Late on Thursday morning, the ABC’s chief people officer, Deena Amorelli, felt the need to email all the staff at the broadcaster. She looked to clear something up that had been raised in the unfair dismissal case of sacked commentator Antoinette Lattouf, which is unfolding in excruciating detail in the Federal Court in Sydney.

She referred to some submissions Lattouf’s lawyers had made earlier in the week “that may have been interpreted, by some staff and commentators, as suggesting that the ABC denies that certain races exist”.