Anthony Albanese (Grayndler, Australian Labor Party, Leader of the Opposition) Share this | Hansard source

I move:

That so much of the standing orders be suspended as would prevent the Leader of the Opposition from moving the following motion immediately—That the House calls on the Prime Minister to immediately:

(1) commission an independent inquiry into the sexual assault allegations against the Attorney-General;

(2) provide a full explanation of his Government's response to the reported sexual assault of Brittany Higgins in the Defence Minister's office in March 2019;

(3) act on the Australian Human Rights Commission's Respect@Work report; and

(4) improve support for programs that prevent gendered violence.

We heard today that the Prime Minister allegedly says that the document that contains the information from the person who's made allegations about the Attorney-General he did not read. It was forwarded on to the AFP without him having a copy of it, which is his excuse, consistent with the fact that he is tone deaf and consistent with the fact that he refused to listen to the words that were said by the women who spoke outside at the March 4 Justice today.

Anyone who knows anything about the Prime Minister's office should be, quite frankly, horrified about the national security implications of the fact that a document such as that can come into the PMO, be forwarded to the AFP and not have a copy or a record of it kept in the Prime Minister's office. It is just not credible, just as it's not credible, as Peta Credlin, Julie Bishop and Malcolm Turnbull have documented, that no-one told the Prime Minister about what had occurred—the reported sexual assault just metres from his office—until the Monday when it was reported on news.com.au. This is in spite of the fact that at least three ministers had been informed of this. This is in spite of the fact that the Prime Minister has someone who was at the time the chief of staff to Senator Reynolds working in his office. This is in spite of the fact that we know that multiple people in the Prime Minister's office knew. This is in spite of the fact that the parliament even had occurrences such as the cleaning of Senator Reynolds's office on the Saturday when it was scheduled to be cleaned on the Sunday under normal circumstances. All of this occurred, and yet no-one told the Prime Minister anything at all. But it gets worse than that, because journalists were making inquiries to the PMO on the Friday, and still, all weekend, no-one said anything to the Prime Minister.

No wonder Brittany Higgins feels let down. No wonder Brittany Higgins gave such an extraordinary statement outside, where she said:

I had my suspicions confirmed when the media exposed a long list of people who knew what had happened to me. A list that seemed to grow by the day as truths about internal reviews, Senate committee submissions, office cleans and witness accounts were all unearthed.

Brittany Higgins also said—

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