{"id":316436,"date":"2025-11-14T11:18:46","date_gmt":"2025-11-14T01:18:46","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.vibewire.com.au\/?p=316436"},"modified":"2025-11-14T11:18:47","modified_gmt":"2025-11-14T01:18:47","slug":"secret-documents-reveal-alleged-labor-plot-behind-2-4-million-brittany-higgins-payout","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.vibewire.com.au\/?p=316436","title":{"rendered":"Secret documents reveal alleged Labor plot behind $2.4 million Brittany Higgins payout"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Previously secret documents have revealed the alleged tactics Labor used which denied Linda Reynolds of her defence against Brittany Higgins’ claims of a political cover-up, which ultimately resulted in Ms Higgins receiving a $2.4 million Commonwealth payout.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

According to The Australian, the cache of documents show Commonwealth lawyers allegedly ignored Ms Reynolds’ instructions and failed to provide the former senator with crucial information about the settlement process.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Ms Reynolds has taken the Commonwealth and law firm HWL Ebsworth to court over the controversial settlement, which was awarded to Ms Higgins in 2022 following just a single day of mediation, saying she was forcibly excluded from negotiations.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The former senator also alleges Ms Higgins’ claims of a political cover-up of her rape claim against Bruce Lehrmann were false and should not have been used as the basis for the multimillion dollar payout.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Two separate defamation rulings, one from Justice Michael Lee and another from Justice Paul Tottle, found Ms Higgins’ cover-up claims lacked merit.<\/p>\n\n\n

\n
\"\"<\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

Ms Reynolds alleges Ms Higgins’ claims of a political cover-up of her rape claim against Bruce Lehrmann were false and should not have been used as the basis for the multimillion dollar payout. Picture: Colin Murty<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Details of the settlement had been largely shrouded in secrecy, with Ms Reynolds having been denied access to the agreement until Justice Lee ordered its disclosure last year.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The latest trove of documents came via discovery in Ms Reynolds’ defamation suit against Ms Higgins in Western Australia’s Supreme Court, where Justice Tottle awarded the former senator more than $340,00 in damages and interest.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Sky News<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Previously secret documents have surfaced showing the alleged tactics Labor used which denied Linda Reynolds of her defence against Brittany Higgins’ claims of a political cover-up.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":22,"featured_media":315899,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"_uf_show_specific_survey":0,"_uf_disable_surveys":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[273,999,35],"tags":[10839,9035,11339],"class_list":["post-316436","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-australia","category-australia-politics","category-breaking-news","tag-australian-labor-party","tag-brittany-higgins","tag-linda-reynolds"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.vibewire.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/316436","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.vibewire.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.vibewire.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.vibewire.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/22"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.vibewire.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=316436"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.vibewire.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/316436\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":316438,"href":"https:\/\/www.vibewire.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/316436\/revisions\/316438"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.vibewire.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/315899"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.vibewire.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=316436"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.vibewire.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=316436"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.vibewire.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=316436"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}