PARLIAMENT OF AUSTRALIA 2023: a short tale of Kevin and his misleading prop

 

The moment Deputy Manager of Opposition Business & Nationals MP for Page Kevin Hogan shamed the rank and file of his party, shamed the people of his electorate and deeply shamed himself.

Kevin Hogan MP at 2:44pm during House of Representatives scheduled Question Time on 8 August 2023. Snapshot from official parliamentary digital live broadcast.

House of Representatives, Hansard, on Tuesday 8 August 2023 at the point Mr. Hogan deliberately and knowingly misrepresented the pages he held in his hand:

The SPEAKER: I'll hear from the member for Page, who is seeking leave.

Mr Hogan: I thank the Prime Minister for earlier tabling page 1 of the document, Uluru Statement from the

Heart. I seek leave to table the full 26-page document, Uluru Statement from the Heart.

The SPEAKER: Is leave granted?

Mr Burke: Leave is not granted.

The SPEAKER: The member for Page will put away his prop.

How do I know that what he held in his hand was not the Uluru Statement From The Heart?

Original Uluru Statement from the Heart. IMAGE: J-Wire, 6 March 2019

Because it is a very specific document created in keeping with the tradition of the Yirrkala bark petitions and the Barunga statement, the Uluru Statement From the Heart was made in the form of a work of art on canvas which in this instance included approx. 444 words in the text. It was signed by over 250 First Nations people representing approx.1,200 delegates who participated in the regional dialogues and conferences which reached consensus, with 100 signatures including the name of their nation. The artwork was painted by Maruku artist and Uluru traditional owner Rene Kulitja and Mutitjulu artists Christine Brumby, Charmaine Kulitja and Happy Reid [The Monthly, May 2019].

What Hogan knowingly held in his hand appeared to be an extract from a 112 page compilation document created with a "3/8/23, 1:10:26 PM" date stamp, which contains copies of the records of many of the regional dialogues as well as a document which includes "Our Story" & a plain text transcript of the wording on the original signed Uluru Statement From The Heart canvas.

A best he perpetrated an infantile stunt that day, at worst he attempted to both mislead the Parliament and the Australian people.

Has Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison lost the confidence of his parliamentary party and its coalition partner?

Since late October 2021 the issue of Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison's leadership, personal integrity and the quality of his decision making has quickly moved past the rumour mongering, onto the international stage and into both Houses of the Australian Parliament. 

The voting public were also beginning to show their disapproval.

The Conversation, 15 November 2021:

52% (up two) were dissatisfied with Scott Morrison’s performance, and 44% (down two) were satisfied, for a net approval of -8, down four points. This continues Morrison’s slump from his pandemic highs. Six months ago, Morrison’s net approval in Newspoll was +20, and last November his net approval was +36.

Members of his own backbench have gone from muttering their discontent from behind closed doors, to actively backgrounding against him and, onto openly defying him inside and outside of the Parliament. 

7am Podcast, 19 November 2021: 

The federal Coalition government holds office by the barest of margins - just one seat. Now, a popular and high profile Liberal incumbent has announced he won’t be recontesting his electorate, throwing the party’s election preparations into jeopardy. Today, Paul Bongiorno on why the Liberal MP abandoning Scott Morrison thinks Anthony Albanese might be a better Prime Minister for the country. 

John Alexander Liberal MP for Bennelong had recently announced he is not standing at the 2022 federal election. He is understood to be tired of partisan politics where winning is everything but good policy in the national interest runs a poor last. Unnamed parliamentary colleagues are saying that privately Alexander is scathing of the leadership of the government of Scott Morrison, Josh Frydenberg and Barnaby Joyce, believing they put the government’s self-interest above everything. 

Full audio here.

On 21 November 2021 @KafkaVoltaire released this summary of a 'backgrounding' he received from two sitting LNP MPs:

On 22 November, the first day sitting day of the short period before Parliament goes into recess until 2022 saw the Prime Minister publicly caught out knowingly misleading the House and, in the Senate members of his government were openly threatening him with political mayhem when five Coalition senators crossed the floor to vote for a bill banning mandatory COVID-19 vaccinations. 

By 23 November the news cycle was beginning to put his feet to the fire....

The Hawaii holiday is one headache, but Scott Morrison has bigger problems in the Parliament. @latingle reports. #abc730 pic.twitter.com/iomrKI6yf1

— abc730 (@abc730) November 23, 2021

There is now speculation that Scott Morrison might be forced to change his preferred election date to March 2022 in order to block fellow Liberal and Minister for Defence Peter Dutton's ambitions to become prime minister.