A News Corp journalist had “not one piece of information” to suggest the deputy Victorian Liberal leader, Sam Groth, began a relationship with his wife when she was underage, the MP’s lawyers have told a court.
In what a federal court judge described as a “test case” for Australia’s new privacy laws, Groth and his wife, Brittany, are suing the Herald and Weekly Times (HWT), reporter Stephen Drill and the Herald Sun’s editor, Sam Weir, over a series of articles published in July.
The articles allege the couple met at a tennis club in suburban Melbourne and began a sexual relationship when Brittany was 16 or 17 and Sam – then a professional player – was 23 or 24 and working as her coach, the court has been told.
Brittany Groth is suing over an alleged serious invasion of privacy, while her husband has alleged he was defamed by the articles.
HWT is defending the reporting on public interest grounds, arguing the allegations could “constitute a criminal offence” and therefore be “weaponised” by Groth’s political opponents ahead of the 2026 Victorian state election.
The tabloid is also arguing it is exempt from new privacy laws – which allow for damages of up to $478,000 – due to the exemption provided for journalists.
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But during a case management hearing in Melbourne on Thursday, the Groths’ barrister, Sue Chrysanthou SC, argued the exemption did not apply.
“The defence has two elements. First you have to be a journalist or the employer of a journalist, and then it also has to be journalistic material,” Chrysanthou told the court.
She said the laws, which were part of a pre-election rush of bills late last year, were written in such as way as “clearly parliament thought that not all publications that purport to be news are news”.
“We say that a proper assessment of that requires an understanding of all the information that the journalist had when they made the decision and did in fact publish this allegation,” Chrysanthou said.
She told the court she would seek to cross-examine Drill during the trial, and use discovery to access to “all of the information” he had at the time of publication.
“They had not one piece of information from any person who had any first-hand information about the circumstances of my client’s relationship when they met,” Chrysanthou told the court.
“And [they lacked] any basis whatsoever, or any first-hand basis, to allege that there was reasonable suggestion that my client Mr Groth was engaging in a crime when he first started his relationship with his now-wife and mother of his two young children.”
HWT’s lawyer, Matthew Collins KC, argued the articles were clearly news, noting they appeared on the front page of Victoria’s highest-circulation newspaper and concerned “the person who aspires to be the deputy premier of the state”.
Judge Shaun McElwaine, however, noted courts in the US had “grappled for years with the tort of privacy and the first amendment”.
“There are limits to what is news and what is salacious gossip,” he said.
Collins is seeking a hearing to determine whether the journalistic exemption applies, while Chrysanthou wants that question heard concurrently with the trial.
A separate hearing on the issue has been set for 6 November.
McElwaine noted that, as the “test case” and “first of its kind” brought under the new privacy laws, it was “inevitable” any ruling he made would be appealed, potentially prolonging proceedings.
He also set a two-week trial for May 2026.
