Christian Porter: losing barrister would be ’big deal’ in ABC case

Christian Porter’s case against the ABC might not be heard this year if Sue Chrysanthou SC is ousted, a court is told.

Barrister Sue Chrysanthou arrives at the NSW Supreme Court. Picture: Getty Images.

It would be a “very big deal” for Christian Porter to be deprived of his high-profile defamation barrister in his case against the ABC, a court has heard.

Jo Dyer, director of the Adelaide Writers Week, is seeking orders in the Federal Court to stop barrister Sue Chrysanthou SC from representing the former Attorney-General in his defamation action against the ABC.

Ms Chrysanthou, who has previously represented actor Geoffrey Rush and Greens senator Sarah Hanson-Young, has been accused of having access to confidential information related to Mr Porter’s case against the ABC provided to her by Ms Dyer in a “lawyer-client relationship”.

Mr Porter’s barrister Christopher Withers SC told the Federal Court on Wednesday that his client was entitled to test the allegations against Ms Chrysanthou.

“It will be … a very, very big deal if Mr Porter loses his counsel in this case,” he said.

He said this was because of the amount of time Ms Chrysanthou had spent on the case, the costs already incurred, and her specialist defamation skills among “a very limited field”.

The potential for a trial occurring this year could also be “jeopardised” if Ms Chrysanthou was removed form the case, he said.

“That is why we are vigorously defending this case in order to keep her as Mr Porter’s counsel in a case that obviously has the most serious implications for him personally having regard to the nature of the allegations,” he said.

Jo Dyer is seeking orders in the Federal Court to stop barrister Sue Chrysanthou SC from representing Christian Porter.

Mr Porter, now Industry Minister, is suing the ABC and journalist Louise Milligan over an online article published on February 26, which reported that an unnamed cabinet minister was facing historical rape allegations.

Mr Porter, 50, outed himself as the unnamed minister five days later and launched the defamation action on March 15.

Ms Dyer is not a party to Mr Porter’s case against the ABC.

However, she was a friend of a woman, known as Kate, who alleged she had been raped by Mr Porter in 1988 when she was 16 and Mr Porter was 17. Kate committed suicide in June last year.

She is arguing that Ms Chrysanthou should be ousted from the defamation case to prevent the misuse of her confidential information and protect the proper administration of justice.

Christian Porter is suing the ABC. Picture: Getty Images.

Barrister Michael Hodge SC, representing Ms Dyer, told the Federal Court on Wednesday that any information provided by Ms Dyer to Ms Chrysanthou during a meeting on November 20 was confidential because of the nature of their lawyer-client relationship.

However, Mr Withers said Mr Porter did not accept that a lawyer-client relationship existed. It was possible for a barrister to “function as a sounding board”, which fell short of an actual retainer, he said.

He is also challenging whether any confidential information was provided to Ms Chrysanthou at the meeting, or whether Ms Dyer had since made that information public.

Mr Withers said Ms Dyer was a “prolific public commentator” on the case, who wanted to make sure the issue remained at the forefront of public discussion. Ms Dyer has been ordered to provide to Mr Porter’s team information about her communications relevant to the case, but not her confidential communications.

Mr Hodge told the court that other individuals present at the November 20 meeting were: Kate’s ex-boyfriend and former debating teammate James Hooke, now a senior managing director at Macquarie Group; Marque Lawyers managing partner Michael Bradley (who is representing Ms Dyer and also represented Kate); and media barrister Matthew Richardson.

Mr Richardson, the son of former Labor minister Graham Richardson — and a close friend of Ms Chrysanthou as well as a friend of Mr Hooke from university — has been ordered to produce any written records from the meeting.

Ms Chrysanthou had reviewed a legal letter sent by Mr Bradley on Ms Dyer’s behalf to The Australian on November 26, claiming an opinion piece written by columnist Janet Albrechtsen had defamed her.

Albrechtsen’s column, published on November 14, had criticised an ABC Four Corners program about sexism in parliament, broadcast that week, as “a poorly executed political hatchet job”.

Ms Dyer was quoted in the program criticising Mr Porter for his conduct as a young man and describing him as having “an assuredness that’s perhaps born of privilege”.

The program did not air any rape allegation against Mr Porter.

The legal letter said that before her death, Kate had disclosed to Ms Dyer “an extremely serious allegation against Christian Porter regarding events that she alleged had taken place in January 1988” and Ms Dyer had agreed to be interviewed for the Four Corners program because she believed she had a responsibility to her late friend.

The letter — well before Milligan reported the rape claims — said Kate had told many people of the allegations and this “must have come to the attention of The Australian”.

“It does not seem plausible that information concerning (Kate)’s allegations had not reached senior editorial staff at the Australian,” it read.

The letter said Albrechtsen’s criticism of Ms Dyer’s appearance should not have been published because The Australian should have been aware the interview had been conducted for the purpose of sharing Kate’s story.

Ms Chrysanthou’s barrister, Noel Hutley SC, has previously told the Federal Court that she had “no substantive recollection” of any confidential information provided to her by Ms Dyer.

“My client’s position is … she will do anything which the court thinks she ought do,” he said.