, Eddie says he did nothing wrong.

What is it with Gillard and her ability to enroll otherwise balanced and skeptical editors as participants in her spin-wars?

Gillard denies new AWU request

PM denies AWU investigation claims

• From:         News Limited Network

VICTORIAN police are escalating their investigation into the union scandal involving Julia Gillard's former boyfriend, engaging forensic accountants to track hundreds of thousands of dollars in allegedly suspect payments.

As detectives continue to interview key witnesses in the Australian Workers Union slush fund scandal, Ms Gillard yesterday denied claims from a Sydney radio host that she was being investigated by police over the affair.

Sydney broadcaster Ben Fordham yesterday alleged the Prime Minister was being "investigated" as part of the wider police probe.

The 2GB host claimed he'd been contacted by Victorian police following a robust March 7 interview with the Prime Minister and asked "to make a formal statement".

"The police are interested in comments made by Julia Gillard in the interview with me," Mr Fordham told his listeners.

Mr Fordham told listeners he knew "for a fact that the Prime Minister is being investigated" by the Victorian police.

But a spokesman for Ms Gillard said the PM has "never been contacted by police and never been asked to provide a statement".

"The Prime Minister has never been contacted by police, she has never been questioned and never been asked to make a statement."

"There is no change to previous statements."

Ms Gillard has repeatedly and vehemently denied all wrongdoing in relation to the slush fund.

Ben Fordham claimed he was contacted by police?   He claims?  That's a terrible way to report the truthful statements of a man who was intent on correcting the record.

And the elevation of Gillard's spokesman's statements in response to the "claims" and "allegations" made by Fordham places Gillard's statements in a  context they don't deserve.   The paragraph that commences Gillard's response to Fordham's claims - in other words what comes after Fordham's statements is the word "But".  Then the Gillard response is presented as if it was a direct rebuttal of Fordham's claims.  It's nothing of the sort.

The offenders are the last to be interviewed in a major fraud enquiry.  There is ample evidence of police progress in taking other statements and conducting inquiries.  Ms Gillard simply wouldn't know what the police are doing, the same as you, or me, so it's a pretty weak and inexpert quote to present as rebuttal to Fordham's "claims".

The media companies might like to say that they are not prejudging Gillard and that is a good aim.   But that's not what they're doing.   They are giving her the benefit of any doubt - and applying that doubt, that questionable status against people like Ben Fordham who deserve better.

Steve Lewis and Carly Crawford have done quite a bit of work in this report.   It's worth a read for at News Limited websites here.