South Coast MP Shelley Hancock was at the centre of chaos in Parliament on Thursday evening, calling several Labor MPs “idiots”, "blockheads" and "boofheads" during question time.
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The comments came from Mrs Hancock, who is speaker of the house, during debate over Opposition Leader Luke Foley's budget reply speech.
“You can all cluster out there and have a little bitch session, I don’t care,” Mrs Hancock said after ejecting five Labor MPs from the house.
After being accused of bringing the parliament into “disrepute”, Mrs Hancock said the only thing bringing the house into disrepute was the behavior of the Opposition.
Following the Thursday, June 21, question time behaviour, Deputy Opposition leader Michael Daley questioned Mrs Hancock’s position.
He said 263 Opposition MPs had been ejected from the house by the Speaker throughout her eight years in the job.
“By contrast, not one Liberal or National MP has been ejected from the House in that time, proof, were it needed, of the Speaker’s partisan approach to a role that is meant to be above politics,” Mr Daley said.
Mrs Hancock was approached for comment but was yet to respond.
However, her close friend Kiama MP Gareth Ward leapt to her defence, saying Mrs Hancock, the first female Speaker of the parliament, constantly battled “total disrespect” and “appalling behaviour”.
"The Opposition ask a question only to immediately start interjecting on the answer,” he said.
"If you could hear some of the comments coming from the Opposition towards the speaker - members of the community would be rightly appalled.
"Every time her authority has been challenged in any formal vote on the the floow of the house, the entire cross bench, independents and Greens have supported her against the worst of the Labor Party's games."
Mr Daley described Mrs Hancock’s actions as speaker as “partisan and one-sided”.
“The role of the Speaker is to maintain order in the House and uphold the civility of Parliament but the rank hypocrisy is that she is the number one offender,” he said.
“She is not fit for the office of Speaker.”