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Christian Porter turns legal attention to other media companies
Having succeeded in convincing the Federal Court to permanently redact three parts of the ABC’s defamation defence, lawyers for former attorney-general Christian Porter are now seeking new orders against two major media outlets.
Naomi Neilson
In what appears to be a pre-emptive strike, Christian Porter’s lawyers are seeking a declaration from Nine and News Corporation – and their legal representatives – that they will not use the redacted parts of the ABC’s defence for any purpose other than their involvement in the proceedings unless the court grants them leave to do so.
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Lawyers acting for the media outlets were provided a copy of the ABC’s full defence, which included the 27 pages that Justice Jayne Jagot said would be permanently unavailable in the public domain. The lawyers were permitted access for the purpose of arguing their case while a suppression order protected it from being published.
Under the current orders, media outlets or individuals that have obtained the material could choose to report on it but would not have the protection of legal defences relating to reporting on public documents in a court case. Mr Porter’s new legal action would prevent the media outlets from taking the risk at all.
Pending the resolution of this new court action, Justice Jagot has extended the temporary suppression order over the redacted parts of the defence. The Federal Court will return to the matter on Wednesday, 18 August to hear the arguments and to decide whether to grant Mr Porter’s request for a costs order against the outlets.
Last month, Justice Jagot made the order that the documents would be removed from the court file “on the grounds that it is necessary to prevent prejudice to the proper administration of justice”. The file will instead be sealed and kept separately.
Nine and News Corporation had argued that there is no good reason to remove material from the court file that would “ordinarily be understood to be publicly available to members of the public” under overarching principles of open justice, particularly if the material is not found to be scandalous or an abuse of power.
In July, the South Australian Coroner was also granted access to the redacted material for the “purpose of the investigation” into the death of a woman who accused Mr Porter of rape. The coroner is yet to decide if an inquiry will take place, having dismissed a brief of evidence for being “incomplete”. Mr Porter denies the allegations.
In addition to this new legal action, Mr Porter is also pursuing an appeal to the decision to remove his barrister Sue Chrysanthou from his legal team. This is on top of being the subject of potential action by The New Liberals leader Victor Kline.
