When it comes to the crunch, Labor is failing women

Labor, which has traded heavily on being the only party in which all women are safe and valued, is unravelling as it attempts to avoid accountability.

Labor senator Kimberley Kitching's funeral St Patrick Cathedral. Federal ALP leader Anthony Albanese, Jacinta Allan, Vic State Minister for Transport Infrasturcture and Victorian State Premier Daniel Andrews stand outside the cathedral after the service. Picture: David Caird

It’s a curious thing to watch something unravel. To watch, as if in time-lapse photography, a crack traverse the full length of a wall in what feels like the blink of an eye.

It is equally odd to watch men obfuscate as they attempt to defend the indefensible, and women declare themselves complicit by their silence.

Federal Labor is self-immolating as it tries to deflect serious and growing allegations of bullying and intimidation – specific allegations and those against the party and its culture more broadly. Labor, which has traded heavily on being the only party in which all women are safe, valued and championed, is unravelling as it attempts to avoid accountability.

This is no longer about a singular set of allegations made by a woman sadly departed.

The revelations about how Victorian senator Kimberley Kitching was treated by her own came not only following her death but also in the wake of damning and brave allegations by Victorian MP Kaushaliya Vaghela. Most recently, former MP for the federal western Sydney seat of Lindsay Emma Husar detailed similar experiences, claiming to have been on the receiving end of toxic, unchallenged bullying within federal Labor. I suspect there will be more. Courage fuels courage.

It’s difficult to decide what’s most astonishing about all of this. However, I think that title goes to Anthony Albanese. When confronted yet again with the growing bank of evidence, the Opposition Leader responded by saying Kitching never made a formal complaint so there was no need for an investigation.

It’s astonishing in how dangerously close that feels to saying, well, she never said stop.

No formal complaint was ever made in relation to matters concerning former attorney-general Christian Porter. Former Liberal staff member, now women’s advocate, Brittany Higgins never made a formal complaint either. The allegations against both were robustly investigated and, in the case of Higgins, criminal charges subsequently were laid.

Imagine if the chief executive of a mining company or a bank – any employer, for that matter – said, well, I’ve no personal knowledge of this and no formal complaint was made, so case closed.

It’s as preposterous as it reads. We in the real world know what the standard is. We’re not buying Labor’s Sergeant Schultz routine.

For all Scott Morrison’s faults, he commissioned the Jenkins report. In doing so, he made his government a lightning rod for generations of terrible behaviour in federal parliament. The Jenkins report made for uncomfortable reading, but the Prime Minister commissioned it. He took ownership and he did it.

There is always a reckoning in these matters, and it could be argued the Coalition has had its own. All the while, Labor stood watching, gloating and pontificating. As with a reckoning, there is always a reaping for the sowing.

By denying the problem, federal Labor is making it about politics when this should be a bipartisan issue. Likewise, the party is giving us a clear view of the chasm between what it says it stands for on this issue and what it actually does. What Labor’s behaviour says to women is: if you have allegations to make about being bullied in the workplace, and those allegations are directed against the wrong side of politics, we will trash you and your reputation. It’s a warning to women everywhere.

On that, where is the advocacy from the many influential, industry-based women’s groups and individuals, those who regularly (and rightly) advocate for women in the workplace? There is opportunity here to lead for all women. Where is opposition spokeswoman for women Tanya Plibersek on this issue that is festering in her own backyard?

In this circumstance it seems many of the same people who insisted that all women must be believed now appear somewhat caught in the thorny briar of their own hypocrisy. It’s just politics, sweetie, didn’t you know?

My generation of women don’t have it as bad as my mum’s and aunty’s did, but in my 30 years of working in media and corporate life I’ve seen and heard some things. As a younger woman, I heard the phrase: it’s just part of working in the media. It was said to me and to others with whom I worked; said to whitewash unacceptable behaviour, to gaslight and deflect. I recall a time earlier in my corporate life hearing women say things like: I should have said something but I don’t want to lose work.

Those days should be long gone. Perhaps we’re not as advanced as we thought we were.

This is an issue so much more important than politics or power struggles. It’s simply that this is a moment of reckoning for Labor and the party is proving deficient. I rage at the easy indifference with which these women and their experiences have been dismissed. We all should.

I didn’t know Kitching. I don’t know Husar or Vaghela, but I believe that what they have brought to the surface deserves to be interrogated and tested. Failing to do so just validates what they allege.