Labor did not leak Age journalist's tape, says Victorian opposition leader
|
Version 0 of 1. The Victorian opposition leader, Daniel Andrews, has again denied that Labor officials leaked the contents of a journalist's tape recorder which was left at his party's state conference. On Monday Andrews admitted that a party official was handed the lost recorder and had copied all files on it “for the purpose of listening to it”, but said a decision was made to destroy all the files. “Every item from the tape recorder was deleted and destroyed,” Andrews told Fairfax Radio. “They deleted it; they destroyed the files. How it was leaked to the Liberal party and distributed to other Liberals I do not know. “Nobody in my office had any involvement in the distribution of this material.” Andrews also said his official, Labor’s Victorian assistant secretary, Kosmos Samaras, had made an error by not returning the tape recorder to the journalist. He said Samaras was angry after hearing a recording of a conversation between himself and the journalist, which Andrews did not know was being recorded. “Mr Samaras has ‘fessed up to the fact and fully acknowledges he should have handed back the recorder,” Andrews said. Samaras issued a statement on Monday admitting to copying, and then deleting, the files. The tape recorder belonged to a Fairfax journalist and was left behind at the Labor party state conference in May. An audio file from the recorder – a conversation with the former Liberal premier Ted Baillieu – was distributed to embarrass the government. However, Andrews has denied Labor officials distributed it. A senior Liberal minister, Matthew Guy, said there should be a full investigation into the leak and Labor officials involved should be stood down until it was completed. Computers and USB sticks involved should be handed to police. “Mr Andrews said he would take full responsibility for this. He had taken none,” Guy, the planning minister, told reporters. “He's running a protection racket for those in his own office, including his state secretary, who he knows has done the wrong thing.” |