There are considerably more connections between Julia Gillard and Val Gostencnik than the FWA related legal ties I wrote about in The Weekend Australian.

This 2004 Corrs Chambers Westgarth biography page for Val Gostencnik was archived here.The bio is a bit hard to follow - I've extracted these jobs and the dates he held them.

• 1982 - 1986 Union Official HEF which became the Health Services Union
• 1986- 1990 Union Official Australian Nursing Federation
• 1990- 1992   Adviser to Labor Health Minister Maureen Lyster in the Kirner Government
• 1992 - 1994 Union official Australian Nursing Federation

Julie Ligeti has a close personal relationship with Julia Gillard dating from the early 1980s at Melbourne University.

Although Ms Gillard dates her partnership with Tim Mathieson to 2005/6 they did not live in the same house until the Lodge became vacant.

As Ms Gillard explained to Michelle Grattan, right up until Ms Gillard was made Prime Minister in 2010, she shared her Canberra unit with Julie Ligeti who then worked for Brendan O'Connor, the brother of one of Ms Gillard's other lovers.

Soon after Ms Gillard was made Prime Minister, Julie Ligeti was given a job in Slater and Gordon managing the company's relationship with the government.   Slater and Gordon acknowledged to me in writing the potential conflict of interest Ms Ligeti's "personal relationship" with Ms Gillard would raise if it were not noted and acted on.

I have provided the source of my observations in these entries

http://www.michaelsmithnews.com/2013/03/what-slater-and-gordon-says-is-a-matter-for-slater-and-gordon-and-julia-gillards-former-flatmate-jul.html

http://www.michaelsmithnews.com/2013/09/slater-and-gordon-confirmed-julia-gillards-personal-relationship-with-julie-ligeti-some-time-ago.html

Anthony Carbines MP said this of Julie Ligeti in his maiden speech to parliament 2011

Thanks to Julie Ligeti, who is always fighting for the Labor movement.

Former state secretary health and community sector union Kay Darveniza exposed the limitations of human imagination when she dedicated her 1999 maiden speech amongst other things to her HSU friends.

Here are some other 1998/9 documents that set out Ms Ligeti's then job as a union official with the Australian Nursing Federation.

http://www.pc.gov.au/__data/assets/pdf_file/0019/45271/sub054.pdf

http://www.pc.gov.au/__data/assets/pdf_file/0017/45602/subdr086.pdf

http://www.pc.gov.au/projects/inquiry/nursing-home-subsidies/docs/transcripts/melbourne981118

Staying in 1999, these are the matters involving joint HSU/Nursing Federation legal action with employers.  In each matter Val Gostencnik of Counsel appears with J. Ligeti of the nurses union.

http://www.austlii.edu.au/cgi-bin/sinodisp/au/cases/cth/AIRC/2000/1217.html

http://www.austlii.edu.au/cgi-bin/sinodisp/au/cases/cth/AIRC/1999/67.html

http://www.austlii.edu.au/cgi-bin/sinodisp/au/cases/cth/AIRC/2000/1217.html

http://www.austlii.edu.au/cgi-bin/sinodisp/au/cases/cth/AIRC/1999/1044.html

Their relationship is shown as

Appearances:

V. Gostencnik of counsel with J. Ligeti for the Australian Nursing Federation.

K. Wilson for the Health Services Union of Australia.

There was a large body of work to prepare or and many sitting days together in both Melbourne and Sydney.

Fast forward to 15 May 2013 and Julie Ligeti is government relations manager at Slater and Gordon and Julia Gillard is PM.

Bruce Wilson is working in the kitchen of a mid north NSW coast sports club.

Val Gostencnik had just been appointed as a Commissioner of Fair Work Australia.   He had been at Corrs Chambers Westgarth where he was the partner responsible for the firm's pro bono program, working out who got public interest free of charge work done.

He was also a director of the board of the PILCH, this extract from its 2010 Annual Report explains its role.

On 15 May this year the Melbourne Magistrates' Court directed Victoria Police to enter Slater and Gordon's premises by force if necessary and to take from there the things particularised in this precis of the warrant.

A hard copy or Notice to Occupier associated with the warrant would have been left with Slater and Gordon when the warrant was executed.  It would be fascinating to follow the travels that any copy of that document might have made.  Every touch leaves its trace.

Summarising the whereabouts of selected people on 15 May 2013

• Magistrate Martin was satisfied by the evidence on oath of a police officer of or above the rank of senior sergeant that serious criminal offences had occured and evidence of those offences could be found at Slater and Gordon.
• Ross Mitchell was getting carboard boxes ready
• Julie Ligeti was managing communications between Slater and Gordon and government.
• Julia Gillard was crying in the House.
• Bruce Wilson was flippin' burgers at the sporties. 

Slater and Gordon told the world that it ceased to act for the conman who had taken in one of its young and naive partners as soon as it was tipped off about the con (psst, buddy, wanna buy a Fitzroy town-house, sorry, workplace reform headquarters?) So Slater and Gordon would not be able to act for nor fund Mr Wilson in any court dramas related to his activities during the time that he was a conman as defined by the Slater and Gordon managing (as opposed to young and naive) partner Peter Gordon.

By 17 May, police had all the doccos boxed and trollied up from Slater and Gordon.   A few weeks later it should have been all done and dusted.

For many years now police have been refining the processes associated with raids on sundry shitbags.  The search warrant for Slater and Gordon was the 1,535th for the year.  Police get the evidence, get it before the court and have matters arising heard and determined within days.  Normally.

But there is something very special about the unique situation of the conman and taker in of the young, naive and unvigilant laywer - who was made partner before 30 and was available for discrete private engagements with selected client(s).

It is now 17 November 2013 and Mr Wilson' s very special brand of lawyer-assisted alleged fraud as described in the 360 documents sitting in a property room at the Melbourne Magistrates' Court is still not settled.

How does he find the money to fund the legal apparatus of sufficient impressiveness such as to secure delays long enough to get past the election and get a public image as educator/stateswoman established of sufficient time so as to allow for the appropriate depth of analysis of the core issues associated with his very own unaided or abetted conmanship?

Instead of receiving the disdain reserved for people accused of pocketing $25,000 for a fictional consultancy that purported to clear very real and deadly asbestos contaminated soil for contact with his workers - this conman has been getting moral and financial support.

The Public Interest Clearing House thought it so much in the public interest that it find support for the conman-broke-my-heart friend of the asbestos distributors - that it went outside the guidelines that directors with fiduciary responsibilities (like Val Gostencnik in his pre Judicial Appointment days) have to make sure are diligently adhered to.

I was sufficiently perplexed to pose this question without answer in September this year.

http://www.michaelsmithnews.com/2013/09/wonder-who-put-bruce-wilson-and-pilch-together.html

http://www.michaelsmithnews.com/2013/09/bruce-wilsons-defence-organised-by-tax-deductible-gifts.html

Whoever designed the laws associated with making a community feel that any money sent off to a Deductible Gift Recipient charity is money that will be well spent on charitable endeavours.

Anyone got their number?