Senator David Van has quit the Liberal party but will remain in parliament.
Peter Dutton removed Van from the Liberal party room this week after multiple inappropriate touching allegations were made against Van, with Dutton urging him to leave parliament altogether.
In an email sent to the president of the Victorian division of the Liberal party, Greg Mirabella, and seen by Guardian Australia on Saturday, Van denied all wrongdoing and said he had been denied a presumption of innocence.
“Given the Liberal party’s wholesale disregard for due process and natural justice in relation to allegations made against me, I write to resign my membership effective immediately.
“I cannot remain a member of a party that tramples upon the very premise on which our justice system is predicated. This is a travesty of justice and I reiterate that I deny the allegations made against me.
“I am deeply distressed and hurt that I have not been afforded procedural fairness in relation to these claims,” Van said.
The independent senator Lidia Thorpe raised allegations against Van in the Senate on Wednesday, which she withdrew later that evening. Thorpe gave a fuller statement on Thursday, alleging she was followed and “inappropriately touched” in a parliamentary stairwell but without naming anyone.
In a statement on Thursday, the former Liberal senator Amanda Stoker alleged that Van apologised for squeezing her bottom twice at a social event in 2020, which she described as inappropriate, “unprofessional and uninvited”.
Van has vehemently denied Thorpe’s allegations, which he described as false. Van said he recalled a conversation with Stoker, but not the behaviour she described, saying he would not have done that.
Dutton said he was made aware of at least one more allegation of inappropriate touching against Van after he expelled him from the party room on Thursday, and raised it with Van on Friday morning.
“I made a decision yesterday based on all of the information that was available to me. It had come to me overnight and on that morning, I raised it with him. I made a decision and that’s a decision I don’t regret at all,” Dutton said.
Dutton said he believed it was in “everyone’s best interest that he [Van] resign from the parliament”.
Van was elected to the Senate in 2019. His term expires in 2025.
Dutton has referred the allegations against Van to the parliamentary workplace support services, which was set up after an inquiry was carried out by the former sex discrimination commissioner Kate Jenkins.
