Anthony Albanese calls for Barnaby Joyce to be sacked after comments likening ballot papers to bullets

Prime Minister Anthony Albanese says Nationals frontbencher Barnaby Joyce should be sacked for comments he made at the weekend in which he urged people to use ballot papers like bullets.

At a rally against wind turbines held in Lake Illawarra Joyce told the crowd their “greatest weapon” to oppose the turbines was to “turn up in numbers in Canberra and Sydney”.

“And the bullet you have is that little piece of paper and it goes in that magazine called the voting box, and it’s coming up,” Joyce said in a recording obtained by The Illawarra Mercury.

Barnaby Joyce has apologised for comments made at an anti wind turbine rally.Credit: Alex Ellinghausen

“Get ready to load that magazine,” Joyce told the crowd.

“Go goodbye Chris, goodbye Stephen, goodbye Albo. And when they see that, they’ll let you in their office for a meeting.”

Joyce’s comments referred to Energy Minister Chris Bowen, local MP Stephen Jones and Prime Minister Anthony Albanese.

Joyce apologised for the comments on Monday morning.

“I apologise for using that metaphor,” he said on Channel 7.

But the prime minister said Opposition Leader Peter Dutton should sack Joyce from his position in the shadow ministry.

“Peter Dutton has not distanced himself from it. He has .… not condemned it, he has not taken any action against Barnaby Joyce so I am not sure what Barnaby Joyce has to do to lose his job,” Albanese said on ABC television on Monday afternoon.

“To talk about any Australian [like that] would have been inappropriate, let alone at a time when we have seen a rise in the number of threats made to people as part of the political process gone wrong. We know that in the United States, we have seen a polarisation, we have seen the attempted assassination of former president Trump, we have seen UK members of parliament lose their lives.”

Dutton did not comment on the incident on Monday. Deputy Liberal leader Sussan Ley said she would not have used the same language but declined to rebuke Joyce.

“When it comes to promoting social cohesion, everyone in their language and their words should be lifting the debate to what brings people together, not what pushes people apart, and I think all of us do that,” Ley said.

“So by focusing and trying to interrogate individual comments at different times, I don’t think that’s particularly helpful.”

The prime minister also talked up his revamped front bench following a swearing in ceremony at Government House in Canberra.

“You’ve had dysfunction on the other side, what you’ve had with this Labor government is stability, order, consistency going forward,” he said.

Albanese described the reshuffle as “minor” and caused by the resignations of Linda Burney, Brendan O’Connor and Carol Brown.

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