Chris Bowen (McMahon, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Climate Change and Energy) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Today the member for Hughes has done what the Prime Minister didn't have the courage to do and sacked himself from the Liberal Party. Let us never forget that when a good local member like Jane Prentice was under challenge for her preselection this Prime Minister sat on his hands, but when the member for Hughes was under challenge it was all hands on deck. When the member for Hughes was engaging in Nazi slurs on the Premier of Victoria, the Prime Minister was silent. When the member for Hughes was insulting the Cambodian community and comparing the World Economic Forum to Pol Pot's genocide, the Prime Minister was silent. When the member for Hughes was accusing our hardworking scientists at the Bureau of Meteorology of doctoring temperatures, the Prime Minister was silent. When the member for Hughes was accusing the chief medical officer and the TGA of crimes against humanity, did the Prime Minister defend them? No, he was silent.

The Prime Minister has ignored the member for Hughes until pressure from this side of politics made him recant, but the Prime Minister was prepared to accept this man's vote within the Liberal party room until 11 o'clock today. The Prime Minister still didn't act; it was the member for Hughes who acted. It was the member for Hughes who sacked himself and who had the courage to do what this Prime Minister has declined to do for too long. The standard you walk past is the standard you accept, and this Prime Minister walks past a hell of a lot.