As it happened: Dutton dumps David Van from Liberal Party room after Lidia Thorpe makes sexual assault allegation against senator

That’s where we’ll leave our live coverage of today’s news. I’m Angus Dalton, thank you for reading.

Here’s what you need to know tonight.

• Former senator Amanda Stoker has accused Victorian senator David Van of sexual harassment, which he denied. Van left the party room after a meeting with Liberal leader Peter Dutton earlier today.
• Thorpe made a tearful address to the Senate on Thursday alleging she had been inappropriately touched, propositioned and cornered in a stairwell in parliament. She did not identify any person as being responsible for that conduct.
• Finance Minister Katy Gallagher held back tears as she faced down repeated questions from the Coalition about her knowledge of Brittany Higgins’ rape allegation. Prime Minister Anthony Albanese said today leaked texts between Higgins and her partner David Sharaz shouldn’t have been published.
• The Albanese government introduced emergency legislation to prevent Russia from opening a new embassy less than a kilometre from Parliament House in Canberra, saying the new site poses an unacceptable security risk.
• The chance of another interest rate hike next month has increased after the number of people in jobs rose beyond 14 million for the first time, taking the unemployment rate down to 3.6 per cent in May.
• Police have raided the bus company at the centre of the Hunter Valley tragedy, while Sydney parents push for the NSW government to install seatbelts on all school buses.
• The ABC’s political editor Andrew Probyn is among the 120 people made redundant from the national broadcaster as it prepares for a restructure.

Former Queensland senator Amanda Stoker has released a statement accusing her then-Coalition colleague David Van of inappropriately touching her.

Her statement was released after senator Lidia Thorpe made accusations of harassment against Van in the Senate, which he vehemently denied, and Opposition Leader Peter Dutton removed him from the Liberal party room this morning, citing “other allegations” being brought to his attention.

Dutton made clear that he passed no judgment on the veracity of any allegations or any person’s guilt or innocence.

Van said he had been “blindsided” by the allegations when Dutton raised them and he said he “had no recollection of the events at all”.

“They were things that were raised by my colleagues three years ago. We had a frank and open and friendly discussion about them.”

Stoker’s statement today evening said the incident happened in November 2020 at an informal social gathering in a parliamentary office.

“He did so by squeezing my bottom twice. By its nature and by its repetition, it was not accidental. That action was not appropriate. It was unprofessional and uninvited.

“I raised the matter with Senator Van at a meeting the following day. I described the action, told him it was unacceptable, and that it was not to be repeated. He apologised and said he would never do it again.

“I accepted his apology and his undertaking.”

Stoker said contemporaneous notes of the meeting were taken, it never happened again and she advised a senior female colleague about the incident to ensure that any other incidents or future reports could be dealt with appropriately.

“Obviously, this was not a good experience. I took it very seriously but did not want his misbehaviour to define me or any other woman. I simply wanted to ensure his behaviour was never repeated,” Stoker said in her statement.

She said she addressed his behaviour through internal processes, and asked for it to be kept confidential.

“I would have preferred that the matter be resolved privately and finally – as I thought it was. However, following Senator Thorpe’s allegations, it is now clear that is no longer tenable.

“I do not know of any other similar events or reports,” Stoker said.

Van said he told Dutton “it was not something I would do, but you have to respect colleagues if they feel like something has happened. I support them, we remained friends from that day since”.

The company at the centre of the Hunter Valley bus tragedy has been issued with seven defect and two infringement notices after police raided two of its depots today.

NSW Police investigators and inspectors from the National Heavy Vehicle Regulator inspected 20 buses at two of Linq Buslines’ depots at Wyong on the Central Coast and East Gresford near Newcastle.

The company’s 2009 Volvo B7R bus was being driven by 58-year-old Brett Andrew Button on Sunday night when it crashed and rolled on Wine Country Drive in the Hunter Valley, killing 10 and injuring dozens of passengers.

Of the 20 buses inspected, police issued seven defect notices, which require an owner to amend a problem before the vehicle can be driven.

Police also reported finding “a cracked windscreen, oil leaks, inoperative seatbelts and vehicle lights and insecure seats” across the fleet.

Read the whole story from reporter Anthony Segaert.

Turning to breaking international news, a parliamentary inquiry has concluded former British prime minister Boris Johnson knowingly misled parliament multiple times in his statements about Downing Street gatherings that breached COVID rules.

Johnson has been under investigation by the Commons privileges committee since last June, after a probe by police and then senior civil servant Sue Gray confirmed a series of gatherings had taken place during lockdowns.

Johnson was found to have misled the House of Commons in five different ways in a scathing report by the seven-member cross-party privileges committee released on Thursday.

The committee said it would have recommended a suspension from parliament for 90 days if Johnson had not resigned as an MP on Friday night.

Read the full story from Europe correspondent Rob Harris.

Fighting back tears as she rose to her feet in the Senate, Lidia Thorpe delivered a message many will find difficult to accept so soon after the reckoning that shook Parliament House only two years earlier.

The building was still not safe, she said, countering the myriad people from across the parliament who had expressed hope that a new, better culture was now in place at the heart of the nation’s democracy.

Instead, Thorpe spoke of a workplace that, by design, left its female occupants vulnerable.

Electing not to name her alleged perpetrator, she said she had been “followed, aggressively propositioned and inappropriately touched”.

Only hours earlier, a cross-party group of female MPs and their staffers had gathered in one of the building’s nooks for a Women for Election event, part of a fresh drive to encourage women to run for public office. Though in a week in which each day plumbed new depths, perhaps few were convinced of the merits of such a career path.

Read the full analysis piece.

Prime Minister Anthony Albanese says he remains confident Australians will support an Indigenous Voice to parliament when a referendum is held later this year despite recent polls showing a decline in support.

Albanese said he believed that “once the debate goes out of Canberra” it will shift in favour of the Yes case as supporters begin knocking on doors and campaigning in local communities.

“We have gaps in health and education and housing and incarceration rates,” Albanese told ABC radio.

“We need to do better and we know that when we consult people who are directly affected, when they get that empowerment or, as the Uluru statement calls it, if you remove that torment of powerlessness from indigenous people we will get better outcomes.”

This week’s Resolve poll showed support for the Voice dropping below 50 per cent for the first time after months of declining support.

Albanese noted that other polls, including an Essential poll published this week, continue to show a higher level of support for the Voice.