Even for less than honourable professions, this was way out of bounds

If there is a profession more ethically ambiguous than modern politics, it is journalism. John Ferguson, one of this city’s best reporters, summed this up last year upon winning the Gold Quill for breaking the biggest story of the lot, the mushroom murders.

Describing the weekend he spent staking out the Korumburra Baptist Church to spy on one of the protagonists in the murder plot, Ferguson deadpanned: “We’re not great people, really.”

Deputy Liberal Leader Sam Groth in parliament earlier this year.Credit: Chris Hopkins

Parliamentarians, particularly those who dabble in the darker arts of internal party politics, would in moments of honesty admit the same thing.

Whatever public good they might serve in higher office, there is nothing noble in screwing over a colleague to get there. But since Machiavelli was a boy, this has been an accepted path for political advancement.

Yet, even within these murky professions, some things remain out of bounds. The family lives of politicians, with rare exceptions, is one.

A series of stories about Deputy Liberal Leader and former tennis star Sam Groth published this week by the Herald Sun shattered this long-standing convention. In tennis parlance, the stories didn’t land just wide of an ethical line – they lobbed seven rows back in the stands.

Sam Groth and his wife Brittany.Credit: WireImage

Groth and his wife Brittany have been married for seven years. They are the parents of four-year-old, twin boys. A Herald Sun journalist, Stephen Drill, has been investigating when they first had sex.

The purpose of Drill’s inquiries was to determine whether Brittany Groth was under 18 at the time their sexual relationship began and whether Sam Groth, as a tennis coach at Brittany’s suburban club, was responsible for her care.

It is a serious allegation which, if proven under Victorian law, would make Sam Groth, a parliamentarian with ambitions to lead his party and the state, guilty of a sex crime against a minor.

The Herald Sun investigation did not substantiate the allegation, which on Wednesday was denied by Groth. Instead, it has created a likely test case for Australia’s strengthened privacy laws, which include a new statutory tort for serious invasion of privacy.

The paper’s interest in the Groths’ sexual history was piqued by the Groths’ comments in previous interviews when they said the first met in 2011 at the Templestowe Park Tennis Club. This would make Brittany 16 or 17 years old and Sam Groth either 23 or 24.

Drill reported that unnamed Liberal Party colleagues raised the issue with Groth amid concerns it could be weaponised by his political opponents. This suggests Groth’s enemies within the Liberal Party fuelled this grubby exposé.

Groth says the matter was never raised with him by a colleague. He also says neither he nor Brittany – the only two people who know the circumstances of when their sexual relationship started – spoke to the Herald Sun about the story before publication.

The Groths’ lawyers, defamation expert Patrick George and barrister Sue Chrysanthou, SC, are the team which successfully sued former Liberal leader John Pesutto on behalf of colleague Moira Deeming. On Wednesday morning, their legal letter landed in the inbox of Herald Sun editor-in-chief Sam Weir.

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If this case progresses to trial, it will be nervously watched by rival media organisations including Nine, the publisher of this masthead, which lobbied for years against the introduction of a statutory privacy tort.

The concerns notice seen by this masthead makes clear that while the defamatory imputations are against Sam Groth – the most serious being that “he sexually assaulted Brittany when she was under 18” and “committed a crime of sexual assault against a minor in his care or supervision” – the most egregious invasion of privacy was against Brittany Groth.

Any woman, even one married to a politician, should be safe in thinking their teenage sexual history is off-limits to political skulduggery and newspaper snooping. The concerns notice describes the decision to “name and shame” Brittany Groth as an alleged victim of child sexual assault as a “grotesque act”.

“There was no basis to allege that any relevant sexual misconduct took place merely because our clients are said to have met when Mrs Groth was 17,” the notice read. “Mr Groth has not been charged with any crime, or even investigated or questioned by police.”

The privacy laws recognise media freedom as a countervailing public interest. The Herald Sun, which is standing by its reporting, will seek to test the strength of this provision. The outcome of any trial could have far-reaching implications for journalism and the politicians we report on.

But at its heart, this story turns on questions that, frankly, feel wrong to ask. Are any of us entitled to know when and in what circumstances a politician and their partner consummated a loving, ongoing relationship?

To return to Ferguson’s observation about journalists, we’re not awful people, really.

Chip Le Grand is state political editor.

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