Can reporting what a witness says ever be an attempt to “harass and attack”?

Suzanne Manning, president of the National Council of Women of New Zealand. Source: National Council of Women of New Zealand.

On Sept 17, Speak up for Women (SUFW) posted on X (Twitter) comments by the president of the National Council of Women, Suzanne Manning.

Manning had answered a question about whether there should be a word to describe the class of people of the female sex who usually have periods, have cervixes, have ovaries, can usually get pregnant and experience menopause by saying: “Not necessarily.”

SUFW then commented: “I wonder what Kate Sheppard would think of that?” Kate Sheppard being the famous campaigner for voting rights for women, a battle won on Sept 19, 1893.

SUFW was reporting and commenting on Manning’s appearance as an expert witness at a proceeding before the Human Rights Review Tribunal.

Manning said a number of other things in evidence, including that the “concept of biological womanhood” is “outdated” and that the presence of trans-identifying men in leadership positions is effectively the presence of women in leadership positions, and Manning’s views might well have shocked Sheppard.

The action before the tribunal was brought by two members of Lesbian Action for Visability Aotearoa (LAVA), Hillary Oxley and Margaret Curnow, against Wellington Pride Festival Incorporated after their booking for a stall at an Out in the City event in March 2021 was cancelled, essentially because LAVA doesn’t accept that lesbians can have penises.

That’s right: lesbians no longer have an automatic right of presence at Pride events, which are meant to celebrate the rights of lesbians and gay men, a cause that culminated in marriage equality.

The suppression order

Hearings of the case are ongoing, but the SUFW tweet led to the tribunal issuing a suppression order, at the request of Pride, banning any member of the public, other than “accredited journalists,” from publishing “any report or account of the evidence.”

The suppression order also included a ban on anyone other than an accredited journalist taking notes or recording the proceedings.

Since only a single journalist from The Spinoff has attended a single day of weeks’ long sessions of evidence, this was effectively a total ban on anyone else reporting on any of the evidence given to date.

This is The Spinoff story published on Sept 8: https://thespinoff.co.nz/politics/08-09-2025/inside-the-clash-between-a-wellington-pride-festival-and-anti-trans-lesbian-activists

Since I have been a journalist for more than 40 years and my career has included frequent reporting on legal proceedings, both in New Zealand and Australia, at which nobody ever questioned my right to do so, I am assuming that I qualify as an “accredited” journalist.

LAVA appealed the suppression order and I observed an online hearing last week into whether the tribunal should lift its order.

Free Speech Union was barred

The Free Speech Union had petitioned for leave to intervene on the suppression order but was denied because the tribunal was satisfied that the FSU “does not have an interest in the proceeding greater than the public generally.”

Victoria Casey, KC, representing Pride, requested that the tribunal make its suppression order permanent and argued that the offending tweet had fallen “far short” of being “temperate” and that the tweet and responses to it were an effort to “harass and attack” Manning.

Casey did not assert that anything about the tweet had been factually incorrect, but she did complain that SUFW had made no attempt to moderate the comments its tweet elicited.

Caseu did assert that the tweet and the ensuing comments “constitute witness intimidation” and could deter other witnesses that are yet to be heard from giving evidence and that the suppression order was “necessary and appropriate to protect the proper administration of justice.”

Further, Casey asserted that journalists “bring with them proper understanding of sub-judice rules” but she is completely wrong in her inference that a journalist would not have reported as SUFW did on X.

Had I been reporting on Manning’s evidence, I would certainly have highlighted her views on what constitutes “womanhood.”

Journalistic malpractice

I’d regard it as journalistic malpractice not to report on Manning’s views, especially given as evidence under oath in a quasi-legal proceeding, because of their relevance to the general population, especially women.

The idea that reporting on what a witness said, whether you’re a journalist or not, could be construed as an attempt to “harass and attack” that witness or that such reporting “constitutes witness intimidation” is just extraordinary.

If courts generally believed such assertions, there could be no reporting of legal proceedings.

The basis for the request for the initial suppression order was simply ridiculous.

Nevertheless, the tribunal was swayed sufficiently by such assertions to grant the initial suppression order – it has undertaken to issue its decision on the appeal before hearings resume on Oct 6.

The tribunal’s acceptance of Casey’s arguments and its agreeing to the initial suppression order is even more ridiculous than Casey’s actual arguments.

Casey also asserted that the lack of media attention to the proceeding is “a fair enough assessment of public interest.”

I would disagree strongly with that assertion – it rather shows how captured by trans ideology the mainstream media is.

It is well-documented that trans-activists have long argued that any questioning of their views is verboten, but such a view is antithetical to the concept of free speech.

Nicolette Levy, KC, representing LAVA, argued that there was no evidence of harassment or attacks on Manning or the National Council of Women – the only evidence presented was the tweet on X and the comments it elicited.

She argued for “the principle of open justice,” that the SUFW tweet had been an accurate report of what Manning said, and “it’s what the witness said” that had elicited the comments that Casey had objected to.

Please note that while the subject of this column doesn’t strictly relate to business, the absence of other media attention persuaded me that somebody needed to report on it. And both free speech and the rule of law are fundamental to the conduct of business in a democratic society.