Craig Thomson’s Latest $100,000 Cash Grab!

• Craig Thomson’s Latest Cash Grab: you do know that we’re paying for it?
• Denies he’s doing it for the money
• Still surviving on $60 in the bank (apparently)

Craig Thomson claims that he is the underdog when he recontests the seat of Dobell as an independent, but insists he is not running in the election for the money.

If Mr Thomson loses his seat on September 14, he stands to gain up to six months’ pay in a resettlement allowance that can be paid to MPs who are defeated at an election.

Craig Thomson was suspended from the ALP last year but says it has been his decision to quit the party and contest the election as an independent.

He told Gutter Trash reporters earlier today that his constituents in his NSW Central Coast seat had “urged him to stand again” and his family have also supported the move.

The embattled MP is facing civil and criminal charges relating to his alleged misuse of Health Services Union funds when he was national secretary.

He has repeatedly declared his innocence.

Mr Thomson said he arranged a meeting with the ALP’s NSW general secretary Sam Dastyari last week to tell him he would be standing as an independent.

According to Mr Thomson, Mr Dastyari invited the independent MP to stand for preselection in Dobell and raised the issue of redundancy entitlements if he was beaten.

”Sam made it clear that if I wanted to stand for preselection I could do so, and if the party didn’t preselect me, I would be entitled to redundancy,” Mr Thomson said.

”I didn’t feel in any sense that Sam was trying to induce me to take a particular course of action, he was advising me as to what I [would] be entitled to under different circumstances.”

On Thursday, Mr Dastyari appeared to contradict this account with the tweet:

”Craig Thomson’s membership of the Labor Party was suspended a year ago. You can’t contest a preselection if you are suspended.”

Earlier today, the Federal Opposition tried to force Mr Thomson to make a statement to parliament on the issue of ”inducements”, but Labor blocked the move.

Shadow attorney-general George Brandis later said he had written to Australian Federal Police Commissioner Tony Negus asking him to investigate the matter.

Senator Brandis referred specifically to a claim reported in a News Limited newspaper that Mr Thomson ”rejected an offer from the NSW Labor Party to allow him to be beaten in a Labor preselection contest – a move which would have qualified him for the politician’s equivalent of a six-month redundancy worth up to $100,000”.

Senator Brandis said that if this was true, then a person or persons within the ALP had sought to induce Mr Thomson to undergo a ”sham preselection process for the purpose of fraudulently increasing his severance entitlements”.

Senator Brandis suggested that this breached sections of the Criminal Code and Commonwealth Electoral Acts.

Mr Thomson said he was entitled to a similar payment regardless of whether he lost the Labor preselection or stood for Dobell and lost as an independent.

”There’s no material advantage in either of those things,” he said before insisting that “the money was not much of a consideration” for him.

”The money, all those options, haven’t been much of a consideration, which is why I went through with what happened with Sam Dastiaryi,  they are not the motivations for me in terms of this.”

He acknowledged that he would be an underdog but said he could get some ”big wins” for the Central Coast simply by standing on September 14, particularly around the issue of water supply.

He added that his decision to stand also reflected his innocence when it came to allegations he had misused union funds.

”Someone who thinks they’re going to be found guilty or has committed a crime isn’t going to put their hand up to stand for public office,” he said.

On Thursday, Prime Minister Julia Gillard told reporters in Canberra that the people of Dobell would ”express their views on September 14”, noting that Mr Thomson was suspended from the Labor Party ”some time ago”.