Richard Marles splits with Anthony Albanese over Scott Morrison’s Father’s Day trip

There is growing frustration among Labor MPs over Anthony ­Albanese’s refusal to call out Scott Morrison’s trip to Sydney to celebrate Father’s Day with his family.

Leader of the Opposition Anthony Albanese (left) and his Deputy Leader Richard Marles at Waurn Ponds Library in Geelong.

Deputy Labor leader Richard Marles has split with Anthony ­Albanese for the second time in a week after he attacked Scott Morrison’s decision to travel to ­Sydney to celebrate Father’s Day with his family.

The Opposition Leader refused to criticise the Prime Minister for the trip, despite his colleagues deriding the decision as “appalling judgement”.

Mr Albanese rattled off a number of issues he would happily criticise the Prime Minister over, but said his family was the point where he drew the line.

“There’s a whole range of things I’ll be critical of, but on matters of his family I never comment on those matters.

“That’s up to him, essentially. And I think that’s a good place to stay,” he told 4CA Cairns.

Illustration: Johannes Leak

Mr Marles took to Facebook to call-out the trip on Tuesday in a comment from his official page.

“I don’t think you can blame a father for wanting to see his children – any father would want to be with his kids on Father’s day if he could,” he wrote.

“The problem is that so many Australians can’t due to ­restrictions, and as usual it’s one set of rules for Scott and his Liberal mates and another for the rest of Australia.”

The Australian understands that there is frustration among federal Labor MPs over Mr ­Albanese’s refusal to call out Mr Morrison over the trip.

Last week, Mr Marles also split with Mr Albanese by calling out Annastacia Palaszczuk’s undermining of the national plan for ­living with Covid-19, saying “we need to be following the health advice” on dealing with the pandemic.

Mr Marles did not get the backing of Mr ­Albanese, who said the Queensland Premier was “doing a fantastic job”.

Mr Morrison defended the ­Father’s Day trip in an interview on Sky News on Tuesday, saying he understood the “frustration” some people felt about his trip but there was “a lot of misinformation” over the issue.

The Prime Minister had copped criticism after reports emerged that he had flown back to Sydney on Sunday to visit his family after receiving an exemption from the ACT chief health officer to re-enter Canberra, enabling him to avoid two weeks’ quarantine as is usually required.

With tens of thousands of Australians stuck overseas and ordinary Australians separated by ongoing border closures, Mr Morrison faced criticism for perceived double standards, with Bill Shorten saying he had exercised ­“appalling judgment”.

“I was a bit surprised when I read he had done this,” Mr Shorten told Today on Tuesday

“It’s not that he doesn’t deserve to see his kids but so does every other Australian.

“When your people are doing it tough, you’ve got to do it tough, too.”

Mr Morrison, however, described criticism from the opposition NDIS spokesman as “cheap politics”.