The Nationals’ meltdown has been triggered by the forced resignation of Bridget McKenzie, and while only a new deputy needed to be elected, Joyce has seized the opportunity to make his leadership run.
I’d hoped to keep my absence nice and private, especially from those quiet Australians fighting fires. Regrettably, despite best efforts, my press office wasn’t able to keep a lid on the story.
Minister David Littleproud on bushfires, drought, and the Nationals
The Conversation, CC BY49.3 MB(download)
In this podcast, David Littleproud says "as elected officials, we've got a responsibility" to wait for the right time to talk about the link between climate change and the ongoing bushfires.
Fire officials warn that this week’s catastrophic fire conditions are “where people die”. Climate change has arrived, and politicians should drop the meaningless rhetoric.
Speaking with The Conversation’s politics podcast, McCormack said in hindsight, it would have been better to have told Nationals who’d been agitating for the code that negotiations were underway.
Deputy PM Michael McCormack on the drought and restive Nationals
The Conversation, CC BY33.7 MB(download)
Following tensions in the Nationals party room over the bring-forward of the dairy code for Pauline Hanson, the Deputy PM admits that the party leadership mishandled the situation.
Following similar comments by Deputy Prime Minister Michael McCormack, a senator has called for the ABC to sell its Ultimo headquarters and move to the suburbs and regional centres.
One of the Nationals’ key KPIs for McCormack has been that he must successfully pressure Morrison for the government to underwrite coal-fired generation.
McCormack must live in a parallel universe if he ever thought Broad’s account of flying off on an overseas date, followed by an apparent move to extract money from him, was just “a personal matter”.
There’s a fine line between being out and about and canvassing. Just being visible is all that’s needed at this stage of a bid. And Joyce doesn’t hide his ambitions for a return.
Deputy Prime Minister Michael McCormack has suggested changing the rules to allow ‘environmental’ water to be diverted to drought-hit farms. But the idea would be far less straightforward in practice.
From Morrison’s point of view, McCormack’s imagery was totally out of whack with his desired framing. Even within the Nationals there is some criticism of the leader for being inept.
Barnaby Joyce had a long history of opposing climate action. His successor Michael McCormack seems to think the same way, despite climate being a growing threat to the Nationals’ rural voters.
As the National Party looks to rebuild under a new leader, it needs to embrace its minority status, establish clearly what it stands for, and remain true to those ideals.