Network Ten and Lisa Wilkinson have suffered a loss in the lead-up to Bruce Lehrmann’s defamation appeal hearing, after a judge declined to order him to pay $200,000 in security to continue the challenge.
Ten and Wilkinson had asked the Federal Court to order Lehrmann, now an unemployed law student, to pay the sum to ensure he would cover some of their legal costs if his court challenge failed.
Bruce Lehrmann before his defamation loss in April.Credit: Dominic Lorrimer
In a decision on Wednesday, Justice Wendy Abraham dismissed the media parties’ application, filed by Ten and supported by Wilkinson, and ordered them to pay the legal costs incurred by Lehrmann in opposing it. Ten is expected to pick up that bill.
“The court will be in contact with the parties as to a date for hearing. There is availability in March, as I understand it,” Abraham said. The parties return to court for a preliminary hearing next month.
The judge said the finding against Lehrmann was “extremely serious” and “the impact on him if he is denied ... [his] right [of appeal] is self-evident”.
“I am conscious that the [media parties] ... will incur costs should this appeal proceed which, if any costs orders are made in their favour, will likely be unrecoverable.
“Nonetheless, I am not persuaded, given the considerations relevant to the particular facts and circumstances of this case, that an order for security ought to be made.”
The broadcaster and Wilkinson successfully defended Lehrmann’s defamation suit over an interview with his former colleague Brittany Higgins that was anchored by Wilkinson and aired on The Project in 2021.
Lisa Wilkinson supported Ten’s application for Bruce Lehrmann to pay $200,000 in security to continue his appeal.Credit: Kate Geraghty
Lehrmann alleged the broadcast wrongly suggested he was guilty of raping Higgins in Parliament House in 2019. In a decision in April, Federal Court Justice Michael Lee found Ten and Wilkinson had proven this was true on the balance of probabilities and dismissed Lehrmann’s case.
This is a finding made to the civil standard, rather than the higher criminal standard of beyond reasonable doubt. A criminal trial against Lehrmann was aborted in 2022 due to juror misconduct and he did not face a second trial owing to concerns over Higgins’ mental health. He has always maintained his innocence.
Lee subsequently ordered Lehrmann to pay $2 million to Ten to cover some of the costs of its successful defence, while Ten has paid some of Wilkinson’s separate legal bills under an indemnity covering costs “properly incurred” by its employee and “reasonable in amount”.
Lehrmann has not paid any of the $2 million. He filed an appeal against Lee’s decision in May.
The former staffer also sought an order known as a stay to halt the enforcement of the $2 million costs order against him. It is likely the enforcement of that order would have led to his bankruptcy.
Abraham granted the stay, which will remain in place until the appeal is determined. Ten will also cover Lehrmann’s costs of applying for the stay.
Court documents filed in support of the application for security for costs revealed Ten expects to spend $272,500 defending the appeal, including $120,000 on its barristers, led by Melbourne silk Matt Collins, KC.
Wilkinson, who opted to brief a separate legal team headed by Sydney barrister Sue Chrysanthou, SC, was expected to incur a further $203,500 in legal costs, an affidavit filed by Ten’s solicitor Marlia Saunders said. This included $78,500 for Wilkinson’s senior and junior barristers.
Saunders said in the affidavit that Ten “does not concede that the costs … would be properly incurred by [Wilkinson] or reasonable for the purposes of the indemnity”. This is not an indication that Ten would not cover any of those estimated costs, but that there may be a dispute about some of them.
Lehrmann’s solicitor, Zali Burrows, said at a hearing earlier this month her client was “on a Centrelink income, and he won’t be able to meet a security of costs order”. She suggested the application for security was a “bullying tactic”, an accusation rejected by Ten.
Lehrmann was “pretty much unemployable”, Burrows said. She added that “the only shot he’d probably ever ... [have] making money is going on OnlyFans or something silly like that”, in a reference to the adults-only content subscription platform.
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