Stonewalling JuLIAR Gillard unsettles caucus........

JULIA Gillard is not changing her tactics in relation to the queries she faces about her involvement in the AWU slush fund affair - she's stonewalling.

Despite widening demands from the media and the prospect of the final week of parliament being dominated by questions about the Prime Minister's role in giving advice on setting up the fund, Gillard is sticking to the idea the best defence is offence. Labor MPs, including ministers, believe the interests of the party and the wider labour movement would be best served by a comprehensive response from Gillard to the avalanche of questions about what she knew and the claimed contradictions in her statements as Prime Minister.

Ministers expressed alarm yesterday as the message filtered back from Ms Gillard's office that the reappearance of one-time union bagman Ralph Blewitt meant it was impossible to say where next week's parliamentary session would end up.

Gillard, who denies all wrongdoing and says she had no knowledge of the workings of the fund, appeared to change tack in Cambodia and start to answer questions on the issue. At a press conference for a handful of journalists at Werribee outside Melbourne yesterday, she went back to demanding an "allegation" be put to her and stating the "smear" pursued by the Coalition had started with nut jobs on the net.

Bill Shorten, the minister responsible for union management, this week in labelling the fund "inappropriate" and "out of bounds" set a new standard among MPs. It looked like the first distancing from the Prime Minister's defence.

Dissatisfaction within Labor has been growing over Gillard's response to the unease about the establishment of the slush fund and her dismissal of claims she has contradicted the position she put to her legal partners in 1995.

But Gillard has made it clear she intends to tough-out the last parliamentary days of 2012 and hope that when the election year begins, the heat will have gone out of the AWU allegations.

Many Labor MPs do not share her view and think the story will continue to be pursued in the media and by the opposition.

This wasn't the way Gillard had planned to end 2012 and go into election year 2013.

Stonewalling PM unsettles caucus | The Australian: