Peter Slipper - New Speaker of the House

Peter Slipper takes over

Tony Abbott was taken by complete surprise yesterday when he realized that Julia Gillard had done a deal that would keep him further away from his goal of becoming Prime Minister. She manoeuvred a Liberal turncoat, Peter Slipper, into the position of Speaker and now the government has the prospect of 76 votes to the Opposition’s 73, previously the ratio was 75-74.

The government now needs only three cross-benchers to pass legislation, instead of four. It seems there was some angst about Craig Thomson being found guilty of paying for prostitutes and other expenses with his union credit card and if found guilty, he would be forced to resign.

Peter Slipper has a reputation of using his parliamentary entitlements to the max and was caught out lying when he made claims of $20,000 which he had to pay back. Yesterday in his acceptance speech, he admitted that he had past ‘transgressions’ and as one politician said yesterday, “They don’t call him Slippery Pete for nothing”.

In March he took his wife on a “study” tour of Europe that cost $25,000. His Queensland constituents were so outraged by his spending habits, they signed a petition calling for a full audit of his expenses which was tabled in parliament in September. The Dept of Finance is seriously thinking of launching an audit of his entitlement claims over the past 10 years.

Popular with everyone, Speaker Harry Jenkins resigns

The move also reduces the danger of Andrew Wilkie being able to threaten the government’s survival if they can’t deliver his poker machine reform. But after a meeting with Julia Gillard, Wilkie said “The government is not so foolish as to think they could burn me because they know they may need me for any number of reasons” he said. How true.

But the thing that everyone wants to know is why did Harry Jenkins suddenly decide to leave? Rumour has it that he loved his job and his salary will now drop from $245,000 to $168,000 and you have to wonder why he would willingly take such a backward step. At one stage in his departure speech yesterday, he became so emotional, he could hardly speak and his reason for leaving - to become more involved in Labor Party policy making - just didn’t add up. So did he sacrifice himself for the good of the party?

Last week Peter Slipper made a fatal error, he invited Kevin Rudd to a function in his electorate rather than attend a function with the long-serving former Liberal Prime Minister, John Howard. Complaints against him were discussed at a meeting of the state executive on Wednesday and it's pretty clear that he jumped before he was pushed.

So is the new speaker intimidated in any way by the bad feeling that surrounds him? Not in the least. He demonstrated that he is well up to the job, booting out 4 Liberal ministers for unruly behaviour not long after taking over. This man must have the hide of an elephant.