‘Celebration day’: Lisa Wilkinson’s cheeky social media post after Ten ordered to pay eye watering sum over Lehrmann lawsuit

Lisa Wilkinson has declared a day of “celebration” in a social media post the day after Channel 10 were ordered to pay an additional $590,000 – and a total of $1.15m – to cover her legal costs for the Bruce Lehrmann defamation trial. The former TV host shared a picture of herself to Instagram on Tuesday morning, in the image she has a massive smile on her face and has her hands in the air. “Celebration day!!” she captioned the image. “My number one priority this year — after a couple of pretty challenging years — is to get my health and fitness back,” Wilkinson wrote in the post. “And today, for the first time in three years, I planked - and managed three and a half minutes. “Pretty happy with that! “A bit to go to get back to my previous record of 6 minutes, but I’m getting there.” She included a bunch of emojis, including a winking face. The post come just a day after Ten were ordered to pay the additional costs. Justice Michael Lee last year dismissed Mr Lehrmann’s high-stakes lawsuit against Ten and Wilkinson after he found — on the civil standard of the balance of probabilities — that the former political staffer had raped Brittany Higgins inside Parliament House in March 2019. Mr Lehrmann sued Ten and journalist Lisa Wilkinson, claiming he had been defamed by a The Project interview in which Ms Higgins alleged she was raped by a colleague after a night out drinking in Canberra. Ten and Ms Wilkinson were at odds over her legal bill and how much the network should reimburse her after she hired outside counsel, prominent barrister Sue Chrysanthou SC, to defend her separately to the network during the trial. Ten had already paid $558,548 of Ms Wilkinson’s legal bill. She had initially sought $1.8m. And the remainder of her costs were examined by a referee. Justice Lee on Monday made an order in the Federal Court that Ten pay Ms Wilkinson an additional of $591,000 before March 19. It takes the total amount to be paid by Ten to its former start to $1.15m Justice Lee last year ordered that Mr Lehrmann pay Ten $2m, after finding in favour of the broadcaster. However, he noted there isn’t “any real likelihood” the former Liberal party staffer would be in a position to pay. The court was previously told Mr Lehrmann could be forced into bankruptcy if he couldn’t meet the costs order. Mr Lehrmann is appealing to the Full Court of the Federal Court, with the appeal to be heard later this year.