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.
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Mr Brough and Mr Turnbull were determined to tough out the controversy, but Labor says it will continue grilling Mr Brough when Parliament resumed next year, and today referred him to the House of Representatives Privileges Committee on claims he misled the House.
“You can imagine my shock when Mr Brough completely changed his story in the 60 Minutes interview”.
“It’s time for Malcolm Turnbull to show some leadership, admit he got this wrong and sack Mal Brough”, Mr Shorten said.
On Tuesday he cast doubt on that admission, telling Parliament “what was put to air was not the full question”. He and Mr Turnbull may believe the matter will fade from voters’ minds over summer, but the opposition can be counted on to keep pursuing Mr Brough.
The AFP were looking for information on the sharing of notes from Mr Slipper’s parliamentary diary, which was allegedly copied by Mr Ashby, without authorisation, and sent to Mr Brough in March 2012. “Mr Speaker, my recollection of the interview was that the question was put to me in a somewhat disjointed manner, and I answered the question without clarifying precisely what part of the question I was responding to”.
“Mal Brough has been such a major figure in Australian politics for some time now, so I guess, he is quite a big scalp, in a way that Wyatt Roy is not so much”, Dr Cook said. “And I don’t think his explanation/clarification fools anyone”.
The federal opposition is seeking to pass a no-confidence motion in relation to minister Mal Brough.
“He has shown himself to be someone that can not even answer a straight question”, Mr Dreyfus said of the minister.
In question time, Mr Brough denied asking James Ashby, a former staffer to Mr Slipper, to procure copies of the then-Speaker’s diaries, despite having admitted the opposite on television.
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The criminal offence carries a two-year jail term. To add to the unhappy confusion, Mr Ashby claimed this week that it was Mr Roy, not Mr Brough, who told him to copy sections of the diary, and that this instruction had followed consultation between Mr Roy and Mr Pyne.
