How does one of Australia's top fashion designers apologise after joking about a sexual harassment case engulfing the top retailer David Jones? She holds a "sorry sale", of course.
That is how Alannah Hill is planning to make amends for her comments yesterday at the retail giant's annual spring/summer fashion parade, in which she described disgraced former DJs chief executive Mark McInnes as "hot stuff" and said the $37-million lawsuit against him was a "glitch".
Meanwhile disgraced former David Jones chief executive Mark McInnes has revealed plans to return to Sydney, seven weeks after fleeing the city and the sexual harassment allegations that cost him his multimillion-dollar career.
Mr McInnes issued a statement via his publicist Sue Cato at 2.40pm today.
In it he once again apologised for acting in a manner "unbecoming of a chief executive officer".
"I made mistakes and I have acknowledged those mistakes," Mr McInnes said. "Having said that, I reject many of the recent specific allegations and legally I have no alternative other than to vigorously contest them and I will."
He said his partner, Lisa Kelly, who is five months pregnant, would join him in Australia.
Ms Cato told the Herald yesterday that speculative reports Mr McInnes had sought treatment for sex addiction at the same clinic in Phoenix, Arizona, as golfer Tiger Woods reportedly sought treatement, were incorrect.
And Alannah Hill says she is 'gutted' over her remarks yesterday about Kristy Fraser-Kirk and Mark McInnes.
"I wanted to be the girl that went to the Bondi flat. I wish he [Mr McInnes] had touched me up," Hill said yesterday.
But one day after her comments were criticised for trivialising a serious situation, Hill went on Melbourne radio today to make an apology - of sorts.
"I'm here with a priest, I'm on my knees and I'm doing my confession," she told Melbourne's Fox FM.
"I'm so gutted ... I feel like such an idiot.
"Look, I know they are really serious allegations and I've never really worked in the corporate sector, and I understand sexual harassment would be unbearable.
"I know people get so stressed they can't even go to work. I feel terrible for that girl and I feel stupid for myself and I really, really humbly apologise."
Hill said her business partner was "so furious" about her comments that she would hold a "sorry sale" on Saturday, and donate half the proceeds "to some sort of a women's shelter or sexual abuse (charity)".
Asked what she would do with the other half of the funds, she said: "I might pass them on to the nice girl with the hyphen in her name. I've forgotten her name."
The "nice girl" she was referring to was 27-year-old publicist Kristy Fraser-Kirk, who this week lodged a $37-million sexual harassment lawsuit against Mr McInnes and David Jones.
Ms Fraser-Kirk alleges the former CEO was a serial sexual harasser and that a culture existed within the company where Mr McInnes' behaviour thrived. In June Mr McInnes left the company and fled Australia. David Jones will defend the claim.
Hill then appeared to relent on radio this morning, saying "maybe" she would donate the entire amount raised in the sale to a women's charity.
As soon as she fronted the media pack yesterday with fellow Australian designer Alex Perry, Hill said she knew she was in trouble.
"You know at a funeral when you're meant to cry and you sometimes laugh?," she said.
"I knew that I'd do it. I thought 'I know what I'm like. As soon as they ask me those questions I'm going to go the other way and act ridiculous'.
"I talked myself into it saying 'Be normal, be straight, it is a serious problem, even though you quite like Mark McInnes, just don't say anything stupid'. And then the words just came out. They came out and they came flowing, they wouldn't stop, and I turned into my mother."
Hill said she had not spoken to Mr McInnes since he left Australia, but she believed he was "one of the greatest CEOs in the country" and she had been attempting to protect him in a "weird, bizarre kind of way" yesterday.
The allegations against Mr McInnes had not surprised her, Hill said.
"Well he was a flirt, he was a great flirt, and I'm a bit of a flirt. It wasn't a huge surprise. He was a flirt and he was great at his job," she said.
"If you had a room full of girls throwing themselves at you and you were single you'd find it hard to sort of say no.
"But in saying that I know that he may have gone a bit far.
"No one is going to win out of this. It's just going to be an awful, bitter battle and I feel sorry for both of them."
Source: theage.com.au
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