00:00Senator Jacinta Numpajimpa-Price in Darwin to defend a defamation suit brought by the
00:08Chief Executive of the Territory's Central Land Council, Leslie Turner.
00:12Mr Turner, how are you feeling going into today?
00:15Pretty good.
00:16Feeling confident?
00:17Yes.
00:18Looking forward to having this resolved?
00:19Resolved. It's taken a while.
00:22The former Shadow Minister for Indigenous Affairs accused of distributing a media release
00:26which claimed Mr Turner had lost the support of fellow councillors and was no longer fit to be CEO.
00:33Senator Price, how are you feeling going into court today?
00:36Mr Turner's lawyer, renowned defamation lawyer Sue Chrysanthou SC, told the court today
00:42that following the council's annual conference in July last year, the then-chair Matthew Palmer
00:47called a men's-only meeting during which he claimed a no-confidence motion had been moved
00:53against Mr Turner, which was unsuccessful.
00:56Ms Chrysanthou told the court Senator Price did not take the necessary steps to substantiate
01:02the claims about what unfolded at the meeting and ploughed ahead distributing a media release
01:07to more than 1,000 journalists and publishing it to her website.
01:12Court documents which outline Mr Turner's claims state the senator's release implied Mr Turner
01:17had behaved so unprofessionally that it warranted his dismissal and was unfit to continue to occupy
01:23the role of CEO.
01:25Ms Chrysanthou told the court Senator Price trampled on my client's reputation without caring at all
01:31whether what she was saying about him was true or false.
01:35Senator Price originally filed a defence on multiple grounds, including the truth defence.
01:39However, this was later withdrawn.
01:42Updated court documents filed in March this year state the matter was in the public interest
01:47and Senator Price had reasonable grounds to believe that what she'd been told was true.
01:52The case returns to court tomorrow.
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