Partner questions aren’t just aimed at women
Julie Bishop’s in trouble for claiming travel expenses for her boyfriend. The Foreign Minister’s spokesman in The Age, yesterday:
They are not married or in a de facto relationship.
Ex-minister Sussan Ley defends Bishop on Sky News, yesterday:
Sometimes I wonder if Julie was a man and her partner was a man, if there’d be quite as much speculation.
Expense-claimers of a feather stick together? Samantha Maiden reports on Sky News, February 22:
Cabinet ministers accuse Barnaby Joyce of being a “hypocrite”. They say in leadership group meetings … considering the fate of Sussan Ley that Barnaby was ruthless, calling for her head and saying that she had to go … ministers including the Foreign Minister, Julie Bishop, were saying, “No. We need to have a process here and establish whether Sussan Ley had done anything wrong.”
We’re pretty sure men have been the subject of this exact same speculation. Barnaby Joyce speaking outside parliament, February 13:
It is without a shadow of a doubt that Vikki Campion is my partner now. But when she worked in my office, she was not my partner. When she worked in Matt Canavan’s office, she was not my partner.
The speculation kinda came up a lot.
Nationals MP Damian Drum on ABC Radio Melbourne, February 13:
There were rumours around the parliament that something was going on, but certainly at the time that Vikki came to work in my office my understanding was that it was no longer an ongoing affair.
But we must not criticise female ministers. Ley on Sky, continued:
She (Bishop) is a standard-bearer for women.
Talking of female ministers, Michaelia Cash seemed rather fond of Labor’s Doug Cameron at Senate
estimates, Wednesday:
Cash: Senator Cameron, you and I, we play tennis, we dance, we enjoy this.
Cameron: I don’t play tennis.
Things have got a bit chilly in the past 24 hours. Cash speaking in estimates, yesterday:
Doug Cameron, Senator Doug Cameron, is nothing more and nothing less than a bully and that was on display yesterday.
And the first woman to run DFAT discusses George Brandis’s appointment to London. Frances Adamson in Senate estimates, yesterday:
Strong leadership skills, a keen interest, a quick mind, a broad knowledge of the issues … they need to be able to operate at the highest levels. They need to be able to command the trust of the assenting government …
Brandis’s old foe, Labor Senate leader Penny Wong, responds:
Wong: Does that include an excessive desire to correct people’s grammar?
Adamson: I can’t comment, Senator.
That’s a bit unfair. Usually Brandis is the one who gets corrected for the way he talks. The Senate, October 17 last year:
Richard Di Natale: My name is Di Na-ta-le, not Di Na-tar-lay ...
Brandis: I mean no offence, Senator Di Natale, that’s just the way I pronounce the English language.
Finally, Labor’s Kimberley Kitching asks a silly question of Defence Minister Marise Payne. Senate estimates, yesterday:
Kitching: Were you tapped on the shoulder to become ambassador to NATO?
Payne: Evidently not.