The last Question Time of the year before the summer break, is being targeted by the Labor to double efforts to sack the Special Minister of State Mal Brough.
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Labor frontbenchers Doug Cameron and Jacinta Collins seized on the comment, saying it contradicted Senator Brandis’ insistence that he had no knowledge of the Jaffair beyond what he learned in the media.
“Never at any point did Mal Brough ask me for copies of those diaries”, Mr Ashby told Alan Jones on Radio 2GB on Tuesday.
Finance Minister Mathias Cormann said it had all been properly explained.
The leader of the house, Christopher Pyne, said Brough should be subject to proper due process, after the Australian federal police executed a search warrant on his Queensland home earlier this year.
“Guilt or innocence is not determined by public denunciation, here or anywhere else”, Mr Turnbull told parliament.
Mr Brough was central to Coalition’s efforts to discredit Mr Slipper, and he relied on a disaffected staffer of Mr Slipper’s, James Ashby, to provide the ammunition – in this case, claims that cab charge vouchers had been improperly used to pay for hire cars to visit Canberra region wineries.
Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull has previously said he supported Mr Brough, despite the ongoing police investigation.
Mr Dreyfus told ABC Radio that Mr Brough appeared to have “misled parliament” and “at the very least” should stand aside.
The Daily has approached Mal Brough’s office for a response today.
“I’m absolutely certain that if everything is as it’s been said, then Mr Brough will continue on”, Mr Joyce said.
A similar motion, and defeat, followed in Question Time the same day.
Mr Slipper’s resignation in 2012 was one of the more unedifying episodes of the 43rd Parliament, overlaid as it was by treachery, ambition, personal enmity and self-righteousness.
Mr Clare said it took Mr Abbott 32 days to get rid of Ms Bishop after the “helicopter scandal”.
“There are some issues, particularly around what James Ashby was asked to do, which, potentially, someone has been asked to commit a breach, if not of law, at least of morality”.
Electoral analyst William Bowe said next week’s polls would be interesting “for the first time in a while”.
Backbench MP Wyatt Roy has also been named as involved in the Slipper affair, but the ALP is probably unlikely to pursue him.
The issue is set to be debated again on Thursday, the final day of parliament for the year.
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“You can imagine my shock when Mr Brough completely changed his story in the 60 Minutes interview”.
