Saturday, February 14, 2015

Bully-boy Abbott leadership style continues

Former Liberal Prime Minister Malcolm Fraser spoke out this morning in support of HRC president Ms Triggs, saying Mr Abbott had handled the report very badly.

"If the Government had wanted to handle the matter sensibly, they would have said they recognise there have been abuses," he told AM.

"[They would have said] they will examine those abuses and have been, indeed, since they got the report in November - which, obviously, they haven't been - and they would have thanked the Commission for its work and said, 'we've got to get children out of detention as soon as possible'."

"Now, instead of doing that, they've chosen to attack the commission as a body and to attack the chairperson in particular, which I think is outrageous. I know Gillian Triggs. She's a very good, distinguished lawyer," he said.

Mr Fraser denied suggestions Ms Triggs had a political agenda or that the commission had a case to answer.

Human Rights Commission president Gillian Triggs.

"Absolutely not. She is fulfilling the charter laid out in the legislation," he said.

"I actually believe that, when this dies over, which it will do, that the people who are going to be damaged by the whole incident are the people in the Government and the Prime Minister in particular, because the Commission's reputation stands high amongst sorts of people. 

"The chairperson's reputation stands high. And if criticism is to carry any weight, you've got to have some opinion of the person uttering it."

Mr Fraser said the response from Mr Abbott to the report showed he had not changed his "bully-boy" leadership style since the spill motion last week.

"The Prime Minister has got his back to the wall," Mr Fraser said.

"He's just survived a near rebellion from his own backbench and he has demonstrated, since then that ... he has not changed; he has not learnt; he has behaved in the same bully-boy fashion, which is a reputation that has haunted him since long before he was Prime Minister.

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