EXCLUSIVE
Sam Newman has been accused of an astonishing act of disrespect during an ‘Acknowledgement of Country’ in Victoria.
The former Footy Show host and AFL great was among the guests at an Australia Day function at the state’s Government House on Wednesday.
According to another guest at the event, when governor of Victoria Margaret Gardner began an Acknowledgment of Country, Newman could be seen turning his back and heading for the exit.
By the time he reached the door, however, Ms Gardner had finished the address, and he made his way back to his place in the venue.
For the rest of Ms Gardner’s speech, Newman had his back to the stage, and appeared to be taking photos of his companion Sue Stanley.
Of the hundreds in attendance Newman was the only one in the room not watching the Governor address the crowd, the guest said.
Daily Mail Australia has reached out to Newman for comment.
Newman has courted controversy as a media figure in the past and made headlines for his comments on Indigenous culture.
When Margaret Gardner began an Acknowledgment of Country, Newman could be seen turning his back and heading for the exit, but he returned when the address was finished
For the rest of Ms Gardner’s speech, Newman had his back to the stage, and appeared to be taking photos of companion Sue Stanley
In September 2024 he urged Australians to boo the ‘welcome to country’ ceremony at the AFL grand final.
The former footy great also recently slammed a dedicated Telstra call centre phoneline for Indigenous people.
The Darwin-based call centre hotline came under scathing attack from the AFL veteran during an episode of Newman’s podcast, You Cannot Be Serious, in January.
Newman’s co-host shared a story about a non-Indigenous woman from Kununurra in Western Australia who was able to skip the line after she lied about her heritage.
‘Why doesn’t everyone do it?’ said Newman in response. ‘Indigenous people – why do they get through while the rest of us wait in line?
‘This will get to – you’ll go to a film, and there’ll be a queue for Caucasian people. And over here, there’ll be a queue for anyone whose skin color is not white.’
Telstra denied the call centre allowed Indigenous callers to skip the queue faced by the rest of the community.
‘Telstra’s First Nations Connect Hotline is supported by a small dedicated team to service our most remote customers,’ a spokesman told Daily Mail Australia.
Newman was the only guest of the hundreds in attendance to not pay attention during the governor’s remarks, one witness said
‘It also provides culturally appropriate customer service to our First Nations customers.’
In 2018 Newman told News Corp he was considering running for Lord Mayor of Melbourne on a platform of getting rid of homelessness in the CBD, cleaning up graffiti and ignoring minority group agendas.
The Lord Mayor role was empty at the time after then-Mayor Robert Doyle resigned while fighting allegations of sexual harassment.
Mr Newman, who said he toyed with the idea of running in the 2016 council election, told the Herald Sun the role of mayor would allow him to fight the politically correct agendas of minority groups.
‘We get bogged down with delusional psychotic anarchists who push all sorts of agendas because they have a point to plead and usually the general interest of the community is thrown under the bus,’ he said.
‘I’m sure that the majority of people are worried about the homeless in the CBD, the graffiti, [and councils] using motorists as a tool to balance the budget.’
