Lisa Wilkinson's last chance: TV star launches fresh court bid over the part of the Bruce Lehrmann defamation judgment she did not like

Lisa Wilkinson has launched a fresh bid to overturn part of a judgment made against her in Bruce Lehrmann's defamation case.

Wilkinson's lawyers lodged a notice of contention in the Federal Court on her behalf on Wednesday, arguing that Justice Michael Lee was wrong to rule against her and Network Ten on April 15.

Lehrmann sued the TV host and television network for defamation over an episode of The Project in 2021, during which Brittany Higgins publicly alleged that he raped her in Parliament House in 2019.

He wasn't named in the broadcast, but claimed friends and colleagues were able to identify him as her rapist.

In his findings earlier this year, Justice Lee found that Lehrmann had raped Ms Higgins by the civil standard of the balance of probabilities. He lodged an appeal to overturn that judgment on May 31.

Wilkinson and Network Ten won the primary truth defence in the case due to the findings against Lehrmann.

However, they lost on a separate defence of qualified privilege when the judge found Wilkinson and The Project team did not act reasonably when preparing the episode for broadcast.

The notice of contention was filed in response to Lehrmann's appeal, and asked the court to reconsider the judgments that were not in Wilkinson's favour.

If Wilkinson's notice of contention was successful, it would restore her reputation. 

According to the notice, Wilkinson argued that Justice Lee made a series of errors in his truth defence judgments as to Ms Higgins credibility and Lehrmann's consciousness of guilt.

The notice went on to detail errors in the qualified privilege judgments, claiming that the judge 'failed to give sufficient or any weight' to a range of factors surrounding Wilkinson's work and career.

Wilkinson argues that Justice Lee ignored her 'experience with sexual assault survivors', particularly given that she had met Ms Higgins multiple times and had 'expertise' on the topic.

It was further suggested that Justice Lee did not distinguish between conduct and decisions made by Network Ten and those made by Wilkinson, because she was an employee with a number of superiors.

In his judgment, Justice Lee slammed Ten and Wilkinson for failing to properly investigate a photo of a bruise which Ms Higgins said was the result of the rape in 2019.

The court heard there was no evidence that the bruise photo existed prior to January 2021, the day she met Wilkinson for the first time. 

In the notice, Wilkinson argued Justice Lee did not give much weight to the fact that Wilkinson relied on Ms Higgins' statutory declaration as proof that the photo and the bruise was a result of her rape.

It was further suggested that Wilkinson did not have control over when Lehrmann was contacted for comment by the network.

The Project's producer Angus Llewellyn emailed Lehrmann on a Friday afternoon, three days before broadcast, and again on the day of the broadcast. 

Justice Lee was not satisfied that he received those emails and made a finding against Wilkinson and Ten, but Wilkinson has now argued Justice Lee made an error when he found Lehrmann did not receive at least one of those emails.

Wilkinson's notice also asked the court to consider the fact that she believed that he had been given adequate time to respond and had no reason to believe otherwise.

The notice claimed Justice Lee misconstrued the introduction to The Project episode, when Wilkinson said: 'Claims of rape, roadblocks to a police investigation and a young woman forced to choose between her career and the pursuit of justice.'

The judge found Ms Higgins was not forced to choose between her career and the pursuit of justice and there were no roadblocks to a police investigation.

He referred to those claims as conspiratorial.

Wilkinson's notice was prepared by her barrister Sue Chrysanthou SC, who represented her during the trial. She has billed Network Ten $1.8million to cover her legal fees.

The appeal is yet to be heard in court. 

Lehrmann may have to provide security costs ahead of any appeal. Failure to pay could result in the appeal not going ahead.