Former Health Services Union leader Kathy Jackson faces a trial that will run for up to three months and feature 90 witnesses, a court has heard, but she appears unlikely to face a jury until 2019.
Ms Jackson has pleaded not guilty to misappropriating more than $470,000 from the HSU to pay for personal flights, hotel accommodation and other expenses between 2003 and 2011, and on Monday was committed to stand trial.
On Tuesday, Melbourne's County Court heard that about 90 witnesses - some of them based overseas - would be called to give evidence before a jury. On a conservative estimate, the trial could run for three months prosecutor Mark Gibson said.
A start date for the trial was not set, because judge Paul Grant gave the parties more time to streamline the number of charges and witnesses and determine whether more than one trial was needed.
The parties are due to return to court on December 15 for a further directions hearing.
Ms Jackson's trial might not start until 2019 given the backlog of cases before Melbourne's County Court.
She has pleaded not guilty to 166 charges, comprising 18 counts of theft, 147 of obtaining a financial advantage by deception and one of obtaining property by deception.
Prosecutors allege Ms Jackson either stole or misappropriated hundreds of thousands of dollars from the HSU between 2003 and 2011 to pay for her own personal flights, travel expenses and other non-work items, by using union-issued credit cards to pay, and then dishonestly claimed to the union her expenses were work related.
Ms Jackson was a union official during the time of the alleged offending and was the HSU's national secretary between 2008 and 2015.
Charge sheets allege she used HSU credit cards to pay for flights to the United States, Hong Kong, New Zealand and Bali, hotel rooms in New York and Las Vegas, and other travel expenses in Seattle, Dallas, Chicago and Los Angeles.
She is also accused of using union funds to pay $22,000 for a 1993 Mercedes-Benz on behalf of then-husband Jeff Jackson, paying $1065 to hire a treadmill, buying products worth $1070 from JB Hi-Fi, spending $4636 on artwork and $12,500 on stationery.
In 2010 she is alleged to have illegally claimed $63,000 from the union to pay herself an annual "honorarium" of $21,000 over the preceding three years.
Ms Jackson, who helped expose corruption in the HSU and the downfall of former union officials Michael Williamson and Craig Thomson, faces the prospect of jail if found guilty.
In 2015 the Federal Court ordered Ms Jackson pay back almost $1.4 million to the HSU after finding she used union funds to support a lavish lifestyle of overseas trips, luxury accommodation and fine dining.
Ms Jackson is on bail while she awaits trial and can live at her home in Wombarra in NSW.
