'I was incredibly surprised'
Michelle Guthrie says she was "incredibly surprised" when she found out that accusations she made about Justin Milne's behaviour were relayed back to him by the board director she had confided in.
Ms Guthrie has accused Mr Milne of touching her inappropriately at a dinner in November in 2017. She has refused to give further details about the alleged incident. Mr Milne vehemently denies the allegation.
Ms Guthrie first told board director Donny Walford about the incident in August. She says she was under the impression Ms Walford was going to share the information with the rest of the board - excluding Mr Milne.
Ms Guthrie tells the inquiry she was "incredibly surprised" when she found out Mr Milne had been informed of the allegations. She later met with another board director, Joseph Gersh, to discuss the claims. At that meeting, Ms Guthrie declined to lodge a formal complaint.
She believes the meeting was not designed to elicit a formal complaint but to convince her to resign as managing director.
'The most incredible and ludicrous proposition'
Michelle Guthrie addresses the Senate inquiry in Canberra on Friday.Credit:Dominic Lorrimer
Michelle Guthrie is now addressing the $500 million project called Jetstream, which sort of sits in the background of the chaos that engulfed the ABC this year.
Basically, the broadcaster wants to create a giant digital database of all content to set itself up for a post-broadcasting future. It's going to be very expensive and it wants capital investment from the government.
Mr Milne was intent on driving the project forward. But Ms Guthrie grew sceptical - following the $83 million funding freeze in the budget - that the Coalition would give the ABC an extra $500 million.
Mr Milne believed the ABC's chance of getting the money was jeopardised by the government's unhappiness with journalists such as Emma Alberici and Andrew Probyn.
But Ms Guthrie says the broadcaster never stood a chance of receiving the money.
The very suggestion of firing the chief political editor of the ABC in order to secure funding for Jetstream seemed to me to be the most incredible and ludicrous proposition," she says.
She has also been critical of the composition of the ABC's board of directors, arguing it lacked sufficient media and public sector experience. This is a point that has been made widely inside and outside the ABC, including by the journalists' union and ABC Alumni.
Who do you believe?
They can't both be right.
Michelle Guthrie tells the inquiry she spoke to Justin Milne on June 15 during which the then chairman berated her and told her to "shoot" political editor Andrew Probyn.
She has provided a rough transcript of this conversation, alleging Mr Milne said words akin to "Malcolm [Turnbull] hates Probyn" and that "Andrew is a problem, we need to deal with this and get rid of him".
Mr Milne vehemently denies this exchange ever took place. Ms Guthrie says she took notes - not immediately but up to a week after the conversation.
"It absolutely happened," she says. She also maintains Mr Milne was "very aggressive" over the phone.
Guthrie hits back over her performance
Michelle Guthrie has hit back at Justin Milne's claims her performance was ABC managing director was "shocking".
She doesn't deny she scored poorly on a so-called 360 review of her leadership - a review completed by the board and her direct reports.
Justin Milne watches on as Michelle Guthrie gives evidence to the Senate inquiry.Credit:Dominic Lorrimer
Mr Milne told the inquiry Ms Guthrie scored in the bottom 4 per cent of chief executives for integrity and was also rated as "arrogant", "autocratic" and "distant".
She argues the 360 review was not supposed to be a performance review but a "personal development tool", and suggested it was misused by the board as an excuse to sack her.
"It is very clear it is not how the survey is meant to be used. It is a personal development tool, not a tool for sacking people," she says.
Ms Guthrie says she did not have a conversation with Mr Milne about her performance until August, and was not aware he regarded her as a poor leader.
That is despite Mr Milne's board having already asked director Donny Walford to coach Ms Guthrie on her leadership following the poor 360 results.
Guthrie says she discussed punting Alberici
Michelle Guthrie admits she had conversations with ABC news director Gaven Morris about moving Emma Alberici out of her role as chief economics correspondent.
In particular, they had concerns about Alberici's ability to write extended economic analysis.
"One of the issues which Mr Morris and I were discussing … was whether she [Alberici] was well-suited to the role of chief economics correspondent, particularly in relation to the need to write long-form analytical articles," Ms Guthrie tells the Senate inquiry.
She does not deny Justin Milne's claim that the idea of sacking Alberici originated from ABC management, not from him as chairman.
I am still devastated: Guthrie
Former ABC boss Michelle Guthrie gives evidence to the Senate inquiry on Friday.Credit:Dominic Lorrimer
Michelle Guthrie starts by reiterating she remains "devastated" by the ABC board's decision to sack her, and that she believes this had no lawful basis.
She says the events have taken a severe personal toll on her.
Ms Guthrie also repeats her comments from Four Corners that she heard less frequently from Communications Minister Mitch Fifield following Justin Milne's appointment as chairman.
She believes that in Mr Milne, the government had found "their man" with whom they preferred to deal.
As an aside, Mr Milne has now left the inquiry.
Guthrie kicks out the cameras
OK - Michelle Guthrie is up now, with Justin Milne watching from the back of the room. Ms Guthrie was not present while he gave evidence.
Ms Guthrie has started by kicking out the cameras - they were allowed to photograph her quickly at the start of the session, but have all been forced to leave.
You can still watch the broadcast of the session on the official parliamentary stream.
Houston, we have a problem
We've got a bit of a situation here during the morning tea break, it seems.
Michelle Guthrie does not want to see Justin Milne and senators had arranged that they would not cross paths during the inquiry.
But Mr Milne is sitting up the back of the room waiting to hear Ms Guthrie's evidence.
Committee officials just went over to Mr Milne and told him that they will help escort him from the building whenever he wants to leave.
Conflicting claims
Justin Milne has rejected almost every aspect of Michelle Guthrie's account of disagreements about editorial issues at the ABC.
Former ABC chairman Justin Milne.Credit:Dominic Lorrimer
He says her account of a phone call they had about political editor Andrew Probyn was "not real" and simply a "script" she made up.
He has cast doubt on a conversation Ms Guthrie alleges she had with news director Gaven Morris in which Mr Morris expressed frustration about Mr Milne's attempted interventions.
He also denies meeting directly with Triple J staff to try to overturn the network's decision to move the Hottest 100 countdown away from Australia Day.
Ms Guthrie is the next to appear before the inquiry so we'll see what she has to say about those claims.
It was 'the zeitgeist'
Zeitgeist watch: former ABC chairman Justin Milne.Credit:Dominic Lorrimer
Justin Milne is repeatedy asked by Greens senator Sarah Hanson-Young to explain how he came to understand that the Coalition government "hated" reporter Emma Alberici.
He says it was "the zeitgeist" and also the words spoken by Malcolm Turnbull on the floor of Parliament. The then prime minister had been highly critical of an "inaccurate" pair of articles Alberici wrote in February about the government's corporate tax cut policies.
Senator Hanson-Young also questioned the timing of Mr Milne's email in May urging Michelle Guthrie to "get rid of" Alberici. It was sent just a day after receiving a fresh government complaint about Alberici - regarding an article about innovation policy - and before the ABC had evaluated the government's complaints.
The ABC later declared almost all of the government's complaints about the article were spurious.
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