Third woman alleges sex assault by former staffer as Brittany Higgins to make formal statement to police

A Coalition volunteer alleges she was assaulted by the same former government adviser accused of the 2019 rape in Parliament House.

Brittany Higgins is preparing to make a statement to the Australian Federal Police.

A third woman alleges she was sexually assaulted almost five years ago by the same former Morrison government adviser accused of the 2019 rape of a female colleague in Parliament House.

The woman, a Coalition volunteer during the 2016 election campaign, alleged she was assaulted after a night drinking with the then political staffer.

The woman, who spoke on condition of anonymity but supported her allegations with a statutory declaration, said she was barely out of school when she went out with campaign volunteers just days before the election.

The Australian has agreed to withhold the city and location of the alleged incident to prevent the woman from being identified.

The new claim comes as Brittany Higgins — who alleges she was raped in the office of -Defence Minister Linda Reynolds in March 2019 — prepares to make a statement to the Australian Federal Police on Wednesday.

Ms Higgins accused Scott Morrison last week of using “victim blaming” language and felt she had been forced to choose between reporting the allegations and keeping her job.

Senator Reynolds and the Prime Minister’s Office have been engulfed in a political crisis for days over when they first found out about the rape allegations and what they did to assist Ms Higgins.

There are now several inquiries into the workplace culture in parliament and in the Coalition.

According to the account of the latest woman to come forward, the former male staffer — who was working in a minister’s office — bought several rounds of “double strength” vodkas and three tequila shots for the woman over the course of a night. She says she had never been drunk before and vomited in the nightclub bathroom. Soon after she was alone with the staffer and told him she was going to call an Uber and go home.

According to her account, the then staffer told her his hotel was “around the corner” and he could “look after me”. They went back to his room and, while laying on his bed, she passed out.

She alleges that she woke up, with her button-up blouse opened and her jeans pushed down and the staffer “lying on top of me” although she can’t be clear as to whether he was “conscious or sleeping”. She fled the room and went to the hotel lobby toilet and noticed “I was bleeding”, before going home.

“I believe his actions on the night of 29 June and the morning of 30 June constitute sexual assault, because he performed or tried to perform sexual acts on me whilst I was severely intoxicated and unable to provide valid and informed consent,’’ she said.

The young woman — who had not had sex before — did not go to police or tell friends or family.

“I was severely embarrassed about it and felt dirty and ashamed and I didn’t want to tell anyone,’’ she told The Australian.

“I later realised I was so drunk, I was not able to give any consent.

“Hearing Brittany Higgins’ story, it was so eerily similar, it made me think this person has a pattern of behaviour.’’

The Weekend Australian reported on Saturday that another woman — a former Liberal staffer who also spoke on condition of anonymity — alleged she had been sexually assaulted by the former government staffer.

Mr Morrison said at the weekend he was disturbed by those claims, and was “very upset about those circumstances”. “There is significant work that still remains to be done in the Parliament House work culture, that is absolutely the case,” he said.

The government has been dogged by questions about why Mr Morrison’s advisers and staff in Senator Reynolds’ office failed to inform the Prime Minister of rape allegations in Parliament House until only this month.

One of Senator Reynolds’ senior staff, Fiona Brown, has since moved to Mr Morrison’s office.

Ms Higgins says she reported the incident to a Parliament House police unit on March 26, 2019, three days after the rape allegedly occurred, and that Mr Morrison’s principal private secretary, Yaron Finkelstein, contacted her to “check in” around November last year.

Advice from the Department of Finance sent to Ms Brown on March 29, 2019 — before she and Senator Reynolds met Ms Higgins on April 1 in the room in which the alleged rape occurred — includes references to the 1800Respect sexual assault and domestic violence website about how to support a person if they choose to lodge a police report.

However, government sources said Ms Higgins had only told Ms Brown she recalled her then-colleague being on top of her.

There was a suspicion of something untoward happening but the extent of the incident and alleged rape was not known.

Senator Reynolds found out about the alleged rape from the AFP on April 4, the sources said, and told Ms Brown the next day.

Unsatisfied by the timelines of events given by Mr Morrison and Senator Reynolds, Labor sources said the party would focus on “the many holes and discrepancies in the government’s account” when parliament sits this week.

The Finance Department advice to Ms Brown outlines a number of actions she took to help Ms Higgins, including notifying her she was able to pursue a police complaint and that Ms Brown and Senator Reynolds would support her if she chose to do so.

“You have provided the employee with the opportunity to come to you for further assistance, support or guidance at any time,” the email states.

“You have encouraged the employee to access the (employee assistance program) provider as soon as possible, and on days she was not in the office, you have checked in with her to make sure she is OK and has support at home.”

Mr Morrison has ¬endorsed an external complaints process for parliamentarians and their staff and said he was angry his staff had not told him about the alleged rape for 48 hours. “You can be assured they (my staff) know exactly my views about that,” he said.

Mr Morrison has repeatedly said his office found out about the alleged rape on February 12 while he did not know about it until it was made public last Monday.

Ms Brown has been aware of the incident for nearly two years but Mr Morrison says she did not pass the information on, as was customary when a staffer moved from one office to another and out of respect for Ms Higgins’ privacy.