Malcolm Turnbull handled the Barnaby Joyce affair badly and his ban on ministers having sex with members of their staff is risible, according to ‘soft voters’ in focus groups.
Barnaby Joyce, the larger-than-life politician, has always been a distinctive brand. But then his personal flaws and indulgences cost him all he’d worked and schemed for.
When he meets the US president this week, the prime minister will talk about the North Korean nuclear threat, the rise of China, and the rebranded Trans-Pacific Partnership.
Media reporting of the Barnaby Joyce affair would have been so much better if journalists had established substantial public-interest justifications before breaking the story.
As the crisis within the Coalition deepened, Barnaby Joyce held a news conference to respond to Malcolm Turnbull’s denunciation of his personal behaviour.
Banning relationships is likely to be ineffective and may result in disengagement, secrecy and resentment by employees of the encroachment of employment policies into genuinely private matters.
The appointment of ministerial advisers is based on a party-political network of patronage, where the primary consideration is loyalty to the political party – not merit.
Care needs to be taken in interpreting progress on closing the gaps between Indigenous and non-Indigenous Australians, and ascribing it to actual policy change.
While this Newspoll is Malcolm Turnbull’s 26th consecutive loss (four short of Tony Abbott’s streak), it is the Coalition’s best position since April 2017.