1 week Ago By Chip Le Grand
These are the agonisingly fine judgments on which political careers survive or perish. Federal Court judge David O’Callaghan said he gave “anxious consideration” to whether John Pesutto, the man hoping to be this state’s next premier, lied in his sworn evidence to defend a defamation claim brought by Moria Deeming, an MP he banished from the Liberal party room 18 months ago. John Pesutto at a press conference on Thursday announcing he wants to stay on as leader.
Credit: Eddie Jim For whatever time it took O’Callaghan to carefully weigh this proposition, Pesutto’s tenure as opposition leader and indeed, the sum total of his six years in parliament, hung in the balance. In the space of a few words written deep in the body of a 250-page judgment, O’Callaghan could have ended things right there. Instead, Pesutto remains leader.
For now. After consulting his lawyers, trusted political advisers and close colleagues, and armed with a form of words more resembling his time as a solicitor than a politician, Pesutto declared the judge had made “no adverse findings as to credit”. “The judgment says very clearly that at all times, I acted honestly in terms of acting [in] what I considered to be the public interest,” Pesutto said.
This isn’t entirely what the decision found. By any measure, O’Callaghan was scathing in his assessment of Pesutto’s performance in the witness box, variously describing his testimony as untrue in parts, evasive in others, disingenuous and unsatisfactory. He noted with more than a hint of frustration that the inordinate time Pesutto spent in cross-examination “was due in considerable part to his inability or refusal to give a simple answer to simple enough questions”.
But critically, the judge stopped short of finding that Pesutto deliberately lied to him. “I am unable to conclude that he gave dishonest evidence ..
. as infuriatingly unresponsive as much of his evidence was,” O’Callaghan said. Although the difference may seem semantic, it makes all the difference to Pesutto.
This is the lifeline he is clinging to, along with polling showing that despite the Deeming saga, people for the first time in a decade are starting to look at the Coalition as an alternative government. With due respect to O’Callaghan, the bigger question now is whether Liberal MPs still furious that this internecine party brawl ever saw the inside of a courtroom are willing to accept the matter is at an end. One of Pesutto’s internal party critics described the entire episode as a catastrophic failure of leadership.
“Anyone with a scintilla of common sense knew this had to be resolved, but they were determined to drive the bus over a cliff,” they said. “There will be some very unhappy campers in the ranks.” The mood is unlikely to improve with the revelation that, had Pesutto accepted Deeming’s February 8 settlement offer for him to cover her legal costs and pay $99,000 in damages, this could have been sorted well before the party room’s most sensitive communications were publicly aired in court.
By the time this matter got to the doors of the court, Deeming’s asking price for a settlement had risen to $2 million, with a series of conditions that Pesutto was in no position to satisfy: that Deeming be welcomed back into the party room with an apology and guarantee that they would never move against her again. With a modest payout, this business could have been consigned 10 months ago to little more than a footnote in the rich Liberal history of party feuds. Instead, it will cost Pesutto and his financial benefactors $300,000 in damages and far more in legal costs.
One of those benefactors, former premier Jeff Kennett, confirmed that party figures would need to pass the hat around so that Pesutto avoids bankruptcy – which would disqualify him from sitting in parliament. Pesutto’s leadership has also been placed at the centre of another round of frenzied speculation. “There are numbers being counted left, right and centre,” one Liberal MP said.
Pesutto’s response to the judgment on Thursday was in keeping with his dogged political character. While he said he was humbled by the responsibility of leading the state opposition, he showed little humility towards Deeming, the newly elected MP he defamed in March last year by falsely claiming she knowingly associated with neo-Nazis. When asked whether he owed her an apology for what O’Callaghan described as the severe hurt and damage he inflicted on her reputation, Pesutto said he was awaiting “fuller and more comprehensive advice from my lawyers”.
When asked whether there was anything about this episode he would like to change, he said there was “little point in re-litigating the circumstances”. What happens next is no longer in the hands of lawyers. Pesutto’s best hope is that the Christmas break and promise of forming government in two years will be enough to quell another open revolt.
If they aren’t, he need only read the judgment to understand who is to blame. Start the day with a summary of the day’s most important and interesting stories, analysis and insights. Sign up for our Morning Edition newsletter .
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