While it is easy to feel sorry for Thomson, the situation he is in is entirely of his own making. Just as any other thief that has been caught, facing justice is stressful and career limiting. Thomson has chosen the hard path of accepting Labor's protection in the hope that he can avoid punishment.

With the hung parliament he has hung a target on his back. Every investigative journalist can see dollars and a career in digging up the dirt on the issue, and by god they have got far more than if Thomson had not been important. For the coalition this is a gift of 1000 unpaid staffers, and all they have to do is rub Juliar's nose in it every day.

The solution for his stress is to make himself no longer a target and to resign from parliament.

This is not going to stop until he is gone. The damage to Labor will continue even to 2013.

Lexi, I think your efforts were fine but the NM story was not expanding on much that is not there already.

As for feeling sorry for him, only to the extent that he is in danger of danger to himself.

The Star Chamber of SM has convicted him already, as is the wont of lynch mobs, but as far as 'credit cards borrowed' goes, the refrain sounds familiar and might just have been a well worn excuse crafted within that union, tainting more than just him.

Let's face it, the HSU might not even have scored a Cert 1 in bookeeping after three or four times at trying to, so to that extent I'd have no quibble with SM or anyone else pointing out the obvious flaws.

But the temptation to state categorically that he is guilty-as-charged has to be resisted and denied, since he has not been charged with anything to get him to a court (beyond that of public opinion), we are not a court, and it is somewhat defamatory SM.

Actually, unless you have started a thread somewhere SM, I'm surprised you have not mentioned the obvious attempt by Howes to kick off a distracting theme with his Press Club speech yesterday, clearly designed to divert attention from Thompson, which seems not to have worked, like much of Howes efforts.

TBC,

I am not defaming at all, simply repeating what a 3 year audit / investigation into the HSU declared.

The normal due process for fraud of this nature would refer the case to the police and financial crimes department who would use the evidence to prosecute. The court would weigh up the evidence and produce a verdict.

The due process for unions instead was referral to the FWA tribunal who reviewed the evidence, and produced a verdict. The difference it does not have the power to sentence, or Thomson would be in far more serious trouble.

However, there has been due process and the time for assumption of innocence has long passed in anything but the criminal trial to come.

TBC it is my belief you and I do some times think alike, we must however clash as we are also quite different.
I do not blame any one for being very much more than upset with this bloke.
I FEAR lip service from within my union movement,to the fact he and others,in the HSU, are pure filth.
I can target, pick very real holes in SOME charges.
But see very clearly others stick.
The Trade union movement MUST CONFRONT! this is a death sentence, unless it is seen to be fixed.
ACTU must, remove the union, forever, start another one, including ONLY the clean skins from this one.
Cut fees, increase service, to reestablish it in its members minds, service has been poor_ask the members.
My concern is this, LIBERALS/CONSERVATIVES ABBOTT are trying to circumvent our system of law.
History shows they do it well, Mark Vaile one of 4 who left rather than be held accountable.
Heffernan,found Innocent in days,by his party!
We are confronted by a potential government/certain one, that is on form going in to power on bile and lies and has only that to fuel it.
I fear for us all.

Quite so Belly, and to that extent we are at least in part in-concert with SM, because there is no fudging the extent of executive wilfulness so far on display from swathes of HSU people.

There is no HSU in Qld. The same people would be AWU, Missos's and whatever public relations farce of a name the QPSU is now hiding behind.

A carve up along those lines sounds like a good solution, cutting their fees maybe, and getting a far higher level of accountability all round.

There could be absolutely no transfer of staff, at least above an industrial officer level, to any other union even considered though.

It will be interesting to see if Ms. Jackson re emerges under an Abbott government with a cushy sinecure somewhere within the industrial system, or perhaps as an IR consultant on union-bashing contract making work under the wing of the HR Nichols Society.

Can anyone name even one criminal offence, no matter how minor, that Craig Thomson has been charged with?

I'll answer that ......... not one person can.

Do you want me to list all the criminal charges that have been brought against other politicians? You'd need several pages to list them all. Including the indecent assault charge brought against Tony Abbott.

The ONLY reason this c r a p is on page one and not page 20 of the newspapers is solely because it's a hung parliament. No other reason whatsoever. The coalition's mock "morality" is pathetic to witness.

If Thomson is not charged with a criminal offense, and charged soon, will the Liberal drama queens apologise? Of course they won't, as they lack the moral fibre and decency to do that.

Now we have that stupid excuse for a "current affairs" (ha ha ha ha) show, ACA, paying a prostitute in order to get a concocted possible story: They admitted it this evening; they said they haven't yet "paid" the prostitute; that way they get around the truth. If they give her the money next week, then "technically" they have not lied. They've clearly been through this with their lawyers.

The ACA prostitute apparently was paid for with Thomson's credit card years ago. Well DUH! That's what Thomson has been saying all along. Nobody has been able to produce even one prostitute that Thomson himself has actually had sex with ... at any stage in his life.

If Thomson gets through this without being criminally charged, or if he's criminally charged and found not guilty, I hope he sues, sues, and sues some more. Every "opinion" shock jock, online forum owner, pretend current affairs show, tabloid newspaper, and quite a few Coalition politicians will provide Thomson with a nice little earner for the rest of his life. He'll make hundreds of million$ from the media and political attack dogs. Sue baby, sue.