Animal Justice MP Georgie Purcell says Nine doctored a photo to enlarge her breasts

Victorian Animal Justice MP Georgie Purcell is ‘not convinced’ automation was to blame after a photo of her aired which she said enlarged her breasts.

The photo of Animal Justice Party MP Georgie Purcell which was shown over the shoulder of newsreader Alicia Loxley during Monday night’s Nine News Melbourne bulletin.

Victorian Animal Justice MP Georgie Purcell is “not convinced” automation by Photoshop was to blame after a pictured of her aired which she said enlarged her breasts and exposed her stomach.

A photo of Ms Purcell was shown over the shoulder of newsreader Alicia Loxley during Monday night’s Nine News Melbourne bulletin, where the MP discussed her opposition to the Victorian government’s decision to continue to allow duck hunting.

Ms Purcell, who formerly worked as a stripper, claimed the photo Nine News used had been edited to give her larger breasts and make it appear as though she was wearing a crop top.

Animal Justice Party MP Georgie Purcell has accused Nine Entertainment of photoshopping her image to enlarge her breasts and expose her stomach.

On Tuesday, Ms Purcell shared the image from Nine News and compared it with the original photo, which she said was taken in 2023.

Nine News blamed the altered image on an automation gone wrong, issuing an unreserved apology to Ms Purcell, which she accepted. It said the image was changed when it was put into Photo­shop to be formatted to ­appear in the news broadcast.

“I would like to sincerely apologise to Georgie Purcell for a graphic error that occurred in last night’s bulletin,” Hugh Nailon, ­director of Nine News Melbourne, said. “Our graphics department sourced an online image of Georgie to use in our story on duck hunting. As is common practice, the image was resized to fit our specs. During that process, the automation by Photoshop created an image that was not consistent with the original.

“This did not meet the high editorial standards we have and for that we apologise to Ms Purcell unreservedly.”

Ms Purcell said: “I’ve accepted Channel 9’s apology. I’m not convinced on the reasoning behind how it happened, but I am satisfied with every other aspect of how they’ve dealt with this and they have apologised to me profusely. I just hope that this doesn’t happen again, because it obviously sends a really bad message to young women and girls. I just don’t think this is something that happens to male politicians. They don’t have their bodies or outfits altered to meet beauty standards.”

Ms Purcell said the image had been “weaponised” by shooters to spread hateful and violent messages. She had earlier alleged the photo had been doctored in order to further “a perception” of her.

“The original picture is one that was taken of me about 12 months ago to the day, just after I got elected,” Ms Purcell told the ABC earlier on Tuesday.

“I immediately noticed (in the photo Nine used) that my stomach was exposed but my whole stomach is tattooed and (the one in the photo) was bare, so I noticed that they turned my dress into a two-piece outfit like a crop and a skirt and have enlarged my boobs.”

I endured a lot yesterday.

But having my body and outfit photoshopped by a media outlet was not on my bingo card.

Note the enlarged boobs and outfit to be made more revealing.

Can’t imagine this happening to a male MP.

What gives? pic.twitter.com/NhnkDRMidc

— Georgie Purcell (@georgievpurcell) January 29, 2024