Almost six months after New Matilda broke the story of Frances Abbott being the beneficiary of a $60,000 scholarship, she has finally publicly commented on the whole situation.
For anyone awaiting a substantial statement with bated breath, you’d be advised to exhale and lower your expectations considerably.
Freya Newman, the student who leaked the information on the previously unheard of scholarship, courtesy of the Whitehouse Institute of Design, currently awaits sentencing until the 25th of November. Human rights lawyer Julian Burnside had called for Newman to be protected as a whistleblower rather than tried as a criminal, with barristers working on Newman’s defence reiterating that what she did would not have been a crime if she had had her own login to the school’s system and that she was motivated by a sense of injustice. Unfortunately for Newman, however, whistleblowing laws in our country only apply to Government institutions.
Frances recently made it into the news after breaking a lease on an apartment her father and the Australian Federal Police deemed unsafe but last we heard on the Whitehouse case Newman had written a letter of apology to Frances Abbott and no one from the Abbott family had commented. Until now.
Frances Abbott spoke to News Corp and revealed that she had accepted the letter of apology and “was trying to move on with life in Melbourne, where she is working as a buying assistant in children’s wear at Myer.”
Frances said: “Yes, I was sent an apology letter. I guess in that situation I’m trying to move forward with everything, but it’s just one of those things. I wish Freya all the best and moving forward we all make mistakes. Obviously, she acknowledged her mistake so moving forward, moving on.”
When asked by The Australian‘s ‘Media Writer’ about New Matilda’s “illegal access of Professor Barry Spurr’s emails and her own education files from the Whitehouse School of Design” Frances said she “did not approve of their methods.”
She went on to say: “To be honest, it’s just like as a small child you learn it’s not right to read someone’s diary. It’s not right to hack into anything. That’s all I’ve got to say on it.”
Photo: Lisa Maree Williams via Getty Images.
