Lawyers representing the former New South Wales One Nation leader Mark Latham have told a court that his comments about Alex Greenwich were offensive, crass and vulgar, but argued they had not harmed the Sydney MP’s reputation.
On the second day of defamation proceedings brought by Greenwich, Latham’s barrister, Kieran Smark SC, argued that people who made derogatory comments online after Latham’s homophobic tweet already felt negatively about Greenwich.
“Mr Latham’s tweet may have wounded Mr Greenwich, but it didn’t wound his reputation,” Smark told the federal court in Sydney.
“The concern of the law of defamation is the protection of reputation.”
Smark said his client’s words were “offensive and crass and vulgar” but questioned if they met the threshold for serious harm.
Smark also told the court that there was no evidence to suggest the initial tweet by Latham had changed the opinions of people – some of them “clearly unhinged” – who then commented about and to Greenwich in the aftermath of the March 2023 tweet.
“All that’s coming to that person is an echo of their pre-existing belief,” he said.
“There’s nothing that makes them think less of Mr Greenwich in particular that wouldn’t flow from their pre-existing dislike of him.”
He said that the overwhelming response to the post, including from the prime minister, Anthony Albanese, premier, Chris Minns, and One Nation leader, Pauline Hanson, had been highly critical of Latham and supportive of Greenwich.
“Quite clearly many people thought that [Latham] had demeaned himself by making the tweet but he hadn’t landed a reputational blow on Mr Greenwich,” Smark said.
“There’s direct evidence of response, but it’s all favourable to the applicant.”
Greenwich launched theaction against Latham over an offensive and since-deleted tweet posted in response to an article in which Greenwich called him a “disgusting human being”. The article was about LGBTQ+ protesters outside an event Latham was speaking at shortly before the NSW election.
In response, Latham said “disgusting?”, and made gratuitous comments about a sexual act that Guardian Australia has chosen not to publish in full.
Greenwich’s lawyers have alleged the tweet was defamatory because it implied the politician was “not a fit and proper person to be a member of the NSW parliament” because he “engages in disgusting sexual activities”.
Latham’s legal team argued that in response to being called disgusting, the veteran politician pointed out something else he thought was disgusting, being “the conduct of homosexual men having sex and more specifically, anal sex”.
Greenwich’s barrister, Matthew Collins KC, said the argument was not tenable.
“In the real world, no one thought this was an attack on homosexual people generally. They saw it as an attack – a vile, homophobic attack – on my client,” he said.
The defamation action also refers to comments Latham had made about Greenwich in a Daily Telegraph story in April which Greenwich claimed implied he was unfit to serve in the parliament “because he goes to schools to groom children to become homosexual”.
Ahead of the trial, Latham’s lawyers outlined that the politician was offering an “honest opinion” when he posted the tweet, using “qualified privilege” in response to the “attack” Greenwich made against him in the earlier media report.
In court on Thursday, Smark said Latham had been responding to Greenwich’s “generalised” and “very high level” comments about Latham’s character.
Collins told the court on the first day of the trial that his client had suffered panic attacks and contemplated leaving public life in the wake of the homophobic comments.
The hearings are expected to conclude on Friday.
In Australia, support is available at Beyond Blue on 1300 22 4636, Lifeline on 13 11 14, and at MensLine on 1300 789 978. In the UK, the charity Mind is available on 0300 123 3393 and Childline on 0800 1111. In the US, call or text Mental Health America at 988 or chat 988lifeline.org
