The former ABC chair Ita Buttrose has pointed to alleged “inconsistencies” in David Anderson’s affidavit for a federal court case, citing differing details of where and when the outgoing managing director told Buttrose that Antoinette Lattouf had been sacked.
In an explosive letter to ABC lawyers seen by Guardian Australia, Buttrose last week urged the ABC to tell Lattouf’s lawyers about the alleged inconsistencies in Anderson’s version of events as set out in his affidavit. The affidavit was filed in court in Lattouf’s unlawful termination case against the ABC, which returns for closing arguments on Thursday.
Guardian Australia does not suggest that Anderson’s testimony in the federal court case was anything but his honest recollection of events that took place in late 2023.
Buttrose in her letter demanded the ABC contact Lattouf’s lawyers “as a matter of absolute urgency” and, if they failed to do so, she said she would “take the appropriate action”.
The evidence Buttrose refers to is an invoice from a hire car company which transported the chair and the managing director to a Christmas lunch on Wednesday 20 December 2023 – which she claims suggests that Anderson’s affidavit was contradictory.
It was the same day that Lattouf was told she would not be returning for the final two days of the ABC radio show she was hosting. Phone calls and texts were flying between Anderson and the ABC’s content chief, Chris Oliver-Taylor.
When Anderson left for the lunch Lattouf had not yet been removed.
A casual broadcaster, Lattouf was dismissed from hosting ABC’s Sydney Mornings program in December 2023 and later brought an unlawful termination case before the federal court.
“In the interests of transparency and our legal obligations to do so, the invoice from ‘Corporate Cars Australia’ must be provided to Ms Lattouf,” Buttrose writes in Thursday’s letter, adding a deadline of 2pm on Friday.
The ABC does not appear to have taken any action in response to Buttrose’s letter. The publicly available court file does not show any documents having been filed by the ABC since it received Buttrose’s letter.
According to Buttrose, she was picked up at home on 20 December 2023 and driven in the hire car to pick up Anderson at the ABC’s Ultimo headquarters.
Buttrose points to Anderson’s affidavit where he states the two met at the ABC Ultimo office “outside her office on Level 14 to travel to lunch together”.
“Clearly, Mr Anderson was not having a conversation with me on Level 14 at Ultimo, when I wasn’t even in the building,” Buttrose wrote to the ABC’s lawyers last week.
She also highlights his account of a conversation he had with Buttrose in which she said words to the effect of “we’re just going to have to agree to disagree” with management’s decision to keep Lattouf on air until Friday.
Buttrose alleges “no such conversation ever took place; and this is corroborated with irrefutable evidence which the ABC now has”.
A conference call with the ABC’s legal department on 18 February “discussed evidence [Buttrose] had that completely refuted Mr Anderson’s affidavit”, according to the letter. “I then emailed that evidence to everyone in this group,” Buttrose said.
“That evidence being, an invoice from ‘Corporate Cars Australia’ that showed that at 12:10pm on 20 December 2023, a car picked me up from my home address in Redfern; and at 12:30pm, that car pulled up to the front of the ABC offices at Ultimo.”
Buttrose’s alleged inconsistencies do not appear to be material to the case. The federal court has heard that Lattouf was sacked while Anderson and Buttrose were at lunch and Oliver-Taylor told the managing director initially via text of his decision, which was then conveyed to Buttrose.
Buttrose disputes Anderson’s version of events about how the matter unfolded.
She disputes Anderson’s recollection that after the lunch Anderson had a conversation with Oliver-Taylor about Lattouf’s sacking “as he travelled in a taxi back to the ABC offices”.
“He was, in fact, in a hire car with me,” Buttrose said in her seven-page letter.
Buttrose said the hire car invoice shows they left the restaurant at 3pm and Anderson was dropped back at the office first – before she was driven home.
In his affidavit sworn in October 2024, and released by the federal court, Anderson states he rang Oliver-Taylor back during lunch and was told “we have decided we need to take her [Lattouf] off the air”. Anderson said “immediately after hanging up from the call with Mr Oliver-Taylor, I informed Ms Buttrose about the conversation”.
He further states that after the lunch he assisted Buttrose to her hire car and then got a taxi back to the ABC. “During my taxi ride back to the office, I called Mr Oliver-Taylor, and (to the best of my recollection) we had a conversation” where Oliver-Taylor provided more details including the allegation that Lattouf “posted on social media against instructions”.
In her October 2024 affidavit released by the court, Buttrose states: “I do not now recall the discussions that Mr Anderson and I had during the course of lunch on 20 December … I do not recall whether we discussed Ms Lattouf.”
She continued: “My recollection is that … during the drive back from lunch, Mr Anderson told me that Mr Oliver-Taylor had told him that he had decided that Ms Lattouf was going to be taken off air.”
An ABC spokesperson declined to comment on the substance of Buttrose’s letter.
“The matter is before the court and it would be inappropriate for the ABC to comment while proceedings are under way,” he said.
Buttrose declined to comment.
Final submissions in the unlawful termination case are scheduled to be heard on Thursday and Friday before Justice Darryl Rangiah retires to consider his verdict.
