'Slow progress' in ex-HSU boss's case

Former union boss Kathy Jackson is still trying to secure funding to defend herself on fraud and theft charges a year after being committed to stand trial.

Jackson is accused of misappropriating nearly $500,000 from her former employer, the Health Services Union, to pay for personal flights, hotels and other items from 2003 to 2011.

"We seem to be progressing slowly," her lawyer Philip Beazley told the County Court on Monday, when she appeared for a further directions hearing.

She'll return to court in December but won't stand trial until next year.

Jackson, who is on bail, was originally facing 169 charges, but that has been amended to 70.

On one indictment, she's facing 48 charges of obtaining financial advantage by deception.

On a second indictment, she is charged with 18 counts of theft, three of obtaining financial advantage by deception and one of obtaining property by deception.

Prosecutors want the matters heard separately.