Clive Palmer (Fairfax, Palmer United Party) Share this | Hansard source

The member for Fisher told me that he would call a meeting of the Liberal Party executive on the Thursday night and bring the president of the Liberal Party of Australia, Alan Stockdale, up from Victoria to attend the meeting and kill the merger if I did not guarantee that he could be president of the LNP. And a motion was passed at the state executive meeting on the Thursday not to allow Liberal members to attend the meeting on the Saturday and vote. On the Friday night I funded a challenge in the Supreme Court of Queensland to overturn the motion of the member for Fisher, and the Supreme Court of Queensland ordered that the meeting go ahead in spite of any opposition of the Liberal Party. Members of the Nationals and the Liberal Party would be free to vote in our democracy, free to have their say.

I can still here the boos the member for Fisher received that Saturday, on a crisp morning, when he arrived very, very red faced after the Supreme Court said that he had to come to the meeting. I nominated Bruce McIver for the presidency of the LNP, and he was elected with acclamation. The member for Fisher, with his tail between his legs, got out of town. He went down to Victoria with Alan Stockdale. He was promised that he would be the member for Higgins, but it never happened. He returned to Queensland to eat humble pie: the member for Fisher should be Prime Minister. You ask him; he would tell you at the time.

When he did the things he did, now subject to a police investigation, the member for Fisher was very desperate. He should step aside as minister while this investigation is on. Integrity of this House and this government should be maintained. (Time expired)

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