‘I didn’t lie about hard border call’: WA premier: Mark McGowan takes stand against Clive Palmer in defamation trial

Clive Palmer’s lawyer says Mark McGowan didn’t have health advice say WA’s borders had to be closed in April 2020.

WA premier Mark McGowan speaking to media outside the Federal Court. Picture: NCA NewsWire / James Gourley

West Australian premier Mark McGowan has denied he lied about the health advice he received before triggering the longest and strictest lockout of the global pandemic.

In the Federal Court in Sydney on Monday, billionaire Clive Palmer’s lawyer Peter Gray SC accused Mr McGowan of repeatedly lying in 2020 by saying it was necessary, based on health advice, to introduce WA’s hard border regime. Mr McGowan denied this. He cited written and verbal health advice that closing the border would have the effect of slowing the spread of Covid-19.

Mr Palmer and Mr McGowan are suing each other for defamation for comments made in 2020. Mr Palmer likened Mr McGowan to a dictator and claimed he lied about his justification for closing WA’s border. Mr McGowan called Mr Palmer “an enemy of the state”.

Appearing in person in the Federal Court in Sydney on Monday, Mr McGowan rejected accusations from Mr Gray that he lied at a press conference on April 2, 2020, when he announced the hard border. On that day he outlined measures already taken to reduce the spread of Covid-19 and said: “it makes sense that we go further now and close the border”.

Mr Gray read from an email containing health advice to Mr McGowan from the state’s chief health officer Andy Robertson and his deputy Paul Armstrong on the evening of March 29, 2020. It said in part: “Dr Robertson and Dr Armstrong agree that closing the border will have the effect of slowing the spread of Covid-19”.

Clive Palmer. Picture: NCA NewsWire / Damian Shaw

However Mr Gray pointed to other sentences in the advice including that “this measure may not reduce the risk significantly further than that which is achieved by measures already in place”.

The advice also appeared to suggest alternatives such as imposing more severe restrictions on WA businesses and residents. It said that closing the border could “have a similar risk reduction of other measures such as closure of further categories of retail”.

“Closing the WA borders will have an impact but is a relatively small impact compared to the effect of the other measures taken to date,” the advice states.

The written advice also states that waiting to close the border would not work.

“Closing the border will only be effective right now rather than at a later date,” the health advice from March 29, 2020, states.

In a media statement at the same time, Mr McGowan’s office announced: “The McGowan Government has taken the extraordinary, but necessary step to place a hard border closure on the State of Western Australia, to further protect the community from the COVID-19 pandemic”.

“Based on the best medical advice, effective from midnight, or 11.59pm, on Sunday, April 5, people will no longer be able to enter Western Australia without an exemption,” the media statement from Mr McGowan’s office said.

Mr Gray asked Mr McGowan to confirm that in his public comments he said that the necessity of a hard border was based on the medical advice that he had received.

Mr McGowan agreed.

Then Mr Gray accused Mr McGowan of lying about what the health advice actually said.

“It didn’t convey that the hard border should close,” Mr Gray said.

Mr McGowan replied: “I disagree with that”.

Mr Gray said to Mr McGowan: ”Isn’t it plain Mr McGowan that Dr Robertson and Dr Armstrong were simply pointing to factors for you to consider?”

Mr McGowan replied: “They were giving us advice on what would work so we took the advice”.

Mr Gray: “For you to say that the medical advice was that a hard border was necessary was a lie wasn’t it?”

Mr McGowan: “I disagree with that”

Mr Gray: “Every time you said it and you said it many times you were lying weren’t you?”

Mr McGowan: “No”.

The case is due to return to court on Wednesday.

Earlier, Mr McGowan told the court that Mr Palmer motivated and agitated a band of followers into extreme action with “crazed language” including that there was no justification for the state’s hard border regime.

Mr McGowan said he was angry, hurt, offended and exasperated by Mr Palmer’s public claims on July 31, 2020, that he lied to the people of WA when he said that he had acted on the advice of the state’s chief health officer to close the borders.

At the time it was impossible to enter WA without an exemption. Mr Palmer – who lives in Queensland – was trying to get into WA where he has substantial business interests.

He then tried to sue WA for $30 billion over a historic decision he says prevented him from developing his Balmoral South iron ore project in the Pilbara. The McGowan government responded with emergency legislation that blocked Mr Palmer’s lawsuit.

Mr Palmer was unsuccessful in his High Court challenge to WA’s hard border.

On Monday, Mr McGowan took the stand and said the first months of the global pandemic were a highly stressful time that required him to contemplate “dramatic decisions that I never imagined in my life I’d have to make”.