Mal Brough has denied leaking extracts of the former speaker Peter Slipper’s diary to any journalist, as the special minister of state continued to resist opposition calls to resign.
Labor raised the issue six times during parliamentary question time on Monday and referred to text messages tendered in the federal court in the context of a previous sexual harassment case against Slipper by a former staffer, James Ashby.
The shadow attorney general, Mark Dreyfus, told parliament: “On 29 March 2012 James Ashby sent a text message to the minister which included pages of the Speaker’s official diary. The minister sent a text back which said ‘Can that be emailed James it is hard to read Mal.brough2@bigpond.com’. The initial copy he received may have been blurry but isn’t it crystal clear the minister should resign?”
Brough replied that the issues had been canvassed by the federal court, and people should “go and have a look at exactly what they had to say”.
The minister added an explicit denial of leaking the diary to a journalist. He said: “I would further confirm for the member who continually asks these questions that I at no time passed any diaries to any journalist. Can I be any clearer than that?”
Brough has come under pressure after confirming the Australian federal police (AFP) executed a search warrant on his Sunshine Coast home two weeks ago seeking documents relating to his contact with Ashby.
Ashby launched the sexual harassment case that led to Slipper – the then member for the seat of Fisher – standing aside and ultimately resigning as speaker in 2012. Brough defeated Slipper for the seat of Fisher at the 2013 election and was elevated to the ministry as Malcolm Turnbull’s special minister of state two months ago.
Guardian Australia revealed in September – a day after Brough was sworn in to the ministry – that the AFP was still actively investigating the alleged unauthorised disclosure of Slipper’s diaries in 2012.
Last week, Dreyfus read into the parliamentary record passages from an AFP search warrant alleging Brough “counselled and procured” Ashby to access the diary contrary to criminal laws.
On Monday, Brough sought to rely on a ruling by two federal court judges in 2014 setting aside a previous decision by judge Steven Rares to throw out Ashby’s sexual harassment case on the grounds of abuse of process.
In December 2012, Rares found Ashby had launched the proceedings predominately “to pursue a political attack against Mr Slipper” and had acted “in combination” with another staffer and Brough.
But two of the three judges who subsequently considered the issue said: “We are also of the opinion that there was no basis for the primary judge to conclude that Brough was part of any combination with anyone in respect to the commencement of these proceedings with the predominant purpose of damaging Slipper in the way alleged or at all.”
Brough said Dreyfus should look at the federal court’s findings on 27 April 2014 – which appeared to be a reference to the decision handed down on 27 February 2014. The minister said that every document he had received was “in the federal court”.
He was asked about an email from the former News Corp journalist Steve Lewis to Brough on 29 March 2012 that was part of a bundle of evidence tendered in the federal court.
Lewis said in that email: “On how many occasions has Peter Slipper travelled to New Zealand since July 2010?”
Lewis’s email also contained several dates under the heading: “Diary extracts – can these be provided for the following dates”.
Dreyfus asked directly whether Brough agreed to obtain unauthorised copies of the Slipper’s diary for a journalist, and whether as a matter of government policy the minister now gave unauthorised copies of other documents to journalists.
Brough replied: “Mr Speaker, the answer is no.”
Lewis declined to comment when contacted by Guardian Australia on Monday.
In February, Slipper won a legal battle in the Australian Capital Territory supreme court to overturn his conviction for dishonestly using taxpayer-funded taxi vouchers worth nearly $1,000 to visit wineries outside Canberra in 2010. The court highlighted considerable uncertainty over the definition of parliamentary business.
