By Sarah Whyte
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Attorney-General George Brandis has lost confidence in Australian Human Rights Commission President Gillian Triggs, saying she had invited accusations of political bias, during an extraordinary estimates hearing in Canberra.
Sitting just two seats away from Senator Brandis during the hearing, Professor Triggs had earlier confirmed reports the new secretary of the Attorney-General's department, Chris Moraitis, had told her that Mr Brandis had lost confidence in her performance as President during a meeting on February 3 and had asked for her resignation.
Professor Triggs she was "certainly very shaken and shocked" by the meeting with Mr Moraitis at her Sydney office. The commission's inquiry into children in detention was tabled a week later on February 11, having been submitted to the government in November last year.
"It was very difficult for me to deal with," Professor Triggs said. Mr Moraitis said she would be offered "other work in the government" and that her law skills would be used by the government if she agreed to resign.
President of the Human Rights Commission, Gillian Triggs.Credit: Andrew Meares
But Mr Moraitis shot back during his witness statement saying Professor Triggs had asked for Mr Brandis' thoughts on her.
"Under her request I took to seek his views," Mr Moraitis told the hearing. "My interactions were to convey that the Attorney-General had lost confidence in the President."
Senator Brandis said although "he likes her personally" he lost confidence in Professor Triggs as President of the Human Rights Commission in October, when she had given "inconsistent and evasive" evidence to Senate estimates when explaining the timing of her decision to hold an investigation into children in detention.
"I felt that the political impartiality of the Human Rights Commission had been fatally compromised", Senator Brandis said.
Attorney-General George Brandis and Professor Gillian Triggs, President of the Human Rights Commission, during Tuesday's Senate hearing.Credit: Alex Ellinghausen
The Attorney-General said Professor Triggs had made a "catastrophic error of judgement" in holding a national inquiry into children in detention that had left the commission open to a perception of bias.
"I'm prepared to consider it an error of judgment," Senator Brandis said.
"Dozens of members of the government in the weeks after those estimates [in October] ... had expressed that view to me.
"I had reached the conclusion, sadly, that Professor Triggs should consider her position."
"I would be glad for Professor Triggs to be of service to the Australian government but I am afraid that the reputation of the commission will not survive the reputation of political partisanship, which I am sorry to say Professor Triggs [has].
The chair of the hearing, LNP Senator Ian MacDonald also told the hearing that he had not "bothered" to read the report into children in detention, because it was too partisan.
Professor Triggs said she originally called Mr Moraitis to ask why neither he or Senator Brandis were sticking up for her, given the negative media coverage about her over summer.
Professor Triggs was appointed in July 2012 for a fixed five-year term.