Health Services Union looter and current General Manager Kimberley Kitching is now running for the Senate seat that will be vacated by Senator Feeney when the federal election is called. She is running under the banner “Kimberley Kitching for Senate movement” which has the support of Bill Shorten, Australian Workers Union (AWU) and surprisingly Andrew Bolt which he announced on his show, The Bolt Report, last Sunday.
I sent some questions to Prime Minister Kevin Rudd during the week and had a text message from Kimberley Kitching’s husband Andrew Landeryou after publishing last week’s post which I will discuss later in this post.
The Kimberley Kitching matter is important for at least two reasons. Firstly we have a situation where Ms Kitching is clearly involved in ripping of the HSU and trying to enter federal parliament while a current federal politician, Craig Thomson, is facing criminal charges for ripping off the HSU when he worked there prior to entering parliament in 2007. Does the Labor Party never learn?
Secondly, the return of corruption at the HSU almost immediately after it was meant to be cleaned up which was overseen by federal MP Bill Shorten. It is Mr Shorten who is backing Kimberley Kitching’s push for the Senate seat which really shows what contempt Mr Shorten has for the Australian public and the Labor Party.
Background
I will only briefly touch on the background as this is a follow-up post from my previous post titled “Bill Shorten tried to stab Julia Gillard in the back one last time. Return of corruption at the HSU” (Click here to read the post)
There was massive fraud and theft at the Health Services Union and an administrator was appointed. New elections were called. Kimberley Kitching and her husband Andrew Landeryou supported Diane Asmar to be elected as the Secretary of the HSU Victoria No 1 Branch. Mr Landeryou also used his website/blog, Vexnews, to support Mrs Asmar and attack her competitors.
Not long after winning the election in December 2012 Diane Asmar appointed Kimberly Kitching as the General Manager which is clear and blatant cronyism. Cronyism is defined on Wikipedia as “Cronyism is partiality to long-standing friends, especially by appointing them to positions of authority, regardless of their qualifications.” Ms Kitching has no qualifications or experience in running a union but is a friend of Mrs Asmar.
Kimberley Kitching ran for Labor Party preselection in the seat of Gellibrand in April which she lost or some have reported she withdrew at the last-minute but it did go to a vote. She than announced on the 12/7/13 her nomination for Labor Party preselection for Julia Gillard’s seat of Lalor then withdrew the same day.
Last Sunday 14/7/13 Andrew Bolt in effect announced that Kimberley Kitching was running for the Senate as he stated that he was part of the “Kimberley Kitching for Senate Movement”. The Senate seat will become vacant when Senator Feeney resigns once the election date is set to contest the lower house seat of Batman. Watch the video below which is only 20 seconds long (right-click anywhere on the video). The look on Ms Kitching’s face seems to say to Mr Bolt “I wish you never said that”
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Why someone like Andrew Bolt, who is very critical of the Labor government, would get involved in supporting Kimberley Kitching is very odd. What I can say that if Ms Kitching does win the Senate spot then anyone who has supported her will have their reputations trashed. In all fairness I did not know who Ms Kitching was or her background until last week and maybe Andrew Bolt does not know her background either. But just the fact she is the General Manager for the HSU should have sent the alarm bells ringing.
Kimberley Kitching has other support as well such as federal MP Michael Danby who said on his website last week “I have known Kimberley Kitching since she moved to Melbourne nearly 20 years ago.” and “Now she is a union official, as part of the team who successfully won the battle to clean up the corrupt Health Services Union”. (Click here to read more) Obviously Mr Danby does not care about his own reputation.
“Kimberley Kitching for Senate movement”
It is worth looking at the time line in Ms Kitching’s tilt for parliament.
April 2013 – Ran for preselection for the seat of Gellibrand – Either lost or pulled out at the last-minute
Friday – 12th July 2013 – Announced she would run for preselection in Julia Gillard’s seat of Lalor. (Click here to read)
Friday – 12th July 2013 – Only a matter of hours after announcing that she will run for preselection in Lalor she withdraws and tweets on Twitter “After carefully considering my friend Kevin Rudd’s and the former PM’s wishes, I’ve decided to support educator Joanne Ryan in Lalor. — Kimberley Kitching (@kimbakit) July 12, 2013“ (Click here to read more)
I have to wonder why she nominated for Lalor in the first place. She had to of known prior to nominating that Prime Minister Rudd and Julia Gillard did not want her nominate. I suspect maybe she did so to force them to support her tilt for the Senate seat as payback for her withdrawing from the Lalor preselection.
Saturday – 13th July 2013 – Late that night I publish my post titled “Bill Shorten tried to stab Julia Gillard in the back one last time. Return of corruption at the HSU” where I write about Kimberley Kitching and why she should not be in parliament and her involvement in corruption at the HSU.
Sunday – 14th July 2013 – 8.46am – I receive a text message from Andrew Landeryou saying “Can we catch up for a coffee some time this week? Andrew” I phoned him and said that I was in Sydney and he is in Melbourne. He said he often comes to Sydney and what about Thursday, Friday or Saturday. I said that I work full-time and run this site in my spare-time and do not have time. He said “I tried” and left it at that.
I never do the coffee routine as I think it is a time waster and if he had anything to say he could say it on the phone. At that point I did not know about the Senate push but he did. Andrew knows the power of blogs as he has run a number of them and so do politicians. While this site is not the biggest on the net, it is big enough to spark a fire so to speak with other media which it has done in the past and this would have worried Andrew and Kimberley.
Sunday – 14th July 2013 – Kimberley Kitching is on The Bolt Report as per the above video and Andrew Bolt says “I am part of the Kimberley Kitching for senate campaign” which lets the cat out of the bag.
KCA questions to Kevin Rudd
Below is the email that I sent to the Prime Minister’s media department and the response that I received. (I have deleted the email addresses so they do not get spammed)
From: Shane Dowling
Sent: Tuesday, 16 July 2013 10:38 AM
To: #########
Subject: Media Request – Shane Dowling – Kangaroo Court of Australia
Dear Sir/Madam
I have a couple of questions for Prime Minister Rudd for a post that I will publish in the near future.
The background to the questions is:
Labor Party member Kimberley Kitching announced her nomination for the seat of Lalor on Friday the 12th of July then only a matter of hours later withdrew her nomination and tweeted on twitter: “After carefully considering my friend Kevin Rudd’s and the former PM’s wishes, I’ve decided to support educator Joanne Ryan in Lalor. — Kimberley Kitching (@kimbakit) July 12, 2013”
The questions are:
- Did Prime Minister Rudd talk to Kimberley Kitching directly and ask her to withdraw her nomination for the seat of Lalor?
- If Prime Minister Rudd did not talk to Kimberley Kitching directly, then how did he communicate his wish that Ms Kitching withdraw from the preselection contest for Lalor as she says in her tweet?
- Did Prime Minister Rudd do a deal with Kimberley Kitching that if she withdraws from the Lalor preselection contest then Mr Rudd would support her to replace Senator David Feeney?
- Does Prime Minister Rudd support the “Kimberley Kitching for senate movement”?
- Kimberley Kitching was appointed by Diana Asmar as the General Manager of the Health Services Union Victorian No.1 branch after Ms Kitching’s husband, Andrew Landeryou, used his blog Vexnews to support Mrs Asmar in the union election. This is clear cronyism. Does the Prime Minister plan to investigate further and/or take any action?
- Is Kimberley Kitching a personal friend of Prime Minister Kevin Rudd as she seems to suggest in her tweet?
Regards
Shane Dowling
The Response:
From: ##########
Sent: Tuesday, 16 July 2013 11:52 AM
To: shanedowling
Subject: RE: Media Request – Shane Dowling – Kangaroo Court of Australia [SEC=UNCLASSIFIED]
Hi Shane,
Thanks for your email. It is well-known in the party that Mr Rudd felt that Ms Gillard’s views should be respected as a former prime minister and leader of the Labor Party.
Regards
The response did not answer the questions which is typical of politicians. So the question still has to be asked, does he support Kimberly Kitching and her Senate bid? I could have sent a follow-up email reinforcing the questions or asking new questions but thought I would save that battle for another day and another matter. In all fairness to Mr Rudd he has only been back in the job a couple of weeks and cannot take responsibility for what has happened at the HSU and Kimberley Kitching. But moving forward he will have to take responsibility whether he likes it or not. If Kimberley Kitching does become a Senator then that will impact on the Labor Party and Mr Rudd is the one who will be getting asked questions by journalists about the scandal.
One of many other questions that need to asked is how much of HSU funds are being spent to have Ms Kitching elected to parliament? I will follow-up on the above and previous post whether of not Kimberley Kitching is appointed as a Senator as there is enough corruption involved to write a book and much more to the story.
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