At the end of his address to the preliminary hearing of the Royal Commission into Trade Union Governance and Corruption on Thursday, Justice Dyson Heydon agreed that too little was known about the former Australian Council of Trade Unions leader Albert Monk, who supported changes to post-war immigration policy under the Curtin and Chifley governments.

Commissioner Heydon said Mr Monk did not view immigration as a threat to jobs. Monk was also known as a cautious negotiator – and for not being militant.

"It would be natural to expect trade unions to oppose this competition for jobs," Commissioner Heydon said. "It is right that to acknowledge Mr Monk's skill in persuading officials and members of the unions that far from being dangerous, the policies of Mr Curtin and Mr Chifley were correct and would lead to great prosperity and useful social benefits in other ways.

"On that rather marginal note, we might adjourn until 10am on Monday, 27 April."

In response to Justice Heydon's comments, Construction, Forestry, Mining and Energy Union secretary Dave Noonan said John Curtin was the secretary of the timber workers' union in Victoria, a predecessor union of the CFMEU.

Commissioner Heydon also gave a lengthy justification for the omission of any reference to Health Services Union whistleblower Kathy Jackson in his interim report in December last year.

Ms Jackson, who was expected to be the royal commission's star witness, instead became the subject of allegations of corrupt behaviour, including the allegedly inappropriate use of tens of thousands of dollars of union money.

The 1817-page interim report by Commissioner Heydon dealt with a range of issues, but noticeably ignored Ms Jackson, apart from an oblique reference, without naming her, to Health Services Union issues to be dealt with in a future report.

The commission had heard that Ms Jackson's HSU branch received a $250,000 payment from the Peter MacCallum Cancer Centre to settle a back-pay dispute, where staff were owed $3.16 million.

The commission heard the workers did not receive the money, but that Ms Jackson allegedly put it in a bank account that she controlled. The commission heard that Ms Jackson made a series of withdrawals from the account and that she allegedly spent some of the money on herself.

The commission also heard that she allegedly paid her former partner Jeff Jackson $50,000 as part of a property settlement after a similar amount of money was withdrawn from the bank account.

The commission did not make any recommendations against Ms Jackson in its interim report.

Commissioner Heydon said on Thursday it was "thought convenient" for the commission to deal with issues relating to Ms Jackson after Federal Court proceedings in which she was involved were completed.

He said "it was thought convenient for the commission to deal with all issues together", rather than in stages.

That was despite the commission not being prevented from dealing with Ms Jackson because of any risk of interference with current court proceedings.

"It should be noted that the decision was not made on the ground that there would be any contempt of court in taking a different course," he said.