Secret recordings of private conversations have been entered into evidence at Bruce Lehrmann's defamation federal court hearing. Sky News has produced a copy of the recording of a private discussion involving Brittany Higgins' lawyer, fiancé and a friend about her evidence during cross examination.
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00:00 It came from a member of the public, apparently, and was given to Sky News.
00:08 The recording itself was made secretly and it was recorded in a Sydney restaurant where
00:17 a group of people were celebrating Mr Zwier's birthday.
00:21 The contents of it are about things like how Brittany Higgins should give her evidence
00:30 and what sorts of things the court should hear.
00:35 But Leon Zwier has issued a statement today which says that anybody involved in that conversation,
00:44 which included David Shiraz, who is Ms Higgins' fiancé and a friend, Emma Webster, they were
00:52 all involved in that conversation on the basis that they say nothing to Brittany Higgins
00:57 because she was still being cross-examined and it would have been entirely inappropriate
01:02 for any of them to have discussed her evidence with her.
01:06 What the court will do with this recording, we don't know yet.
01:11 Everyone is having a look at it overnight but at least it has now been received by the
01:15 court after an order was made this morning.
01:18 And there were also two other recordings admitted into evidence today.
01:22 What were they about?
01:24 Yes, also secretly recorded, this time by Brittany Higgins herself.
01:28 They were both recorded around the time she started to talk to Channel 10 about an interview
01:37 about what she alleges happened to her at Parliament House.
01:42 One was with the Chief of Staff she had worked with and the other was a recording of a telephone
01:48 conversation she had with the Chief of Staff, Daniel Try, and her then-minister, Michaelia
01:55 Cash.
01:57 The conversation was about how Ms Higgins had tried to resign and they were trying to
02:04 talk her into perhaps working from home.
02:07 So she wouldn't have to come into Parliament House.
02:10 They even offered to let her work from the Gold Coast.
02:14 But in the conversation she said she just wanted to get away from politics.
02:18 She'd been re-traumatised every time she had gone into work at Parliament House.
02:25 And the conversation went on with her becoming more and more distressed during the course
02:34 of that conversation.
02:35 That was ultimately shared with the producers of the project and there were some questions
02:44 about that today as the case progressed.
02:49 And what direction has the cross-examination taken?
02:52 Well, the producer of the project, Angus Llewellyn, has been giving evidence and he's been questioned
03:00 by Matthew Richardson, who is representing Mr Lehrman, about whether some of the things
03:08 that were in the program that Ms Higgins was asserting were not checked thoroughly enough
03:14 and whether he had misled the audience.
03:18 But Mr Llewellyn said with the things that he was putting together, he wasn't preparing
03:23 a police statement.
03:25 He was preparing a TV program.
03:28 So this will go on tomorrow.
03:30 No doubt we'll learn a little bit more about what happened in the lead up to this case.
03:35 [BLANK_AUDIO]