MP Kevin Andrews says quotes about leadership challenge were ‘taken out of context’

WAS Kevin Andrews “taken out of context” when he told Leader he could challenge for the leadership again? Listen to the audio and judge for yourself.

Defence Minister Kevin Andrews and Communications Minister Malcolm Turnbull during Question Time in the House of Representatives, Federal Parliament, Canberra.

KEVIN Andrews’ has today played down comments about his aspirations for his party’s leadership after earlier telling Manningham Leader he would challenge “if circumstances arose”.

In a wideranging interview with the Leader, the Menzies federal Liberal MP shed light on his work in the electorate, his past disappointments and the circumstances under which he would return to the front bench.

But speaking to reporters today, Mr Andrews claimed his quotes in the Leader had been taken out of context.

“Oh look, I spoke to a local journalist a few weeks ago, he asked me about the past challenges and things like that and a hypothetical question to which I have a hypothetical answer,” he said.

“But the reality is that Mr Turnbull is the Prime Minister, he will lead us to the next election and I expect we will win the next election.”

Mr Andrews also told Nine News that the story was “taken out of context”.

An unedited transcript of the audio shows the “hypothetical question” was about whether Mr Andrews had current leadership ambitions after earlier challenging twice, once for the deputy leadership and once for the leadership.

“Look, it has never been my sort of burning ambition to be the leader of the party,” he said.

“But if circumstance arose, which they did in both instances where I thought there should be a change or there should be a contest, I am prepared to do it.”

In his response addressing his challenge for the deputy leadership last year, Mr Andrews also detailed how a further leadership challenge would work.

“I made that decision (to challenge for the deputy leadership) in the sort of spur of the moment because it just came up. So I thought there should be a contest, people should be able to decide who they want,” he said.

“So that’s probably more likely how it, if it was ever to come up again, it would be more like that, rather than me setting out and saying I want to be the Prime Minister or something.”