By Stephen Brook and Kishor Napier-Raman
Gillian Triggs, the human rights lawyer who became a United Nations assistant secretary-general and assistant high commissioner for protection with refugee agency the UNHCR, is transitioning into retirement.
Credit: Jozsef Benke
Before the UN, where she was so well received she was awarded the Ruth Bader Ginsberg Medal of Honour in 2021, Triggs rose to fame as president of the Australian Human Rights Commission from 2012 to 2017. Her prominence sparked such a firestorm of divergent views during the years Tony Abbott was PM that she should have been renamed Gillian Trigger-Warning.
Triggs’ family terrace on grand Victoria Avenue in the bayside haven of Albert Park is on the market, with a price range of $3.85 million to $4.05 million.
The three-bedroom home is said to be a “perfect blend of modern elegance and practical comfort, designed to meet the needs of contemporary living” with a kitchen termed a “chef’s delight”.
“They are moving towards retirement and downsizing,” RT Edgar Albert Park real estate agent Gerald Betts told CBD of Triggs and her husband, Alan Brown, a former diplomat.
In December, the UNHCR said in a blog post that Triggs was “preparing to conclude her appointment”, and late on Sunday, CBD heard back from a UNHCR official in Geneva who said she had quietly left the agency in January.
The couple want to spend more time with their children and grandchildren and are downsizing to an apartment in Melbourne. Frankly, there should be more of it.
MORRISSEY CALLS TIME
Queen of Australian fiction Di Morrissey is one of our best-selling novelists. She has also been doing her bit for local independent journalism – until now.
Morrissey launched The Manning Community News on the NSW mid north coast nearly 10 years ago as she believed regional media outlets were letting local governments get off easy. But now she has reluctantly shut down her monthly newspaper and given the MidCoast Council in northern NSW an earful.
Di Morrissey is a defender of local journalism but said goodbye to her newspaper.
When CBD contacted Morrissey for comment, she replied with a 400-word article within the hour.
“When the spotlight is on the role of journalists, the media, and the increasing threats against honest journalism and genuine media outlets, I realise what a threatened species we are,” Morrissey told CBD.
She accused the council of banning her paper from local libraries.
“Staff were told not bring it onto council premises. I soon learned that businesses knew better than to advertise with me if they didn’t want any hassle from the council,” Morrissey said.
Her paper put local officials under scrutiny, but in 2019, she settled a defamation case and apologised to former local councillor Len Roberts, who also sued the ABC.
CBD rang MidCoast Council only to be told by an officer that under the Local Government Act, it had 48 hours to respond to our email query and she couldn’t put us through to anyone on the media team (which doesn’t have an email address) or even name anyone on the media team. We explained how deadlines worked and she then hung up after citing our “threatening” behaviour.
We did track down Mayor Claire Pontin, who gave us an off-the-record no-comment but put us in touch with a media contact.
Marcelle Boyling, council’s communication, engagement and marketing manager, was happy to tell us that MidCoast Council confirmed there “is no ‘ban’ on any publication from any council premises”, local publications are important avenues to the community and that the council always provides a response “anytime it has been requested”.
“We are not in a position to tell anyone either on staff or in the community what to read or where to advertise. They are matters for individual community members and businesses,” she said.
So vale, The Manning Community News, and after that runaround, even more respect to you Di Morrissey.
COMPUTER SAYS NO
When is a job cut not a job cut? When it’s an admin error.
One of CBD’s spies spent much of Saturday teasing out claims Ambulance Victoria was cutting patient transport shifts it contracts out to St John and the Royal Flying Doctor Service in Ballarat, Bendigo and Geelong.
Ambulance Victoria itself announced the cuts to the organisations, which although taken aback, duly emailed the news to staff.
The Ambulance Union of Victoria, known for its muscular defence of its paramedic members, was outraged. Union boss Danny Hill said any cuts to external patient transfer services would mean ambos would be moonlighting as taxi drivers, ferrying non-urgent patients between hospitals and nursing homes.
It was a bad look, and a bad time for the news to come through: Victoria’s pinched health system is getting squeezed from every direction.
But in a relief to Hill and his members, an Ambulance Victoria spokeswoman interrupted her weekend to get to the bottom of it. Just an admin error, she said. If only all job cuts were so easily reversed.
POTTY MOUTH
Even in a rancorous, sometimes weird place like the NSW upper house, there are certain rules about what can and can’t be said. Swearing is very much out.
It’s a different story outside parliament. Last weekend at a protest against coal mining in Newcastle, Greens upper house MP Sue Higginson was unrestrained about the rules of parliamentary civility, launching into an F-bomb rant about the NSW government’s alleged failure to created a koala national park.
NSW upper house Greens MP Sue Higginson.Credit: Dion Georgopoulos
“And it is now over a year. They’re logging the absolute guts and heart out of it and telling us, ‘Oh you’ll get your great koala national park at some point. We’ve done the job, go back and just play being greens.’ ”
“And we say, no f--k you, that is not a promise.”
Higginson said the government’s failure to create the national park amounted to “the most disloyal thing any political party has ever done” in the history of environmental politics.
When CBD came calling, she maintained the rage.
“I’m totally willing to go on the record and say, frankly, it’s a f--king joke.”
We appreciated the candour.
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