Locked Out: How a Senior Public Servant Sued Parliament House | Jo Tarnawsky | Grit Diaries
Jo Tarnawsky entered Parliament House at 12 after winning a TV competition, carrying a dream forged in that single afternoon. She built a two-decade career as a diplomat and political operative, thriving in crisis zones and complex postings. In 2022, she returned to Australia as Chief of Staff to the Deputy Prime Minister—her childhood dream role. Within two years, she was locked out of her office, barred from her workplace, and pushed toward silence. Rather than slip away quietly, she chose to speak publicly, eventually filing suit against the Deputy PM, the PM's Chief of Staff, and the Commonwealth. The case settled on a no-liability basis in early 2025. Since then, she has redirected her energy into helping others navigate toxic workplaces through educational resources, videos, and advocacy work.
Jo Tarnawsky is a career diplomat and political staffer who worked for the Australian Government across multiple continents—from Iraq to Italy to Zimbabwe—before returning to Australia as Chief of Staff to the Deputy Prime Minister. In 2024, she took the federal government to court over workplace bullying in Parliament House.
In this Grit Diaries conversation with Mon & Mazz, Jo shares the story behind the moments below.
🎙️ IN THIS CONVERSATION:
• Workplace bullying in institutional settings is often covert and sophisticated—exclusion, email omission, and exclusion from meetings rather than overt aggression—making it harder to name and easier to doubt yourself.
• High performers and ethical people are targeted specifically because they pose a threat to systems that want to remain unchanged; the bullier's insecurity manifests as a need to neutralize those who shine a light.
• Early intervention with human dignity, apology, and reasonable accommodation can prevent escalation to litigation; institutions that default to legal protection and risk management often create the very crisis they're trying to avoid.
• Isolation is the most damaging weapon in workplace bullying; when you cannot eat in the cafeteria, access your own office, or know what's happening in your own portfolio, the psychological toll accelerates rapidly.
• Children offer clarity in moments of despair; a child's simple suggestion to tell someone what is happening can become the permission slip to stop protecting the system that harmed you.
• Speaking publicly about a painful experience does…
🕒 CHAPTERS:
00:31 Introduction: Workplace bullying in Parliament House
04:12 The moment at Parliament House that changed everything
09:11 Falling into diplomatic career with DFAT
12:11 Deputy Ambassador posting to Italy and family
15:42 Starting dream job and initial success
20:00 Locked out of Parliament House
24:30 The choice: be pushed out quietly or call them out
29:13 First press conference and initial requests
35:12 Final return to office and settlement
38:25 Pivoting to purposeful work helping others
42:39 Upcoming resources for safe work transitions
48:11 Book-ending: starting and ending career at Parliament with press conference
🎧 If this story moved you, follow Kintsugi Heroes in your podcast app so you never miss an episode.
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
🎙️ ABOUT KINTSUGI HEROES
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
Kintsugi Heroes is a not-for-profit Australian podcast network sharing real stories of resilience and transformation.
Named after the Japanese art of repairing broken pottery with gold — the philosophy that what's been broken can become more beautiful for the mending — every episode honours the cracks, the rebuild, and the human underneath.
We believe every story matters. Every scar has something to say. And every person quietly finding their way through deserves to be heard.
📺 Series on this channel:
– Kintsugi Heroes — real stories of resilience | hosted by John Milham
– Animals & Us | hosted by Natalie Stockdale
– Grit Diaries: from Grit to Grace | hosted by Simone Allan & Maryan Bova
– Golden Threads — stories of disability & resilience | hosted by Dan Dougherty
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
🔗 CONNECT WITH US
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
🌐 https://kintsugiheroes.com.au
▶️ https://www.youtube.com/@kintsugiheroes
📘 https://www.facebook.com/kintsugiheroes
📸 https://www.instagram.com/kintsugi.heroes
💼 https://www.linkedin.com/company/kintsugi-heroes
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
💛 SUPPORT THE NETWORK
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
Kintsugi Heroes is listener-supported and run entirely by volunteers. Your support helps us keep sharing stories that matter.
❤️ Donate (tax-deductible): https://kintsugiheroes.com.au/donate
🤝 Partner with us: https://kintsugiheroes.com.au
🔔 Subscribe for new episodes every week and join a community that believes in the power of human stories.
We're all in this together. 💛
#GritDiaries #KintsugiHeroes #FromGritToGrace #WorkplaceBullying #ParliamentHouse #ToxicWorkplace #MentalHealth #AustralianPolitics #CourageToSpeak #WorkplaceCulture #ConstructiveConflict
———
Show notes by Tony Bailey · Approved by Tony Bailey · Australian English
Mentioned in this episode:
Support Kintsugi Heroes
Kintsugi Heroes is a not-for-profit, and every story we share is free for the people who need it. If this show has meant something to you, you can help us keep going. Visit kintsugiheroes.com.au and click donate. Every contribution helps us keep telling these stories, and it's tax-deductible.
Kintsugi Heroes
Follow the show, share it with someone who needs it, or share your own story at kintsugiheroes.com.au. Your story matters.
