Labor godfather 'took secret cash'
The Queensland union and ALP “godfather” Bill Ludwig has been accused of receiving a secret slush fund cash payment of $50,000 from the former boyfriend of ex-Labor prime minister Julia Gillard.
The explosive claim was made today during evidence to the royal commission into trade union governance and corruption by Ralph Blewitt, the self-confessed bagman for Ms Gillard’s ex-boyfriend, former Australian Workers’ Union leader Bruce Wilson.
Mr Blewitt made the claim on the first day of commission hearings in Sydney into an allegedly corrupt slush fund called the AWU Workplace Reform Association that was set up for Mr Wilson when he was West Australian, and later Victorian, secretary of the AWU.
Mr Ludwig, who only recently retired, was the AWU’s Queensland secretary and national president, and a highly influential figure in the ALP when the $50,000 payment was allegedly made to him in September 1993.
Mr Blewitt alleged under oath today that he withdrew a cheque made out to $50,000 cash in September 1993 from the Perth bank account of the secret slush fund.
He said he then travelled to an AWU national executive meeting in Sydney to hand the money in person to Mr Wilson at the Camperdown TraveLodge hotel where the meeting was held.
When he asked Mr Wilson what the money was for, Mr Wilson told him that it was for Bill Ludwig -- but did not give a reason.
Mr Blewitt said he was acting on the instructions of Mr Wilson, who had set up the Workplace Reform Association “slush fund” in 1992 with help from Ms Gillard, who drew up its rules and was a partner of Melbourne legal firm Slater & Gordon.
At the time, Slater & Gordon was the AWU’s legal firm but Ms Gillard did not tell fellow partners at the time about her role in helping to set up Workplace Reform Association. She later openly referred to it as a “slush fund” to pay for union elections but has been adamant she had no role in its operation.
Mr Blewitt said today that Mr Wilson was “very, very close” to Mr Ludwig at the time of the alleged $50,000 payment, and Mr Wilson recently had moved from the AWU’s Western Australian branch to head its Victorian branch in an effort to fix a faction fight and retain numbers on the union’s executive for Mr Ludwig.
According to Mr Blewitt, Mr Ludwig was so close to Mr Wilson that he was “grooming him” to be a future Labor prime minister.
“He was very highly thought of at the time,” Mr Blewitt said of Mr Wilson.
Mr Blewitt also fleshed out detail of payments allegedly made to the slush fund by the Thiess construction company in return for workplace safety services never provided at the company’s Dawes Hill Channel project near Perth.
In its first year of operation, the fund received a series of payments totalling $90,000 from Thiess after invoices sent by Mr Blewitt.
He said he knew the invoices were “false” but followed instruction from Mr Wilson at all times.
The commission also heard that money paid by Thiess was also used to buy a house in Melbourne’s Fitzroy on February 13, 1993, shortly before Mr Wilson moved to head up the AWU’s Victorian branch in 1993.
But Mr Wilson allegedly wanted to distance the purchase from himself and the AWU, so he allegedly required that the property be bought at auction in Mr Blewitt’s name.
The signatures of Mr Wilson and Ms Blewitt were on a document allegedly witnessed by Ms Gillard that handed power of attorney for the auction purchase to Mr Wilson.
The slush fund scandal is one of the Abbott government’s prime reasons for calling the royal commission, following reports by The Australian’s Hedley Thomas.
Revelations about the slush fund were politically damaging to Ms Gillard in her last year as Prime Minister, but she has steadfastly denied any wrongdoing and said she was naive as Mr Wilson’s girlfriend.
Ms Gillard broke off her relationship with Mr Wilson in the mid-1990s when alleged irregularities were first reported.
Ms Gillard attended the auction for the Fitzroy property bought in Mr Blewitt’s name and did conveyancing work. She has said she never lived at the property.
Mr Ludwig strenuously denied that he had ever received $50,000 from Mr Wilson.
A spokesman for Mr Ludwig said the commission had heard that Mr Blewitt said he provided $50,000 to Mr Wilson, who “in turn told him the money would be forwarded to Mr Ludwig’’.
“Bill Ludwig never received such money and completely rejects the allegation,’’ the spokesman said.
Sources close to Mr Ludwig denied that he had ever received any illicit money from the West Australian-based fund and also cast doubt on the reputation of Mr Blewitt.
It was also claimed by Mr Blewitt today that he gave $7000 in cash from the slush fund in late 1994 to Mr Wilson to pay for renovations being done at Ms Gillard’s house in the Melbourne suburb of Abbottsford.
Mr Blewitt said he was called to the property by Mr Wilson and asked to bring money from the slush fund in September or October 1994..
He claimed Ms Gillard was at the house when he arrived, either in the front room or front verandah while workmen were at the back with Mr Wilson. She allegedly said, “Bruce is in the back, go through.”
He said Ms Gillard did not see the payment made at the time to tradesmen doing the work because she was not in the room.
When she was first quizzed about it by partners of Slater & Gordon in 1995, Ms Gillard could not categorically rule out that money from the slush fund was used to pay for her renovations.
In 2012, as Prime Minister, she insisted she paid for her own renovations when questions arose again.