Sexual assault survivor advocates have called for reflection in newsrooms as they observe increasingly hostile reporting on Brittany Higgins’ sexual assault allegations against former Liberal Party staffer Bruce Lehrmann.
Last Friday at a Young Achiever Awards night sponsored by the Seven Network, child sexual assault survivor and advocate Harrison James criticised a decision made by executives at the network to broadcast a controversial interview with Lehrmann.
In an acceptance speech for an award for his advocacy work, James said it was “ironic” the interview would air just days later.
He is leading a campaign aimed at pressuring the NSW government to remove the ability for alleged paedophiles to tender character references in proceedings launched against them.
“I consider this award an immense privilege, but before I conclude I would like to address a point that many survivors will be hoping I bring up this evening with great respect,” he said. “I find it rather ironic that on the same weekend I win an award for my advocacy as a survivor, Seven News is platforming Bruce Lehrmann on Sunday evening. It’s a real shame.”
In James’s view, the interview wasn’t just poorly timed — it shouldn’t have gone ahead. He told Crikey the footage of an alleged rapist broadcast on the most-watched free-to-air television network in the country could have deterred countless victims from reporting crimes committed against them.
“I think it is a real moment to be like, ‘Well, this shouldn’t have happened in the first place, and it shouldn’t happen again.’ I think Seven was scraping the bottom of the barrel and just calling it investigative journalism,” he said.
“Because you’re not just disregarding the story of one survivor in Brittany, you’re disregarding the stories of millions of survivors around the country.”
The Seven Network declined to comment.
In the lead-up to the broadcast, the Seven Network billed the interview as a blockbuster event, where viewers would hear for the first time from the alleged perpetrator.
The allegations were first publicised in 2021 by Higgins in an interview with journalist Lisa Wilkinson on The Project. A subsequent trial in the ACT Supreme Court was brought and later abandoned for fears over Higgins’ mental health. Lehrmann has always denied the allegations.
A voiceover narrating promotional footage of the interview released in the days before its Sunday airing said: “Despite the allegations, despite the headlines, Bruce Lehrmann has never told his side of the story. Not one. Single. Word.”
James was among several sexual assault survivor advocates to publicly condemn media coverage of Higgins’ allegations in the days since. On Tuesday, Canberra Rape Crisis Centre CEO Chrystina Stanford addressed the Australian media in an open letter, condemning coverage of both Higgins and the issue of sexual assault more broadly.
Stanford said the centre had recently been contacted “a number of times” by reporters looking to confirm details about Higgins’ interaction with the service, which she called “the wrong story”.
“The reason seems to be to publish yet another story aimed at shaming, blaming, and discrediting a young woman. A young woman who very well could be our friend, partner, child … In fact she is all of those things,” Stanford wrote.
“These are not positive experiences for us, as we were contacted in an attempt to … criticise a young person publicly, to tear at her story, her life and her pain. The media wanted us to join the circus. We wanted no part of it.”
Stanford encouraged the media to instead turn their attention to highlighting the prevalence of sexual violence in Australia: “We wanted them to ask about why Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people are sexually assaulted more, and why disabled people are targeted for sexual violence, or young people, or those from the LGBTQIA+ communities,” she wrote.
Coverage of the allegations and subsequent trial have in recent days taken a marked turn, advocates say. News reporting on Lehrmann’s interview with Seven has been couched in sympathy, while coverage of Higgins has grown increasingly hostile, particularly across the News Corp stable.
Sharna Bremner, founder and director of End Rape on Campus, said the hostility isn’t limited to News Corp’s publishing assets. Media organisations across the board had questions to answer for their news-gathering tactics and reporting on Higgins, which she said has been “revolting” to watch.
“We often see a really interesting belief that a News Ltd publication will only ever print an awful hit piece on somebody, whereas a more ‘reputable organisation’ like the ABC is likely to be really ethical in their reporting and treat individual survivors really well,” Bremner told Crikey. “And that just hasn’t been my experience.”
She said News Corp has done “amazing” work on the #LetHerSpeak campaign, led by survivor and journalist Nina Funnell.
“On the other hand, we’ve had stories that the ABC has worked on where reporters have behaved appallingly,” she said. “[For example] I had one journalist from the ABC several years back now ask me to speak to somebody who looked more mainstream than the person she was interviewing that had been assaulted.”
However, Bremner remained optimistic the top-down directives that lead to harmful reporting will be outgrown. In the short term, she encouraged reporters to find a way to cover the issue through a news framework that prioritises humanity and ethical news-gathering.
If you or someone you know is affected by sexual assault or violence, call 1800RESPECT on 1800 737 732 or visit 1800RESPECT.org.au. In an emergency, call 000.
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