Diana Asmar has been sworn at the Royal Commission
Friday, 19 September 2014
Ms Asmar has been sworn and has adopted a witness statement that was sent to the Royal Commission at 10PM last night.
Ms Asmar has been asked about funding that Industry 2020 provided to Ms Asmar's election campaign. She states that "they didn't".
Ms Asmar persists in her claim that she is now aware of Cesar Melhem's slush fund, Industry 2020, providing any funding for her campaign.
Ms Asmar was asked about these entries in Mr Melhem's diary.
She states that she never discussed funding for election campaign with Mr Melhem.
She states that some of the meetings simply didn't happen.
Mr Stoljar asked Ms Asmar about the circumstances of the sacking of the former finance manager Mr Miller. Mr Miller was apparently sacked for not wanting to become involved in sending out letters to staff demanding their loyalty to the new team. Mr Miller was sacked for refusing to send the letters.
Mr Miller was a fully qualified accountant. He was replaced by the Asmar family friend and unqualified finance operative Kerry Georgiev.
Ms Asmar has no idea how much money her branch has spent in defending her position in the Fair Work Commission investigation into the allegations about the Right of Entry Permit tests. Mr Stoljar put to Ms Asmar that Holding Redlich has been paid more than $100,000. He pointed out that it was members money. Ms Asmar has ANFI. In so many ways.
At 11.15 Mr Stoljar completed his examination.
Ms Asmar's Counsel, Mr Van der Weil is examining his client. He asked her to review a bundle of documents - Ms Asmar states that the "documentations" are various financial papers relating to new salary structures within the branch. Mr Van der Weil tendered the documentation, avoiding the temptation to add an s.
Ms Asmar has been stood down from the witness box in order to read a witness statement that she is not yet familiar with.
She will return to the witness box later on today.