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RUBY:

Hey everyone, it’s Ruby here. Just a heads up, today’s episode contains descriptions of sexual assault. At the end of the episode we’ll share some numbers that you can call if it’s raised any issues for you.

From Schwartz Media, I’m Ruby Jones, this is 7am.

Last month a Liberal staffer went public, alleging she was raped at Parliament House.

Archival Tape -- News Reporter:

“Claims of rape, roadbocks to a police investigation and a young women, forced to choose between her careeer and the pursuit justice.”

RUBY:

In the days that followed, a number of other women said that they too were assaulted, allegedly by the same man.

Archival Tape -- News Reporter:

“In the morning newspapers a third of allegation of sexual assault by afternoon a fourth.”

RUBY:

Then, five days ago another allegation of rape was levelled: this time at a Cabinet MInister in the federal government.

Archival Tape -- Unidentified Person:

“The entire cabinet has if you like a smear over it, that there is an historical allegation from 1988.”

RUBY:

The Minister hasn’t been named - and the woman who made the allegation died last year. The woman’s friends are calling for an inquiry, but so far Prime Minister Scott Morrison has said that won’t happen.

Archival Tape -- Scott Morrison:

“It's not for me as Prime Minister to seek to interfere or intervene in those processes.”

RUBY:

Today, chief political correspondent for The Saturday Paper Karen Middleton, on the sexual assault crisis that’s rocked the country.

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RUBY:

Karen, over the past few weeks we’ve seen accusation after accusation raised against people working at Parliament House. This all, really started though when Brittany Higgins, a former staffer, went public. So, tell me about what we know about her allegations and how they were handled?

KAREN:

Yes, her allegation is that in March of 2019, a senior adviser who also worked for the defence industry minister, Linda Reynolds, now the defence minister, raped her on the minister's couch after drinks one Friday night.

Brittany Higgins did speak to the police that are based at Parliament House but didn't opt to make a formal complaint.

And after that she moved to the office of senator Michaelia Cash, she worked there until February this year when she decided she was going to resign and ultimately went to the media to tell the story of what she says happened to her two years earlier.

The questions that have arisen since then are really about whether government ministers did all they could to help her, whether they encouraged her to report it to police.

RUBY:

And one of the big questions has arisen since then is this question about who knew about the alleged assault and when they knew. And it seems like within a few days of the alleged assault, Linda Reynolds, the defence industry minister at the time, whose office it's alleged to have happened in, she knew about it. Did she tell anyone?

KAREN:

She says she didn't tell the Prime Minister. And this has been key to the political debate over this issue in the last two weeks.

Archival Tape -- Linda Reynolds:

“As I have affirmed in this place, I did not advise the Prime Minister because it was not my place to do so.”

KAREN:

He insists, he only found out about it the day that the news story was published.

Archival Tape -- Scott Morrison:

“ Speaker as I've already advised the House—I thank the member for her question—I first became aware of these matters on the 15th February.”

KAREN:

That his staff found out about it three days before that, when Samantha Maiden, the journalist, lodged questions about the incident, but that they didn't tell him either.

Archival Tape -- Scott Morrison:

“I'm advised my staff first became aware of these matters of the sexual assault on the 12th of February, Mr Speaker, and the other matters that have been raised are the subject of the processes that I've already outlined to the House.”

KAREN:

So the speculation has been around whether that is a credible sequence of events involving a Prime Minister when there are serious allegations around, you know, an event that occurred in a cabinet minister's office.

RUBY:

Right. So the Prime Minister is maintaining that he did not know about the allegation of rape in a Ministers office down the hall from his own office, until it was reported by the media. That’s despite the fact that Linda Reynolds had known for years and staff in his own office had known about it for days. Is that credible Karen? That he would be the last to know about something like this?

KAREN:

Well, we have to take the Prime Minister at his word. The former Prime Minister, Malcolm Turnbull, has said that he doesn't believe that it's credible,

Archival Tape -- Malcolm Turnbull:

“Well I find it incredible, that is to say, very very hard to believe that the Prime Minister’s Office would not have been aware of that incident as soon as it occured.”

KAREN:

He believes, based on his experience as a Prime Minister, that senior minister would have told the Prime Minister in advance that something like this had occurred, certainly before the news story appeared.

Archival Tape -- Malcolm Turnbull:

“I mean now if they weren’t, it was a complete failure of the system.”

KAREN:

Other people have raised questions about whether it's a likely sequence of events, given that Scott Morrison keeps a very close eye on the political tactics and strategy of the government and manages a lot of it himself.

And we can assume that members of his staff would have been concerned about the impact that this story might have had. You've got to remember that the alleged offence occurred in late March of 2019. The federal budget was being held in April, just a week or two later, and then the federal election was called. So literally, they were on the eve of an election. They were very concerned about the prospect that they might lose that election. And so, they were also very sensitive to any issues that might have caused any problems.

So the pressure has been mounting in the last couple of weeks on this issue, it hasn't gone away. We've seen question after question being asked about what Britney Higgins says happened to her and who knew what and when they knew and what they did about it, and then on Friday evening,

Archival Tape -- News Reporter:

“To some breaking news now about an historical rape allegation involving a cabinet minister.”

KAREN:

The ABC broadcast and published a story that revealed that several members of Parliament, two Senators and the Prime Minister had received a letter that day anonymously suggesting that a young woman had been raped when she was 16, back in 1988 by a man who is now a current member of the cabinet.

Archival Tape -- News Reporter:

“Attached to the letter is a detailed account of the alleged rape back in 1988 when the women was just 16 years old.”

KAREN:

Now, this alleged offence is said to have occurred before he was in politics. The name of the minister hasn't been published, but the letter was sent to Scott Morrison and to Labor's leader in the Senate, Penny Wong, and South Australian Greens Senator Sarah Hanson-Young.

Archival Tape -- Unidentified Person:

“Very sadly this woman took her own life in June last year, but before she did that, she went to complain to NSW police about this alleged incident and had been going to make a formal statement.”

KAREN:

They've all forwarded that letter to the federal police. And accompanying that letter, we understand, was a brief of evidence, allegedly, of information to support this allegation.

RUBY:

We’ll be back after this.

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RUBY:

Karen, lets talk about the Prime Ministers response to the rape allegation, against one of his Ministers. What is Scott Morrison saying? Did he know about this allegation before it was made public?

Archival Tape -- Scott Morrison:

“Good afternoon everyone, I’m here to release...”

KAREN:

He gave a news conference on Monday saying that because it was now in the hands of the federal police that he wouldn't speak any further about it.

Archival Tape -- Scott Morrison:

“The police have had these matters referred to them, the individual involved here has vigorously rejected these allegations and so it’s a matter for the police, and in my discussions with the commissioner, there were nothing immediate that he considered that was necessary for me to take any action on.”

KAREN:

He did say when he was asked whether he'd heard about these alleged offences or this allegation, prior to receiving this letter, he said he'd heard rumours about something to do with a member at the time that the ABC Four Corners program was being broadcast in November of last year.

Archival Tape -- Journalist:

“Had you heard about these claims at all before last week?”

Archival Tape -- Scott Morrison:

“No not really of any substance.”

Archival Tape -- Journalist:

“What have you heard?”

Archival Tape -- Scott Morrison:

“Only rumours of an ABC investigative journalist making some enquiries, that's all I’d heard, I didn’t know any substance of them.”

KAREN:

He insisted he didn't know the detail of any allegation, but that he had heard rumours.

Archival Tape -- Journalist:

“Did you know who it was about when you heard those rumours?”

Archival Tape -- Scott Morrison:

“I tend to not pay attention to rumours.”

KAREN:

But he is relying heavily on the fact that it's been now sent to the federal police as his reason for not wanting to talk about it any further in public.

Archival Tape -- Journalist:

“Do you believe it is acceptable for this cabinet minister to remain in his position while he has this hanging over his head?”

Archival Tape -- Scott Morrison:

“I think it's appropriate for the matter to be dealt with the federal police and the federal police to advise me of the nature of this, which they're doing.”

RUBY:

Right, so Scott Morrison is saying he didn’t really know about this although he had heard some rumours which it sounds like he didn't follow up on, and it looks like he won’t hold an inquiry and that he’s saying federal police are dealing with this. So what does that mean? What’s likely to happen next?

KAREN:

Well, that's another important point. The Prime Minister is saying, because it's been referred to the federal police that he can't speak about it any further, implying that there is now an investigation on foot. But the federal police don't have jurisdiction at this stage to investigate the alleged offence, because those were not offences allegedly committed under Commonwealth law.

They were allegations of rape and those are offences under state law. So if any police investigation was going to ensue, it would have to occur in the state where the offence was said to have occurred. In the case of the cabinet minister who's being accused, we understand from the detail of that letter that the offence was said to have occurred in Sydney. So in other words, as of early this week, there was no federal police investigation underway and it would be wrong to suggest that an AFP investigation was on foot.

RUBY:

I know this is a hard question Karen, but do you have thoughts on what might happen here? Because I suppose I’m at a bit of a loss - but this is a serious allegation, an allegation of rape against a Cabinet Minister - the person who made the allegation, she has now passed away, but presumably pressure on this is not going to relent? I mean, this is no small thing..

KAREN:

It's an incredibly complex and difficult issue, both in a legal sense and in a political sense.

In a legal sense, what we know is that the woman who made the allegation of rape against the cabinet minister is no longer living. She took her own life in June of last year. And it makes any prosecution extremely difficult because she is not there to speak to her allegation or to be cross-examined. That makes prosecution almost impossible.

In a political sense, it puts the Prime Minister and the minister about whom the allegation is made in an extremely difficult position too. They argue that no minister should have to stand aside if no offence has been proven to the point that any charges have been laid. In the ministerial code of conduct suggests that that is the test for standing aside a minister, if he or she has been charged with something.

The Prime Minister is defending him in the absence of using his name at this point. But it's going to be a pretty tough political situation with this sort of hanging in the air without any resolution, either legally or politically.

We have to remember that natural justice is very important and that we have a system in this country of someone being innocent until proven guilty.

We're dealing with allegations about people unnamed that can't be tested, but have the potential to cause damage. And clearly, a young woman has taken her own life, which is an absolute tragedy. And so, you know, it's an awful situation for a whole lot of people. Most, most awful for the woman herself and the people closest to her.

RUBY:

And Karen, speaking in a broad sense here, you have worked in Canberra for a long time. And you know the culture there. How significant do you think this moment in time is? It seems from the outside to be completely unprecedented.

KAREN:

It looks not like anything I've seen in politics in the 30 years I've been covering it. We've certainly heard allegations of sexual harassment and rumours of worse. But this has all kind of conflated, I guess, now with the case of Brittany Higgins and now these subsequent allegations into, well, verging on a crisis for the government.

It remains to be seen how it ends up being resolved and whether the Prime Minister can just tough it out and insist that nothing further needs to be done. But in terms of the current political culture, it's been said loudly and increasingly loudly in the last fortnight that there's a culture that exacerbates the risk of sexual harassment and even sexual violence by its permissiveness, by the sense of impunity that people with power have in the parliamentary precinct, in the building and just in political life in general, and that something needs to be done about that. And it does feel like there's a momentum around that that hasn't occurred before.

RUBY:

Karen, thank you so much for your time.

KAREN:

Thanks, Ruby.

RUBY:

If this episode has raised issues for you, you can get support at 1800 RESPECT. Those numbers are: 1800 737 732.

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RUBY:

Also in the news today…

New South Wales police have confirmed they won’t be investigating the historical rape allegation, made against a sitting cabinet minister, citing “insufficient admissible evidence”. In a statement police said they now considered the matter “closed”.

Meanwhile, former Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull has called on the accused minister to make a public statement addressing the allegations.

And a Royal Commission into Victoria’s mental health system has found that it “catastrophically failed to live up to expectations” and must be rebuilt.

Premier Daniel Andrews has promised to implement all of the report’s 65 recommendations.

I’m Ruby Jones, this is 7am. See ya tomorrow.

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