Updated
Speaking publicly for the first time since she was
sacked from the ABC, former managing director Michelle Guthrie has
detailed explosive allegations about her relationship breakdown with the
board and the former chair, Justin Milne.
In the Four Corners
investigation, Ms Guthrie and Mr Milne made claims and counterclaims
about alleged political interference and pressure to fire journalists at
the national broadcaster. Ms Guthrie was sacked from the ABC in late September and just days later Mr Milne resigned in the face of allegations of political interference.
'Deep concerns' with leadership, Guthrie told
In August this year Ms Guthrie was summoned to a meeting with the former chairman and told that the ABC board had deep concerns with her leadership.Three days later, in conversation with board director Donny Walford, who was acting as Ms Guthrie's executive coach, the former managing director made a claim that Mr Milne had engaged in inappropriate behaviour.
Ms Guthrie alleged that Mr Milne touched her inappropriately, rubbing her back, while they were at a board dinner at Sydney restaurant Billy Kwong in November 2017. Mr Milne categorically denies the claim.
"Inappropriate touching is the best description of it," Ms Guthrie said.
"I felt icky. It was inappropriate. It was unprofessional and inappropriate.
"It didn't have an effect on my professional relationship with him, but it was certainly in [my] mind that in social settings ... I tried to avoid putting myself into situations where that might recur."
Mr Milne insists the incident never happened.
"Definitely not. I think she meant that to have a sexual innuendo about it, which I can't possibly for the life of me understand why she would say that," he said.
"I've had no physical relationship with Michelle at all. I never, ever acted inappropriately with Michelle, or indeed with any other woman in the workforce, or any other woman at all."
Ms Guthrie met with ABC board member Joe Gersh, who was deputised to discuss the alleged incident with her, but at the time declined to make a formal complaint.
The ABC board offered this as part of a statement about the meeting:
"The board determined that Mr Gersh would meet with Ms Guthrie to give her an opportunity to formalise her allegations and make a complaint, which would be dealt with by the board. Ms Guthrie declined to formalise her allegations or make a complaint."On September 13, Mr Milne informed Ms Guthrie that she could not continue as managing director.
Ms Guthrie argued that at that point she had not received sufficient feedback from the board about her leadership, despite providing a proposal setting out how she would address the board's concerns and her plan for the corporation for the next two-and-a-half years.
"I never got a response ... other than being handed a deed of release with a letter of resignation and a draft press statement saying that I had to leave the ABC for urgent personal and family reasons," she said.
In the course of negotiations between Ms Guthrie's lawyer and the ABC, the question was posed as to whether the termination of her employment was because she had raised allegations against the chairman.
On Friday, September 22, Ms Guthrie included that question in her now-infamous dossier defending her achievements and leadership of the ABC, extracts of which were published by Fairfax after her sacking.
Mr Milne said Ms Guthrie's sacking was based solely on her performance.
"The problem in the end that the board had with Michelle was not her personality or her niceness, it was her leadership," he said.
On Sunday, September 23, six board members voted to sack Ms Guthrie immediately. Mr Milne abstained. Four Corners can reveal that the decision was not unanimous. Kirstin Ferguson was the lone voice against removing Ms Guthrie.
She wanted a negotiated exit for Ms Guthrie that minimised risk to the ABC.
Just before 9:00am on Monday September 24, Ms Guthrie was fired from the ABC with immediate effect.
"My first response was ... I have a management meeting first thing at 9:00. [Mr Milne] said, 'Well, we've changed that'," she said.
"I was told that I should leave as soon as I could. I said, 'I want to go home and tell my parents'. I haven't told my parents, I haven't told my siblings and I just tried to get out of there as quickly as I could so I could get home to tell my parents before they saw it on TV."
'It became a firestorm'
Three days later, sections of Ms Guthrie's dossier were leaked to the media alleging political interference in the ABC by Mr Milne, saying he pressured her to sack journalists, including ABC economics correspondent Emma Alberici.
"That narrative took off and it became a firestorm. The union became involved. Clearly that became a very serious situation. The board let me know that they wanted to meet without me. They did and then they asked me to step aside. I agreed immediately to resign," Mr Milne said.
Mr Milne told Four Corners that early conversations about Emma Alberici's employment status did not start with him, but instead within ABC management.
"Early in the piece, the idea of providing Emma with a warning or moving her out were all discussed by management, not by me. The fact that they were discussing that was presented to me," he said.
He said Ms Guthrie was involved in these discussions but she denies there was ever talk about firing the journalist.
"It was having a conversation with her about her career. There was never a conversation about firing Emma," she said.
Ms Guthrie said she still does not know why she was fired from the ABC.
"It was shocking ... Would any other board do this? If you looked at the board of any public company, this doesn't happen, this doesn't happen and this is the ABC. How do you explain the urgency?"
Former ABC board member Matt Peacock was on the panel that hired Ms Guthrie and said her determination should not be underestimated.
"She's tougher than people think, as has been exhibited since they tried to get rid of her," he said.
"She's already launched her counterattack and the chairman is gone and now I suspect she's gunning for the board."
The bitter feud is not over. Ms Guthrie is suing the ABC and Mr Milne and has pointed out to Four Corners one possible outcome of her legal action is reinstatement as managing director and a return to the ABC.
Watch the Four Corners investigation, Bitter End, on iview.
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