Labor knows what it feels like to have a "rat" in the ranks. Mal Colston was a man totally destroyed by his colleagues for defecting to the other side and Peter Slipper needs to watch his back. He has something in common with Colston - he also lied about his parliamentary entitlements.
When Mal Colston felt slighted about being passed over for deputy presidency of the Senate, he defected to the Coalition. Labor members were furious and went for the jugular. Veteran Victorian senator Robert Ray said “Anyone who rats on the Labor Party will get exactly what this quisling Quasimodo from Queensland got.”
Senator John Faulkner also had his two bob’s worth ''I want to speak about someone who is venal, I want to speak about someone who is unscrupulous, I want to speak about someone who is mercenary, I want to speak about someone who is contemptible and despicable, I want to speak about someone who is the most useless and abominable representative the federal Parliament has ever seen. That person is a person who last night skulked into this chamber, slimed into the chamber quite slowly to collect his travel allowance cheque.”
The gossip has already started and only Harry Jenkins can stop it. Rumours abound, among them is the theory that Harry took a sizeable drop in salary for the good of his party but will be compensated and looked after, possibly in the same way they looked after Kim Beazley. The government says that the first time they knew about Harry’s intention to leave was on that very morning and if this is true, he should say so.
Another theory is that Jenkins was tired of criticism from his Labor colleagues and was stung by the dressing down Cream gave him a few months ago. Come on Harry, give us the drum.
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