Mark Dreyfus (Isaacs, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Attorney General) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

My question is to the Special Minister of State. Yesterday the member for Fairfax said:

The member for Fisher stated to me that we needed to destroy Peter Slipper.

Given the minister is responsible for government integrity, were the minister's actions, in seeking to destroy the man he replaced, appropriate and in keeping with the standards he would enforce as a minister?

Tony Smith (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Just before I call the minister, I have listened very carefully, obviously, to all of these questions over the course of the week. It is fair to say that, whilst some of them have got very close to the line, they have made the connection with his ministerial responsibilities. My view is that it is out of order to refer to a statement that the member for Fairfax made in the MPI. It bears no relationship or connection, I should say, to the hook, if I can put it that way, that the member for Isaacs has been drawing—and that is the minister's previous answers and the statement he alluded to. I will give the member for Isaacs an opportunity to rephrase.

Mark Dreyfus (Isaacs, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Attorney General) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Thank you, Mr Speaker. My question is to the Special Minister of State. I refer to the minister's previous answers and previous references to the statement that he made. Given that the minister is responsible for government integrity, were the minister's actions appropriate and in keeping with the standards he would enforce as minister?

Mal Brough (Fisher, Liberal Party, Special Minister of State) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I say to the honourable member that integrity is uppermost in everything that I have ever done and it will always continue to be.

I refer the member to the comments by the member for Fairfax yesterday. They were so new that he made them at a press conference in Brisbane as the PUP leader in the lead-up to last election! He made all those allegations, and I answered them in full at that time. Furthermore, he then proceeded to take defamation actions against me. He subsequently withdrew those, informing the media that he was holding out 'an olive branch'. I have answered these queries, these allegations, in full in the past.