Political point scoring over sexual harassment has to stop

During the disturbing days in parliament last month when the Liberals tried to claim the political scalp of Katy Gallagher, it felt like little had changed in the political arena, writes Nikki Gemmell. Picture: NCA NewsWire / Martin Ollman

That unsettling week in parliament last month was instructive. In case you need reminding, it was when the combined forces of the Liberal Party were trained against Labor senator, Katy Gallagher, but it ended with a breathtaking own goal: the loss of a senator, David Van, from the Liberal Party’s own ranks, over allegations of sexual harassment by three women – including two from the Liberal Party.

Yet what was also instructive about that week was the simmering fury of many women, and how close it came to erupting once again.

A rage of aggrieved sisterhood was seamed deep through proceedings; it felt like a volcano lidded. It was the anger of women in solidarity and ready to agitate; a flavour I hadn’t discerned since the days surrounding the roiling March4Justice when women congregated on the lawns of federal parliament and the then prime minister, Scott Morrison, declared that not too far from this country such rallies were being met with bullets.

During those disturbing days last month it felt like little had changed in the political arena. Had the Canberra bubble learned nothing from the past few years? From a previous government in terms of how it related to women – and how that had played out at the ballot box, not least with the rise of a new political movement known as the Teals?

Opposition leader Peter Dutton’s objective was clear: to claim a political scalp. Gallagher had been accused of misleading the Senate during the events surrounding Brittany Higgins last year. But instead, his tactics reignited a spark, and gave women something to push back against.

It all threatened to unleash a firestorm of rage once again, as collective memories were triggered. Of unfairness. Of sexual harassment. Of being dismissed and diminished. Of the centuries of having our truth twisted, exploited, muddied. Of being talked over and talked about and of not recognising ourselves in the conversation of the day.

The Liberal Party’s Amanda Stoker and the National Party’s Bridget McKenzie raised their voices in support of Independent Lidia Thorpe’s allegations of sexual harassment against Van. These women speaking out were the opposite of so-called “crumb maidens” meekly doing the patriarchy’s bidding in the hope of scattered morsels of acknowledgment; they were supporting their sister above their political parties.

Brittany Higgins during the March4Justice in 2021. Picture: Getty Images

Janine Hendry was the founder of the March4Justice in 2021. As for the recent political shenanigans, she says she’d like to think we’re moving forward as a nation – away from point scoring over sexual harassment. But that parliamentary week showed when one woman is being abused in the pursuit of power, others will react with fury.

“Women’s lives and livelihoods are (still) seen as pawns in an endless cycle of one-upMANship,” Hendry states. “What is it that women have to do in this country to be taken as equal, when the glimpse of a political score sees women expended and abused? Has there been no learning, ever since we took to the streets to demand change in 2021?”

In that febrile week women around Australia were freshly enraged. The political manoeuvring backfired monumentally on the LNP. Instead of felling a political warrior, they reminded women of why they got so angry several years ago.

Hendry says: “These shenanigans … are hardly a salve to the LNP’s ‘woman problems’. Women are angry.”

Dutton should be very careful about stoking these kind of flames. When the Coalition last got it wrong an entire political movement was created, and an election was lost. Nothing he does now will change the mistakes of the past.