Tent protest intermediary backs PM

29 Jan 2012, 4:45 pm   -   Source: AAP

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ACT union official Kim Sattler has corroborated Julia Gillard's account of events that led to the Australia Day protest outside a Canberra restaurant.

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ACT union official Kim Sattler denies her account of events on Australia Day contradicts Prime Minister Julia Gillard.

News Limited reported on Sunday that Ms Sattler said her conversation with the prime minister's office had made her believe Opposition Leader Tony Abbott wanted to close the Aboriginal Tent Embassy.

Ms Gillard on Saturday said her former media adviser Tony Hodges did not suggest to Ms Sattler that Mr Abbott had said the embassy should be shut down.

Ms Sattler said the reports were "inaccurate".

"As I said in my statement yesterday, Tony Hodges from the prime minister's office told me what Tony Abbott had said - that people should `move on' from the tent embassy," she said in a statement on Sunday.

"Yesterday the prime minister gave an accurate account of my role."

Ms Gillard said Ms Sattler's statement on Saturday was consistent with her account of events on the Australia Day incident.

"Ms Sattler has obviously formed the view that she has not been accurately reported in today's media," Ms Gillard told reporters in Melbourne on Sunday.

"As I'm advised, she has put out a second statement today which once again accords with the views that I hold."

About 100 people surrounded a Canberra restaurant after they wrongly heard Mr Abbott had called for the tent embassy to be destroyed.

Mr Hodges resigned on Friday after admitting he had told Ms Sattler Mr Abbott was inside the Lobby restaurant and for that information to be passed on to someone.

Ms Gillard and Mr Abbott were evacuated from the restaurant when police and security personnel assessed there was a risk to them remaining there.

Mr Abbott said the Australian Federal Police must investigate the events that led to the protest.

The incident on January 26 was the most serious security breach involving Australian leaders since the 1970s, he said.

"It should be unthinkable for a security breach of this nature not to be fully investigated by the Australian Federal Police," he told reporters in Sydney on Sunday.

"The prime minister clearly does have to tell us what she was told verbatim by her office and by her former staffer. We need to know who knew what when and exactly who said what when."

Senior opposition frontbencher Christopher Pyne said the episode was another example of a government more concerned about itself than its citizens.

"There is a stench at the heart of this government, in the prime minister's office where dirty tricks and grubby political deals are elevated," Mr Pyne told Sky News on Sunday.

"The concerns of the Australian people about job security and other cost-of-living issues are pushed into the background."

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