Christopher Pyne (Sturt, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Education, Apprenticeships and Training) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Mr Speaker, I have a question to you. During question time, I was ejected from the House for describing the Treasurer with the unparliamentary term of 'scumbag'. The Leader of the House, at the end of question time, described the opposition as 'morons', for which he was only asked to withdraw. I ask you to review that judgment for future purposes, because it appears to me that both of those terms are equally unparliamentary and the Leader of the House should have been expelled from the parliament for the same reasons that I was expelled from the parliament.

Peter Slipper (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I will not be reviewing my judgment. It is always a matter of context, and the Manager of Opposition Business was almost out before he uttered that unparliamentary term, which was the icing on the cake. The Leader of the House would have been treated exactly the same had his comment been the icing on the cake, but he had been relatively well behaved for a period beforehand.