karl stefanovic interviews chris mcardle , page-4

It's a bit rich to say he admitted to authorising payments as "a throw away line". For starters the transcript of the interview shows that it was more like pulling teeth, getting that admittance.

Secondly, FWA requested clarification from Thomson after that interview and the FWA report goes into great detail about the questions they asked him because his evidence to them contradicted what he said in the 2gb interview.

Thomson declined to respond, claiming that as it was likely to be part of a police investigation he had been advised to give no comment.

In his official FWA evidence he claimed that he never picked up that any invoices were for escort agencies BUT also falsely claimed that another union official had repaid $15k for them. The $15k was in fact a repayment of over-claimed holiday pay (no comment) by Kathy Jackson's husband, nothing whatsoever to do with escort agencies. He also falsely claimed that Fairfax had settled his defamation case on the same accusations - subsequently strenuously denied by Fairfax.

What the FWA report shows above everything else is that as a union official of one of the country's lowest paid workforce he lived a lifestyle most people could only dream about.