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On Gogglebox’s Australian edition, viewers watched this month as Scott Morrison, prime minister, was asked how he was unaware a young female staff member was allegedly raped in his colleague’s office over a year ago and why so little had been done about it since.
Goggleboxer Keith, 60, and his partner Lee, 59, appeared stunned as they watched: “It happened in your building mate!†Lee shouted at the TV.
The disgust felt by many Australians viewing the litany of sexual assault and harassment scandals uncovered at the heart of the nation’s government, has contrasted with the confusion of some male politicians and journalists about why they were such a big deal.
Morrison, once lauded as a political genius for his unexpected 2019 election victory, is now sinking in the polls and seems unable to manage the crisis away. Meanwhile, a senior reporter at the nation’s top financial daily labelled the female journalists who broke the stories “unapologetic activistsâ€.
Amy Remeikis, a Canberra reporter involved in the coverage, says there is a disconnect as politicians respond to a “human story†with political point scoring. She adds that the accusations of “activism†show “just how many men saw this as a ‘woman’s issue’â€.
Their attitude also reveals a gulf between a public generally familiar with basic HR standards and sections of Australia’s political and media establishment who believe that if a person doesn’t “toughen the fuck up†and get on with things, they are just not up to the job.
The resistance of many of these powerful men to hold those responsible for abuse to account means Australia’s much-delayed #MeToo movement could be undermined. That would be an insult to assault survivors, including Brittany Higgins, the political staffer whose bravery in going public about her rape inside parliament house encouraged other Australian women to describe their assaults, breaking free of the country’s stifling defamation laws, which hampered the movement in the first place.
These laws put the onus on the victim to prove their allegations are true, a task made more difficult in harassment cases by the lack of witnesses. Critics say victims were further discouraged by the large payouts awarded to some high-profile figures accused of harassment who successfully challenging accusers with defamation suits.
Since Higgins went public with her allegation, the country’s attorney-general has been accused of a historical rape, which he denies; a parliamentarian’s staffer has been accused of harassing women for more than half a decade; and another MP was accused of taking an inappropriate photo of a young woman while she was bending over.
As a former political reporter who started her career in Canberra and worked for national newspaper companies, none of this completely surprises me. In encounters that former female colleagues would find unremarkable, I dodged boozy advances from parliamentarians, was asked by an editor why I didn’t enter a more “female†profession and feared repercussions of turning down numerous drinks invitations from a senior male colleague.
Among politicians and their staffers, and parts of the media, there was a feeling that those working in the political capital were somehow excluded from workplace rules. This allowed bad behaviour to carry on unchecked. One staffer describes watching a former prime minister “vent†by kicking an office bin directly at two junior staff members. Another says it was “totally normal†to receive abusive phone calls from MPs at all times of the night.
Such bullying, which has driven talented women out of top media and political jobs, is not sexual assault. But the impunity with which people act, and their failure to embrace even basic diversity in their hiring practices, breeds an environment that has protected abusers.
Were Morrison to institute a proper investigation of Higgins’ treatment, banish the photographer MP from his party and change how parliament is run, he would send a signal from the top to call time on this culture. The “Keith and Lee vote†may depend on it.
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