Julia Gillard has a case to answer

If it is established that the association was not a "slush fund" as well as not being a workplace safety fund and the PM had knowledge of this, she has misrepresented a material particular twice.

The 2^nd misrepresentation would be much more serious than the "slush fund" misrepresentation. It would also open the PM to a charge of misprision as Michael Kirby has noted. The PM's defence to any accusation that she did not notify the authorities of possible fraud to do with the association is "By the time the matters . . . came to my attention, they were already the subject of inquiry and investigation."

But there are cogent inconsistencies with this defence such as union officials not knowing about the association for nearly a year after the PM left Slater and Gordon and terminated her relationship with Wilson.

It is a serious business accusing the elected head of a democracy of criminal offences. So far the dominant defences by the PM have been of the tu quoque variety. More specifically Abbott is a misogynist if he criticises the PM directly or a coward if he does it by proxy through his deputy Ms Bishop, a lawyer of considerably more experience than the PM.

However there is real meat to the complaints against the PM; the overriding criteria should be transparency and the rule of law. Abbott is right to raise these issues and the case to answer remains firmly in the PM's corner.