Word on Twitter is that Newspoll has the Coalition’s two-party lead out from 56-44 to 59-41, from primary votes of 27% for Labor (down two) and 51% for the Coalition (up three). But for a 26% result in the September 16-18 poll, this would be the lowest primary vote Labor had ever recorded since Newspoll commenced in 1985. The two-party figure ranks as the Gillard government’s equal worst result, along with the poll of September 2-4. Newspoll hasn’t always reported two-party preferred results, but my own calculations tell me there remain unbroken records from the respective honeymoon periods of Rudd (63-37 in February/March 2008) and Howard (60.5-39.5 in April 1996). Julia Gillard is up a point on disapproval to 63% and steady on approval at 28%, while Tony Abbott is down two on approval to 33% and up one on disapproval to 55%. Tony Abbott has widened the preferred prime minister lead he gained in the previous poll, from 41-39 to 41-36. As always, the sample for the poll was around 1150, with a margin of error of 3%.
My guess is that Pyne told Ashby that Brough would be a useful person for him to contact if he had concerns about Slipper.
Pure supposition, of course, but that’s my guess.
Same answer to all three questions: No, no, no, can’t recall, well yes, so what?
If there is a compelling response to ‘so what’, then “Boats!”
[Once is happestance, two is co-incicdence, three is enemy activity……………]
GG, i cant recall, but i was there as well
Labor and their supporters have won again today,
What’s that davidwh? The soft back pedalling of a soldier unwilling to die for the cause?
Anyone uncertain about abbotts involvement in this sordid conspiracy needs to talk to MKingston about abbotts actions pursuing onenation.
This doesn’t stink, it absolutely reeks.
shellbell
Fair enough
geezlouise
Abbott has form. Pauline Hanson and Cheryl Kernot can attest to that
[Nicola Roxon and US Equivalent. 24]
Once upon a time #OurABC would investigate & break news like Lewis/Asbhy/Pyne/Brough, that was once upon a time long long time ago #auspol
You normally can’t step onto Twitter without falling over an ABC journo tweeting away. Mysteriously none of them are around today.
Pyne, Ashby, Slipper, Brough …as Danny Lewis said the other day, there are a hundred fingerprints on this, and 100 of them belong to the Liberal-Nationals.
Probably documents to the effect if US claims you have pirated off to Gitmo you go.
questions should be put to michelle gratten and others
Do they still think there is nothing to this slipper scandal
Spur
And it only took our glorious meeja … how long to get there?. I mean, what was the first name (well, initials) to pop up on PB? MB? With AS? On the weekend (if I remember rightly) along with Utegate II?
Dio
[On the other hand, the gossip I hear is that he is a complete farkwit.]
And rumour doesn’t lie!
His electorate rolled him. No one wanted him – except the remnants of Howard’s gov, which thought (& still does) the sun shines out of his fundamental orifice: The Fed Libs couldn’t get Q electoral council to accept him; no Liberal anywhere in Oz, was prepared to resign in his favour.
OK, he thinks, I’ll grab preselection from Slipper … and so the well-worn (& never got anywhere or anything) was dusted off & the Feds alerted yet again. Then the LNP merger had a ‘grandfather clause’. Tough, MalB …
And so it goes, & so it goes, & so it goes: keep dusting off the same old 2003 sexual harrassment scandal, same old travel allowance rorts – and still nothing sticks to old Teflon Slipper … not in 2003, not in 2009, not so far in 2012 …
Flamin’ Libs can’t even devise a new Kill Slipper’s Career Cunning Plan. And people want them to run the Nation?
questions from media about to commence
The time-line’s a bit odd, though. Why would Pyne spend a couple of hours with Ashby, then ask for his email – which anyone in Parliament could have figured out anyway, seeing as they all follow the same format – via a third party? BTW, Slipper would have been the most obvious person to ask if you want Ashby’s email anyway. If it’s all above board, that is.
And what did Pyne do with the information, anyway? According to his account, he didn’t even use the email address, or pass it on.
It would certainly be worthwhile checking Brough’s email history – whether he emailed Ashby, and when. Somlyay too, I suppose.
Delay News 24 cuts away
Back here is Roxon
The way this scandal is unfolding, very soon people will be feeling sorry for Slipper and begin to rally around him. That’s about as a big a conspiracy cock up that anyone could achieve.
One of this nation’s few assassins, Eastman will be keeping the courts in the ACT, which are under enormous pressure as is, clogged until he serves his sentence/dies
[ A date has been set to clarify whether the ACT Supreme Court was right in disallowing David Harold Eastman a second inquiry into his murder conviction.
Eastman, 66, is serving a life sentence for the 1989 murder of Australian Federal Police assistant commissioner Colin Winchester after a jury found him guilty in 1995.
He has mounted several challenges to his conviction, including in the High Court.
Last month Eastman lost his latest Supreme Court appeal for a second inquiry into his conviction when the court ruled the law only allowed for one review under such circumstances.
The ACT Government says the Supreme Court may have misinterpreted the Crimes Act in disallowing another inquiry.
A hearing date has been set down for later this month to determine whether this was the case.
ACT Attorney-General Simon Corbell will be involved, presenting both sides of the argument to assist the court.]
Deeper spying ties.
geezlouise I just know from recent events in QLD that events can be shown in ways that seem very sinister but yet do not turn out that way in the end. Therefore I prefer to wait until there is more than just conjecture before jumping to conclusions.
As I said we need to see how the matters against Slipper play out and what further information comes out linking Ashby to people in the LNP and the extent of any links. It will play itself out in the fullness of time.
Increased Internet Monitoring
Would the Commonwealth, as co-respondent, request the presence of Messers Pyne and Brough for questioning? Could the Commonwealth, as co-respondent, subpoena documentation from Mr Pyne, Mr Ashby and Mr Brough?
If a criminal charge is laid, could the Commonwealth force Messers Pyne and Brough to the stand for cross-examination?
It will be interesting to see how Peta runs on the back foot – not real good I’d say.
US Napolitano mentions privacy.
shellbell
As you say, it is a dream run for the legal industry.
I wonder what it has cost in total so far?
Government front benchers getting out today:
Swan
Combet
Roxon
all with televised pressers
meanwhile, muckraking bottom feeders Abbott et al scurrying about denying consipracy to blacken The Speaker’s name.
Clare talking about the increased intelligence sharing.
@PeterSlipperMP Mr. Speaker SMH has made a claim that Mal Brough met up with your accuser. http://www.smh.com.au/opinion/political-news/brough-met-slippers-accuser-claim-20120504-1y3b6.html A statement in the House pls
Looks like NSW wants new elections for HSU East.
What happens if the same people get back in?
[“We will be introducing legislation next week to enable the appointment of administrator to the NSW assets, and the NSW management,” Mr Pearce told reporters in Sydney today.
“That administrator will be charged with having a new election as soon as it can occur.
“The main point is that the administrator in NSW will secure the assets, so there will be no more hanky panky, and the NSW administrator will ensure that the members are looked after, and their interests are considered.”]
http://www.adelaidenow.com.au/news/breaking-news/nsw-administrator-for-hsu-next-week/story-e6frea73-1226347017154
Presser done.
It’s just typical that I’ve been on an errand to find out the next court case of one Jeffrey Charles Geaney, the would-be JG Klller – while the story has been breaking about LNP fks up to it in their armpits in the Slipper affair!
Absolutely sucks. And totally predictable.
However, if you are interested.
shellbell advised me to ring Townsville Magistrates Court – as an interested spectator in the case.
After being shovelled from pillar to post, from court, to Townsville Police Prosecutions, to Cth DPP, and having to divulge my intimate details, and 10 phone calls later, I am pleased to announce I finally found out the next court appearance of the would-be-assassinator of our PM.
It’s May 28, 2012 at 9.30am in the Townsville Magistrates Court.
*buried in more topical stuff*
Diogs,
That’s what Kathy Jackson is aiming for.
Kezza2
Job well done!!
Diog
The “funny” thing with HSU East is that it is a NSW Union and A Federal Union under the guise of one industrial organisation. The NSW legislation may prove to be as useless as an ashtray on a motorbike – uncharted territory.
shellbell re my 6133
meant to say thanks for how to handle the inquiry.
they were all flabbergasted when I said I was just an interested member of the public – “spectator” didn’t go down too well.
thanks again.
As I said,
next court appearance is May 28, 2012 at 9am
hope you bookmark it!
The ABC is seriously damaging itself here. A raft of its supposedly credible political experts leapt in to pooh-pooh suggestions the Pyne Affair needed a deeper look when even on the most cursory look there were riduclous gaps in Pyne’s story, even the corrected version.
Now the SMH and to a lesser extent The Australian has started digging and it hasn’t taken long to get legally fireproof stories.
Still no mention on ABC online and far from having three or four people being paid to tweet basically the same things every other day there is apparently nobody on duty today from the national broadcaster and the managing director is tweeting rubbish about digital cameras.
Lyne Lady
[any chance abbott might have to leave port macquarie to take charge of the mess? wishful thinking….]
You would think Abbott would want to stay close to the Canberra action this weekend. Things are unravelling on Slippergate, it’s budget day on Tuesday, he must have a lot to do. He should be in his office or out meeting wth the troops, not prancing around Lyne in lycra. No sense of priorities at all, or maybe he’s hoping a few msm shots of himself on a bike will be a circuit breaker. As if!
If we are into conspiracy theories what about a reverse wedgie by Ashby and Slipper.
Both want to flit away into the sun but before they do they want some cumuppance and recompense from the LNP.
Ashby provides a notional grievance to the desparate Abbott via Pyne – they make sure they then involve every player in the plot including Lewis and Brough and then slowly drip feed chinese water torture style until the LNP explodes.
Is that enough conjecture for ya Bushie?
Davidwh, you display the patience of wisdom and the caution of experience but I suspect this is just a front as you wait to see how good the evidence destroying skills of the LNP are.
Waiting for ABC to mention “bombshell revelations ” in the Slipper case.
waiting….
waiting….
gough1
I did say the other day that Ashby might be a double agent!
vic
Ta! Told you, you should be employed in the PMs office.
You’ve a nose like a bloodhound
*meant in the nicest possible way*
Something the ABC has mentioned.
Jeremy Hernandez just said the governments RELENTLESS push to get a surplus.
[If we are into conspiracy theories what about a reverse wedgie by Ashby and Slipper.
Both want to flit away into the sun but before they do they want some cumuppance and recompense from the LNP.
]
it has crossed my conspiratorial mind that Slipper has set this whole thing up himslef. Ashby is the honey pot, but the stupid bears putting their fingers in are Brough, Pyne and Abbott.
vic,
His code name might be Deep Throat!
[Would the Commonwealth, as co-respondent, request the presence of Messers Pyne and Brough for questioning? Could the Commonwealth, as co-respondent, subpoena documentation from Mr Pyne, Mr Ashby and Mr Brough?
If a criminal charge is laid, could the Commonwealth force Messers Pyne and Brough to the stand for cross-examination?]
In civil, you can only bring to court the witnesses who help your case. If there is a trail which suggests Ashby has been influenced by others, you put that to Ashby in the witness box and you can argue that his failure to call the supposed influencers means the supposed influencers’ evidence does not help Ashby.
You can, but rarely, call people out of the blue. First you dont know what they are going to say and it might be bad for your case. Secondly you cannot cross-examine the witnesses you call except in rare circumstances.
Is the crime against Slipper or Ashby? Whichever one you only call the witnesses you have evidence from (there is always an exception) as a prosecutor.
Sneaking off to daughter’s netball now. Hopefully they can achieve more than one shot at goal this week.
Catch u later
@abcmarkscott Mr. Scott, when is #ABCNews & #ABCNews24 going to report on the new bombshell from SMH about Mal Brough http://www.smh.com.au/opinion/political-news/brough-met-slippers-accuser-claim-20120504-1y3b6.html
[His code name might be Deep Throat!]
No that is the 3rd person who is drip feeding Jessica Wright. 🙂