OZ PM defends partner Tim Mathieson's pro-Israel lobbyist group job

Melbourne, June 29 (ANI): Australian Prime Minister Julia Gillard has defended the right of her partner Tim Mathieson to work for a property group owned by a pro-Israel lobbyist.

Mathieson is employed as a real estate salesman at a company owned by Melbourne developer Albert Dadon.

According to The Sydney Morning Herald, Gillard said that her public condemnation of Hamas rocket attacks on Israeli territory during the Gaza intervention occurred well before there had been any suggestion of Mr Mathieson working for Dadon.

The paper also stated that Gillard had taken advice on the issue because she did not want to make an inappropriate decision in the cabinet.

"I have made all the necessary declarations and disclosures," she said.

Gillard said that her becoming Prime Minister indicated to the nation that this was a different age, adding that the personal situation of her predecessor Kevin Rudd had also broken new ground.

"Kevin was the first Prime Minister, as I understand it, to have a partner with her own career, and a formidable and successful career it is," the paper quoted Gillard as saying.

Gillard said she was the first Prime Minister with a male partner who had his own career and job.

"I hope that people would understand that, that he's got a right to live his life too," she added. (ANI)