The current managing director of Slater and Gordon tells us that Julia Gillard was the partner at Slater and Gordon who acted directly for Ralph Blewitt in the conveyance of 1/85 Kerr Street Fitzroy.

We have the statement of Grech that Gillard had the carriage of the Kerr St conveyance. The file contains references to interactions between her and Olive. It makes complete sense that this would be the case given such factors as her attendance at the auction, preparation of the Power of Attorney and relationship with Wilson.

 

Regulation 3.3.9 (5) of the current Legal Profession Regulations requires the name of the person from whom relevant money has been received to be recorded on a receipt. This information should also appear in the Cash receipts book and the ledger. The same requirement would have existed in 1993.

 

S& G would have received daily statements from the bank on their Trust Account in order that their ledger would accurately reflect the funds available. It is from such statements that their entries in their Trust records would have been made.

 

The information given to Ian Cambridge by the Commonwealth Bank includes a copy of the actual cheque it processed to negotiate the movement of $67,772.30 from the AWU WRA and deposited into the Slater and Gordon Trust Account.   That information is at odds with the source of funds recorded in the Slater and Gordon Trust Account ledger.

The entry of this information into the Ledger is a routine matter and given that the Trust Account was audited would have been correctly done in the great majority of cases. It is highly likely that it did not occur in this case due to the intervention of someone in the firm with some level of authority. The obvious candidate for this is Gillard. She was the person who had the carriage of the matter, she had knowledge of the parties and she had the authority of a partner.

If that is so, it demonstrates the following. 

1.She now knew irrefutably that the AWU WRA was not an election slush fund.

2.Assuming that the Association had been a legitimate body to this stage it was now acting contrary to its rules (her rules).

3.The statements she subsequently made in her termination interview about Blewitt's motivations for the investment and status as a sophisticated investor were bald faced lies. '

4.Above all it shows that at this stage she had a guilty mind as to the source of the funds.

Whilst S&G appear to have breached the regulations covering Trust Accounts, the overwhelming significance of the recording of the deposit is what it potentially shows about Gillard’s state of mind at this time and the implications that flow from that about her involvement as a Principal in the whole scam.