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Scott Morrison has appeared in a defamation trial to testify about what he knew, and when, of the alleged rape of Brittany Higgins in a ministerial workplace in Canberra in 2019.
Senator Linda Reynolds is suing Higgins over a sequence of social media posts containing alleged mistruths that Reynolds believes broken her fame.
Morrison tuned into the listening to within the Western Australian Supreme Court docket on Tuesday by way of a video hyperlink from Sydney.
How did we get right here?
Morrison was first revealed as a possible witness for Reynolds two months in the past, when attorneys for the 2 sides mentioned the timing of the trial and who could be referred to as on to testify.
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Based on ABC Information, Reynolds instructed reporters after that listening to she had appreciated the assist she acquired from colleagues: “I’ve been notably grateful in current occasions for the assist from Scott Morrison and from many different witnesses on this trial by way of the affect this has had on me and lots of different individuals as nicely.”
What does Morrison need to do with it?
Morrison was prime minister on the time of Higgins’ alleged rape, and remained in that place when information of the allegations broke.
A lawyer for Reynolds, Martin Bennett, mentioned forward of Tuesday’s listening to that Morrison’s proof could be “important”, and that it might handle the “diploma of confidence” the then prime minister had in Reynolds and the way he was “pressured to interchange her as minister as a consequence of her in poor health well being”, in line with ABC Information.
What did Morrison say?
Morrison instructed the courtroom on Tuesday he learnt of what had occurred in 2021, after Higgins’ allegations about Senator Reynolds’ mishandling of the incident grew to become public.
“I undertook a sequence of briefings … via my employees … and sought to deliver myself updated as I ready to face questions within the Parliament,” he instructed the courtroom.
He agreed with a suggestion Reynolds was “attacked” within the aftermath, and mentioned the response to the allegations gave the impression to be “aggressive” and “coordinated”.
“It was meaning to discredit her,” he mentioned. “It was the weaponising of this problem for political functions to discredit each Senator Reynolds … and the federal government, and by extension myself.”
Requested what was alleged in the course of the assault, Morrison mentioned: “[That] the federal government was concerned within the cover-up of this problem, which was fully and completely false, with none basis.”
How did Reynolds react?
Morrison mentioned he was distressed to see Reynolds experiencing bodily and psychological signs following a query time session after the information broke.
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“She was sitting within the whip’s workplace in a really distressed state … I offered her consolation as a buddy but additionally as her prime minister and chief, and expressed my robust assist for her,” Morrison mentioned.
“She was fairly visibly, bodily confused and in a extremely fragile emotional state at that time.
“I used to be unaware of her cardiac situation. This was dropped at my consideration together with her permission someday later and that solely deepened my concern.
“I keep in mind for a interval there we had been very fearful for Senator Reynolds this may very well be a deadly consequence for her.”
What’s subsequent within the trial?
Extra proof will comply with, together with deliberate testimony by Higgins, later this month.
In the meantime, Bruce Lehrmann, Higgins’ alleged rapist and one other former worker of Reynolds, is interesting a verdict in a special defamation swimsuit, introduced by him in 2023 in opposition to Community 10.
In April, a decide in that trial wrote in his verdict that Lehrmann had, on the steadiness of probablities, raped Higgins.
The rape allegation was beforehand the topic of a felony trial, which was derailed by juror misconduct earlier than the cost was dropped. Lehrmann maintains his innocence.
— With AAP
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