The insiders who unmasked Fashion Critical… Plus, Abbie Chatfield’s leaked group chat reveals her panic over lawsuit – and Triple M responds to damning claims from exiled NRL reporter: INSIDE MAIL

Feeding the chooks

While Abbie Chatfield‘s ‘woes’ roll on, fresh details have emerged about her eyebrow-raising defence strategy.

Shortly after her former ‘male best friend’ Heath Kelley slapped her with a defamation suit, the left-wing influencer asked her brains trust for legal advice.

‘Is any chook in here a… defamation lawyer?’ she wrote in an Instagram group chat for her fans at about 10pm on September 8 – eight hours after the claim was filed.

Dozens of ‘chooks’ jumped in with advice, and even lawyer recommendations.

‘Sue Chrysanthou… she’s the best,’ one fan helpfully suggested.

Chrysanthou is, of course, the legendary silk who has represented the likes of Lisa Wilkinson in her defence against Bruce Lehrmann; Special Forces veteran Heston Russell in his case against the ABC; and former Victorian Liberal MP Moira Deeming when she went up against party leader John Pesutto.

All big wins – and she famously doesn’t come cheap.

The problem for Abbie and her army of chooks, though, is that Ms Chrysanthou SC was already involved in the case… representing Mr Kelley.

That’s, like, really awkward, babes! I’m honestly embarrassed for you!

The defo battle stems from a fiery series of ill-advised Instagram Stories that Abbie posted on May 7, just days after the federal election.

In them, she falsely accused Kelley – a man she once claimed to love – of supporting ‘genocide’ and the ‘slaughter of children’ in Gaza, tagging him directly and telling her old high school mates to ‘reconsider your friendships’ if they still associated with him.

The outburst came after Kelley privately messaged her saying he was ‘pro-Israel’ because of the Jewish state’s stance on LGBTQI and women’s rights – messages she promptly screenshotted and shared publicly, labelling him a ‘right-wing troll’.

Court documents state her posts were ‘inherently serious’ and left Mr Kelley open to ‘hatred, ridicule and contempt’.

Mr Kelley wants $95,000 in damages and a public apology from Abbie in which she admits her claims were ‘completely false and should never have been made’.

Bye-bye, Balmain

Long before Freya Leach was, er, firing up on Sky News, her main claim to fame was running as the Liberal candidate in the traditionally working-class seat of Balmain.

She placed third behind Labor and the Greens in the 2023 NSW State Election – not a stellar result, but consistent with past Liberal performances in the seat.

During that campaign, she billed herself as a ‘Balmain local’ – but Inside Mail can reveal her days in Tiger Town are over.

Last week – just as Sky News pulled the pin on her talk show Freya Fires Up – Leach and her husband, Young Liberals NSW President Cooper Gannon, marked one year as proud homeowners… in Cronulla.

On October 1, 2024, the goofy lovebirds snapped up a breezy two-bedder near North Cronulla Beach – scraping together a deposit with help from the First Home Super Saver scheme (FHSS).

The scheme – introduced by the Coalition in 2017, naturally – allows young go-getters like the Gannons to make voluntary super contributions, then withdraw them later to put towards a starter home.

They splashed $870,000 on their love nest, complete with a lock-up garage – a tidy profit for the previous owner, who paid just under $400,000 back in 2009.

We reckon ‘Nulla is a far better fit for Freya than lefty Balmain. Cronulla, of course, has been a Liberal stronghold since 1956 – currently represented by NSW Opposition Leader Mark Speakman.

Let’s hope she doesn’t fire up too much in her new patch – tempers have been known to flare in those parts…

Albo’s delulu

Prime Minister Anthony Albanese‘s latest attempt at global statesmanship would be laughable if it weren’t so predictable.

Suggesting that Australia’s recognition of Palestine helped inspire the US-led Gaza peace plan is self-congratulatory nonsense – the kind that flourishes in a political vacuum.

The notion that Donald Trump acted as he did – and that Middle Eastern leaders are now more likely to fall in line – because little old Australia changed tack is ridiculous.

We’d love to see a sharp reporter ask Trump about Albo’s ego-fuelled claim when they finally sit down – especially given that Team Trump was so critical of Australia recognising Palestine in the first place.

The truth is, Australia’s foreign policy has rarely mattered less – and Albo’s insistence on claiming credit for progress he didn’t engineer only underscores that irrelevance.

Still, we shouldn’t be surprised.

This is a PM who, after waiting 300 humiliating days for a meeting with the leader of the free world, marked the fleeting encounter with a grinning selfie – like an adoring fan – and promptly posted it to social media.

High and dry in Bondi 

The mystery of why sports presenter Tiffany Salmond hasn’t scored an NRL gig since relocating from New Zealand to Sydney seems to have dragged on longer than Parramatta’s premiership drought.

Salmond believes she was quietly blacklisted for being ‘too sexy’, and for ruffling feathers with her sizeable social media following.

By contrast, media execs have been quietly spinning the yarn to journalists that there ‘just isn’t a role for her right now’. We’ve heard that one before.

Most of Salmond’s frustration centres on her exit from Fox Sports, where she once did sideline interviews during Warriors games, before being told there was no longer work for her.

But this week, Salmond turned her attention to Triple M, claiming the station promised her work if she moved to Sydney, only to leave her off the roster once she arrived.

‘I actually started this season doing sideline for them in New Zealand,’ she wrote on her Instagram Stories on Monday.

‘I was officially asked to be part of the Triple M team for this season, and during conversations, I was encouraged to move to Sydney with the promise of receiving more games here than I would in NZ.

‘Safe to say, I’m not sure what happened there.’

It sounded like a classic case of media bungling – but when Inside Mail asked around at Triple M, our sources maintained her story was wrong.

A source insisted no one would be asked to move interstate – let alone overseas – without a contract. They said Salmond had called a handful of games as a freelancer and may have hoped it would lead to more work, but no promises were made. 

When Inside Mail put this to Salmond via email, she stood by her version – but acknowledged that no formal contract was ever offered.

She said she had months-long conversations with a senior Triple M executive who had decision-making power over the NRL broadcast team, and that she was actively encouraged to relocate, even being asked how many games she’d like to work once she arrived.

‘I had no reason to doubt the legitimacy of those conversations as this was the same executive who had rostered me to work sideline for the 2024 NRLW Grand Final,’ she added.

Then came her move to Bondi, which we first reported in April. Salmond was ready to work – and receiving the weekly NRL roster – but never scheduled.

‘After five consecutive weeks of not being scheduled and no communication about when I’d be brought on, I asked to be removed from the email list,’ she said.

‘That decision came only after it became clear I was not being utilised, despite doing everything on my end to be available.

‘The fact that I was not rostered for even a single game this season once moving to Sydney is, I believe, enough for any reasonable person to feel misled.’

There’s an old saying in media: don’t do anything until you’ve signed a contract.

But still, it’s hard to shake the feeling that the rug was pulled out from under Tiffany. Her story should serve as a lesson for editors and managers working with freelancers – the most vulnerable members of our professional ecosystem:

Don’t make promises you can’t keep.

Reply-all chaos

A well-meaning charity drive in NSW Parliament has unravelled into inbox chaos – all thanks to that most feared of workplace blunders: the accidental ‘reply all’.

Labor MLC Sarah Kaine had emailed colleagues asking for clothing donations for this month’s ‘Parliamentary Friends of Sustainable Fashion Swaptober Clothing Swap’ – a wholesome initiative promoting sustainable fashion, with leftover garments going to women’s shelters.

But when the message landed in the inbox of Campbelltown MP Greg Warren, he wasn’t exactly swept up in the spirit of giving.

‘No thanks,’ he shot back.

Unfortunately for Warren, his blunt reply didn’t just go to Kaine – it went to every MP, staffer, and hanger-on with a NSW Parliament email address.

Cue inbox chaos. 

The message was hastily recalled in a bid to spare Warren the embarrassment of looking like Macquarie Street’s resident Scrooge… but not before it was screenshotted and forwarded to Inside Mail, naturally.

Fashion Criticised

Well, that certainly stirred the pot last week, didn’t it? 

We didn’t expect our little exposé on the PR powerhouse behind anonymous red carpet style blog Fashion Critical to cause quite such a commotion.

By Thursday morning, we were gripped by the sinking suspicion we’d fingered the wrong culprit, after a flood of emails from women declaring: ‘I am Fashion Critical’.

Alas, it was all a joke at our expense – and fair’s fair: if we dish it out, we can take it.

But now that the cat’s not just out of the bag but tearing down the highway, here’s a fun little titbit about the publicist behind the blog: Dani Lombard.

Around two years back, a savvy fashion journo quietly cracked FC’s true identity. She didn’t shout it from the rooftops, but did discreetly let a few industry friends know.

Lombard clearly has eyes and ears everywhere, because she somehow caught wind of the chatter.

She slid into the journo’s DMs with a surprising plea: ‘Apparently you have discovered my secret! Please don’t tell anyone!’

The journo respected her wish, but Lombard was dying to know how she’d been rumbled. The answer? Weeks of piecing together clues – with the clincher being a glimpse of Lombard’s neon nail polish that matched one of FC’s posts.

‘You’re a genius!’ declared Lombard.

We’ve said it before and we’ll say it again: if you want secrets cracked with FBI-level precision, forget the news desk – ask the fashion team.

Of course, that’s just one example of Lombard’s alter ego being rumbled – by fashion insiders, social media sleuths and eagle-eyed reporters, all of whom decided to keep their knowledge under wraps.

Inside Mail understands there have been many such close calls over the years – including one involving a private investigator – with Lombard rushing to put out the fire each time.

Clearly, the humble street sweeper from Gundagai knows how to keep a secret.

P.S. We note that Fashion Critical will be appearing ‘Live & Incognito’ at Dymocks George Street on October 21 to promote her new book. We had hoped to see her there but the event is sold out. I suppose that’s karma…

Clowning around

The Liberals have entered their performance art phase, issuing ‘Charter Letters’ to shadow ministers on how to behave – as if Sussan Ley were headmistress of Hogwarts.

The letters spell out her ‘expectations of conduct’, which is spin for ‘stop leaking and shut up’.

Unfortunately, the circus tent was already up. Andrew Hastie quit the shadow cabinet over disagreements on immigration policy, declaring he could no longer be silent.

Jacinta Price called the whole thing a ‘clown show’.

Then, deputy leader Ted O’Brien spun the chaos as ‘democracy at work’ – which is certainly one way of describing the whole snafu.

When your own MPs are calling it a clown show and your deputy insists it’s democracy in action, you know the joke’s on all of them.

A party that needs written instructions on basic teamwork sounds like it’s on the verge of completely falling apart.

Read the room, Don

Only in Canberra could a cost-of-living crunch inspire a plan for more politicians.

Yes, really. Special Minister of State Don Farrell has tasked the electoral matters committee with exploring a bigger Parliament. More snouts in the trough at taxpayers’ expense – when the budget is in deficit. Good thinking!

Here’s the kicker: under the Constitution, the House must be roughly double the size of the Senate – so even a modest bump snowballs quickly.

The scenario being floated is another 28-32 MPs in the lower house, which means many more senators, too. Next, they’ll tell us Parliament House isn’t big enough and they need a new building. Where does it end?

The Parliamentary Budget Office has already crunched the numbers: half a billion dollars in salaries and entitlements over the next few years – all before the AEC even redraws a single boundary.

If Labor wants to die on this hill, it should at least call it what it is: unpopular, costly, and designed by the people who benefit the most.

Oh, and by the way, more senators makes it easier for more minor parties to win seats – making it even harder for governments to get anything done.

Nuclear fallout

Environment Minister Chris Bowen has sparked chatter with a social media swipe at the Coalition’s bid to revive its nuclear energy policy – a plan Labor insists was ‘buried six feet under’ by voters at the last election.

The post featured an AI-generated cartoon of a smoke-belching nuclear plant – leaking faster than the Liberal Party, we might add – towering over a dazed-looking Sussan Ley and David Littleproud.

‘It may not yet be Halloween, but this is the scariest film in town,’ Bowen wrote. ‘It’s scary because it shows the Coalition still doesn’t get it.’

But while Bowen was clearly enjoying himself, not everyone was laughing.

The timing raised eyebrows, landing just days after a Senate Select Committee report on information integrity in climate and energy – one that specifically flagged concerns around the use of generative AI, bots and trolls in spreading misinformation.

Bowen wasn’t fazed, however, responding promptly to Inside Mail’s questions about the AI image.

‘We are unable to use an image of the nuclear energy the Coalition supports as no commercial small modular reactor has ever been successfully constructed,’ Bowen said.

‘It is clear this image is not purporting to be real but instead is designed to illustrate that the Coalition has not learned a single lesson from the message delivered by the Australian people at the election.’