WA Liberal Senator Linda Reynolds has taken aim at Attorney General Mark Dreyfus while entering the WA Supreme Court this morning, as she prepares to begin her five-day stint in the witness box in her defamation row with former staffer Brittany Higgins.
Former Minister Linda Reynolds arrives at the Supreme Court this morning. Credit: Trevor Collens
Reynolds arrived at the David Malcolm Justice Centre flanked by lawyers shortly before 10am, stopping briefly to reiterate that she was confident the truth would be told about her role in responding to Higgins’ claim about her rape in Parliament House in 2019 by colleague Bruce Lehrmann.
“I’m very much looking forward to, after three-and-a-half years, having the opportunity to tell the truth, and I’m very glad the Attorney General [Mark Dreyfus] does not have any reach in the Supreme Court of Western Australia,” she told the media.
The pair have been at odds over the government’s handling of Higgins’ $2.4 million compensation claim, with Reynolds lodging a complaint with the anti-corruption watchdog and using observations from Federal Court Justice Michael Lee’s judgment that there was no cover-up as a call for Dreyfus to admit he got it wrong.
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Dreyfus insists the compensation claim was handled to the “letter of the law”.
The five-week defamation trial comes more than one year after Reynolds sued Higgins over several social media posts accusing her of harassment, claiming they damaged her reputation and caused her distress and embarrassment.
The former defence minister’s legal team argue the posts implied she had engaged in misconduct, provided inadequate support for Higgins following her alleged rape and wanted to silence victims of sexual assault.
But Higgins has fiercely defended the action by claiming her posts were substantially true that Reynolds mishandled her rape complaint and used the media to pursue a campaign against her.
Lehrmann has long maintained his innocence.
Source Agencies
