The United States' wannabe first female president, Hillary Clinton, defended Australia's first female prime minister, Julia Gillard, in her new book titled Hard Choices.

The book covers her stint as secretary of state, which gave her the opportunity to meet Ms Gillard who was then PM of Australia. She described Ms Gillard as having battled outrageous sexism, which the former first lady wrote should not be tolerated in any country, reports Brisbane Times.

When the two powerful women met in Perth in 2012, Ms Clinton gave the PM some advice on how to confront her detractors and address sexism. It was probably some of the advice that she later used when Ms Gillard confronted then Opposition leader Tony Abbott in Parliament and accused him of misogyny.

Ms Clinton's belief that the male politicians were belittling Ms Gillard appears to have some truth behind it as Bruce Wilson, the former boyfriend of the PM, disclosed that a lawyer allegedly offered him $200,000 to make false claims that union funds were used in renovations of her home in the 1990s.

The alleged offer came out as part of an ongoing Royal Commission investigation into trade unions. Wilson's statement, leaked to ABC, named lawyer Harry Nowicki as the one who offered him the money as part of a well-funded "Get Gillard Campaign."

Nowicki had admitted that he met Wilson and media agent Max Markson, but said the purpose of the meeting was to discuss buying Wilson's story. The lawyer also admitted offering to pay for Wilson's hotel room in Sydney.

Wilson is scheduled to appear before the commission on Thursday.