2021 Australian Parliament House sexual misconduct allegations

On 15 February 2021, Liberal Party junior staffer Brittany Higgins alleged to two media outlets, news.com.au and The Project,[1] that she was raped in the early hours of 23 March 2019 in then-Defence Industry Minister Senator Linda Reynolds' office in the ministerial wing of Parliament House by a colleague, later named as Bruce Lehrmann, after security guards admitted the pair into the building.

[2][3] Higgins said she became heavily intoxicated at a work party and left with her colleague in a taxi, believing they would both be dropped at their respective homes; instead she said she was taken to Parliament House and raped while slipping in and out of consciousness,[4][5] waking to find her skirt around her waist.

[13] Eventually Higgins transferred to work for Employment, Skills, Small and Family Business Minister Michaelia Cash for a year before resigning a month before going public with her allegations.

[15] However, during the trial Michaelia Cash said she knew about a security incident in late 2019 when Higgins began working for her, but only became aware of the rape allegation on 5 February 2021.

[29] The Australian reported Senator Reynolds made the comment in the open part of her office and was heard by several staff members, including public servants on secondment from the Department of Defence.

[34][35] Reynolds continued to be on medical leave until 2 April on the advice of her cardiologist,[36][37] and was not questioned during that time in or outside Parliament on the circumstances or of her knowledge of the alleged rape.

Noting Higgins was conscious and did not look to be in distress, the guard shut the door and went back to her duties.The man accused of the rape, Bruce Lehrmann, appeared by telephone at the Magistrates Court of the Australian Capital Territory on 5 November 2021 and pleaded not guilty.

[42] Higgins made a complaint against the Australian Federal Police for unlawfully giving Lehrmann's defence team protected evidence, including counselling notes and video recordings.

[51][52] Higgins subsequently criticised the criminal justice system on live television, saying it "has long failed to deliver outcomes to victims of sexual assault".

[53] The matter was relisted for 20 February 2023,[51][52] although a senior barrister soon after said it remained to be seen if the case is retried, given the extent of comments by politicians and media personalities now making Lehrmann virtually untriable.

[68] This was later disclosed as being $2.3M, and was negotiated in controversial circumstances with the Federal Attorney General specifically excluding Senators Reynolds and Cash and former staffer Fiona Brown from appearing or providing any evidence for the mediation.

[80] The defamation case was judged in favour of Network Ten on 15 April 2024, with Justice Michael Lee concluding that there was "substantial truth" to the allegation that Lehrmann raped Higgins.

The letter was anonymous, and included a statement by the alleged victim,[82] who had opened a case with New South Wales Police in 2020, but closed it shortly before taking her own life in Adelaide in June 2020.

[85] While some legal experts have opposed calls for an inquiry,[86] others urged the Prime Minister to conduct an independent investigation into the allegation,[87] along with Wong, Hanson-Young and the deceased's lawyer.

[94] On 9 March 2021, the Four Corners episode "Bursting the Canberra Bubble" provided more background on the woman, and the circumstances of the night in 1988 when the alleged rape occurred.

[96] It was also revealed that the woman, who lived in South Australia, had asked NSW Police in early April 2020 to make a statement via Skype, but was dissuaded from doing so.

[100] On 10 June 2021 film producer and festival director Jo Dyer, confidante of the alleged victim, was awarded A$550,000 in costs after she brought separate litigation to prevent one of Porter's defamation lawyers, Sue Chrysanthou, from representing him.

[90] On 28 February 2021, Liberal Senator Sarah Henderson said a woman had sent her an email alleging she had been raped by a man who is now a Labor federal member of Parliament.

[114] In March 2021, photos and videos were leaked from a group chat of male government staffers, where they had performed sex acts in Parliament House, including masturbating on the desk of female MP Nola Marino.

[115] Peta Credlin alleged:[116] when an MP cleaned out the former staffer's desk, and the computer, that MP uncovered evidence that for many months, that staffer had regularly met with other men during the middle of the day – while the MP was in Question Time – for orgies in political offices.On 24 March 2021, two days after resigning from the Liberal Party, Tasmanian House of Assembly speaker Sue Hickey used parliamentary privilege to claim Liberal Senator Eric Abetz said to her, "As for that Higgins girl, anybody so disgustingly drunk who would sleep with anybody could have slept with one of our spies and put the security of the nation at risk"; and in reference to the Christian Porter allegations, "the woman is dead and the law will protect [Porter]".

[118] On 27 March, Laming stood aside from all parliamentary roles after another woman accused him of taking a mobile phone photo of her bottom while her underwear was visible in 2019.

[128] A verdict was expected in late October 2023;[129] in February 2024 Zumbo was convicted of indecently assaulting four women,[130] and was sentenced to a two-year intensive corrections order to be served in the community.

[131] The allegations sparked discussions over a toxic workplace culture, systemic misogyny and victim blaming both in political establishments and wider society.

[135] Former deputy Liberal leader and former Foreign Affairs Minister Julie Bishop also criticised the Morrison government and said that handling of sexual harassment was an issue for all parties in Parliament.

[139][140] On 23 March 2021, Prime Minister Scott Morrison held an extraordinary behind-closed-doors meeting with 400 Coalition staff at which he admitted his government's shortcomings in tackling sexism and bad behaviour, and acknowledged they had put up with "absolute rubbish".

[141] Morrison was criticised for his handling of a press conference on 23 March 2021 addressing the issue of sexual assault within Parliament House, during which he told reporters that an individual at News Corp was under investigation for harassment.

"[142][143] After News Corp chairman Michael Miller rejected the claim and made a statement that no employee was under such investigation, Morrison issued an apology and acknowledged that the incident he described did not happen.

[145] Adelaide radio announcer Jeremy Cordeaux was sacked by FIVEaa in March 2021 following on-air comments about Higgins, in which he described her as "a silly little girl who got drunk".

[148][149][150][151] The ACT Government is set to conduct an inquiry into the matter after a letter between the Territory's Prosecutor and Chief of Police stated that they were being targeted by a campaign to not prosecute the Lehrmann case.

[157] Members of the Liberal Party accused Gallagher of misleading parliament when she told the Senate, in June 2021, that "no one had any knowledge" of Higgins' allegations before they were aired publicly.