The Coalition's attack on Katy Gallagher over Brittany Higgins is unrelenting

"How can you say you didn't mislead the Senate when your exact words were 'no one had any knowledge'?" the reporter asked, pursuing the Labor minister through to the airport car park.

She wore a grey sweatshirt with "women's spirit network" written on the front, having just returned from speaking at the Labor women's conference in Perth.

"I've addressed this in the statement," Gallagher said. The questions followed her to her car, turning into statements.

"You haven't addressed it, senator."

The "it" in question was that claim Gallagher misled Parliament two years ago when she said "no one had any knowledge" of former Liberal staffer Brittany Higgins' rape allegations before she went public.

Private text messages between Higgins and her partner David Sharaz, questionably published by The Australian last week, suggested Gallagher learnt of the allegations a few days before the rest of the country did.

After days of questions, Gallagher said that yes, Sharaz had given her some details of the rape allegations ahead of time, but no, she had not used the allegations for political purposes. And that was what she meant when she responded with incredulity to Reynolds' question.

But the Coalition smelt blood.

The airport chase foreshadowed the week ahead in Parliament. A week that would end with the Coalition evicting a member from their own party following multiple allegations of sexual assault. A week that would plunge Parliament back into a dark era we hoped was over.

This week's prosecution of Gallagher left many to wonder whether the senior Labor politician would be able to emerge with her political career intact.

Questions around whether she had breached parliamentary standards quickly turned into suggestions of collusion.

One by one, Coalition senators stood up in question time and asked the Minister for Women the same questions: Did Lisa Wilkinson give you early access to her interview on The Project? Did you tell anyone about what you learnt? Did you attend David Sharaz's first wedding?

Senators from across the aisle cried out "hypocrite" and "disgraceful" as Gallagher responded.

For those who support Higgins, this has all been an attempt by the Coalition - who were originally accused of mishandling her rape allegation - to rewrite the events of 2021 with a new villain: Gallagher.

For those on the other side, this saga has been proof that Higgins' rape allegations were, at best, a politicised attempt by Labor to smear the Coalition.

But for the Coalition, another former ACT chief minister Kate Carnell believes, this week has been about taking down one of the government's most senior ministers.

"This is because she's a target," Carnell, a Liberal ACT chief minister in the '90s, told The Canberra Times on Thursday night.

"You know, she's a very competent senior woman in the Labor ministry ... if you can take her down, well, you know, that's a scalp."

Gallagher started out as an accidental politician in the ACT government, but quickly rose through the ranks to become not only one of the most influential women in the Labor Party, but in federal politics.

In 2001, the 31-year-old single mum successfully ran for the Legislative Assembly after hearing that the Labor Party needed more women on the election ticket.

Just over a year later, she was elevated to the front bench (a consequence of being the "least insane" of the backbench crop, she once explained to this paper).

Several years and ministerial portfolios later, Gallagher took over the top job from chief minister Jon Stanhope in 2011, serving just over one term in the role before making the switch to federal politics as a senator for the ACT.

Now as Minister for Women, Finance and the Public Service, Gallagher - who hails from Labor's socialist left faction - has a place in the cabinet, a respected voice in Labor's party room, and the trust of Prime Minister Anthony Albanese.

All this to say that Gallagher may be a lucrative political target, but also a seasoned politician who has survived her fair share of scandal.

In 2003, she said she almost quit politics when a child protection scandal blew up in her face. In 2012, the opposition tried to oust her as chief minister after it was revealed that thousands of Canberra Hospital emergency department records had been manipulated to make waiting time figures look better. And in 2014, she was targeted with online threats after dobbing in a man to police for providing a sick two-and-a-half-year-old girl with cannabis oil to ease her symptoms.

Carnell said that this week won't break Gallagher's career, adding that the "supposed misleading of Parliament was pretty minor".

But Carnell - who knows from her own tough days in politics - said that to assume this week won't impact Gallagher was wrong.

"She's been around politics for a long time. She doesn't expect it to be nice and chummy. But every single one of these sorts of personal attacks hurts," Carnell said.

"And when you get to a certain number of scars, it's a bit like mud sticks."

'Another huge misstep' for the Coalition

Rather, the Coalition's plot for a political scalp blew up spectacularly when independent senator Lidia Thorpe on Wednesday stood up in the Senate and accused Liberal senator David Van of harassment and sexual assault.

Senator Van rejected the allegations, and several members of the Coalition quickly came out to his defence. Former Liberal Victorian premier Jeff Kennett tweeted that the Senate should move to suspend Thorpe from the chamber for a year after her allegations.

But the following day, Opposition Leader Peter Dutton said he had since heard further allegations of misconduct and announced that Senator Van would no longer sit in the Liberal party room.

Later Thursday night, former Coalition senator Amanda Stoker came forward with claims that Senator Van had squeezed her bottom twice in 2020 at a social gathering in a parliamentary office, calling the behaviour "unprofessional and uninvited". Van said he doesn't remember what Stoker alleges.

Dutton called for Van to resign on Friday morning, citing a third allegation of inappropriate touching.

Politically speaking, the Coalition's attempt to land a blow against the Gallagher was already "another huge misstep" for a party trying to win back women voters, according to Kos Samaras, a political strategist who previously served as Labor's Victorian deputy campaign director for 14 years.

Last year's federal election saw the Coalition haemorrhage support from professional women in their 30s and 40s, costing them a number of key urban seats like Kooyong and Goldstein.

According to Samaras, prosecuting the Higgins case and trying to lay blame on Gallagher may allow them to "score points in Parliament", but won't win those voters back.

"Did Katy Gallagher know about [Higgins' allegation]? Did she politicise it? That's not what they're paying attention to. What they're paying attention to is the politicisation of an allegation of this nature," Samaras explained.

But Samaras said the allegations against Van makes the party's line of attack against Gallagher look all the worse.

"'Of course this is why you're so insensitive towards a woman who's putting in a complaint, because that's what you do behind the scenes'... is the sort of narrative that could be possibly ricocheting in countless people's minds across the country," he said.

"If [the Coalition] in the business of winning the next election, they have to win those teal seats back. They have to win seats like Bennelong back. They're not going to."

Where to from here

But the people who have suffered the most this week are victim-survivors of sexual harassment and assault who have watched as Higgins' private messages were published in a national paper and read out as evidence of wrongdoing day-after-day in Parliament; who have once again seen proof that our Federal Parliament is little more than a hunting ground.

Dr Blair Williams - a lecturer at Monash University, whose research focuses on gendered media coverage of women in politics - said the worst part of this week is "the message it communicates to victim-survivors". She said that the way that Higgins' text messages were used in the Senate served as a "warning" to others who wanted to come forward with allegations of sexual assault and harassment.

Williams added that the backlash that Thorpe initially faced this week after making her allegations was just further proof of the "intersection between racism and sexism, particularly that Aboriginal women experience in this country".

"The MeToo movement in Parliament house is not finished," she said.

A week that began with Katy Gallagher followed through Canberra Airport ended with David Van being questioned by reporters at Melbourne Airport as he arrived home Thursday night.

Gallagher's political career will move on, while the future of Van's hangs in the balance. But the rest of the country is left wondering whether all that talk of reform and progress in Parliament House over the last two years was just that - talk.