Really MICK? You are prepared to blame Husar's bullying and misuse of entitlements on the Liberals? Are you suggesting that if it wasn't for the Liberals that she would still be allowed to continue her bullying and rorting her entitlements? Are you supporting Foley's grubby actions? I recall you were quick off the blocks when Joyce erred without blaming anyone for outing him. As a matter of interest, MICK, he was outed by your nemesis, News Corp. Your union bosses will be proud of you MICK.

Whoa! You've excelled yourself with your misinformation, MICK. (I won't use the word "lies.) The current net debt as at July this year was $341 billion which is an increase of $166.5 billion, not the outrageous $600 trillion you claim. 

Unlike OLD MAN Mick we dont make excuses for the low lifes in the Australian Parliament.  Banks complained about being bullied during the knifing of Turnbull.  She was promised they would take action.  Which turned out to be no action.

You reap what you sow.  So much for the brightest and the best.  Time for an election.

Sorry, 4b2, I don't make excuses for any lowlifes, whether inside or outside a parliament.

OMG - Mick the Marxist is at it again.

Nick off Mick.

NaB your comment is a direct attack on a subscriber. If you haven't any constructive input on the subject at hand then please refain from personal attacks.

Whilst I agree with your comment, 1984, there is a very long list of people who frequent this forum who almost always revert to personal attacks when the facts stack up against their biased posts. It would be nigh on impossible to weed all of them out. I try to be constructive but others may not agree.

Looks like the trolls are back in force after manning the polls in the Victorian state election and angry they voters rolled them.  Suck it uo.

I'll stick with my OBSERVATIONS.  The Liberal Party is the party of dirty tricks, lies on steroids and gutter politics.  

Call me what you like but the timing of the dirt almost always coincides with impending elections.  This what you and your vile members do.  Perhaps we need elections to elect decent citizens rather than politicians who for the most part are damaged goods anyway.  But where would you giys go?  North Korea?  Russia?  Iran?  You'd all probably fit in well with these regimes.

Typical feminist loser

Didnt get her way, so she's had a dummy spit 

OM  -  its all in the timing mate.  You can run.  You can twist.  But the reality is that BEFORE an election the Labor dirt starts to flow.  Please tell me why Foley was not knifed much earlier as the allegations had apparently been circulating for some time?  Of yes...coincidence.  The same coincidence of GetUp being hacked 2 weeks before a federal election.  The same coincidence of Husar being nobbled 2 weeks before an important byelection?

You can spin this any way you like but genuine readers will see that the timing is no accident.  not repeatedly, or do you really expect people to believe it is coincidence?

Fake news baby he insinuated she was or had an affair with with the former know all from SA.  He deserves to be called a pig.

My only regret is the Labor party did not support him.  Weomen should support each other.

Since when is it "demeaning" to have an affair?

Since when is it "demeaning" to exchange recipes?

Furthermore I am not "baby"... learn some manners.

If women want equal rights..if women want to see changes..they stand and see it through..they do not run away..that's cowardly and demeaning..

Julia Banks was in the corporate world before she entered politics..do you know why she left the corporate world?

This is what Barry O’Sullivan said when he attacked senator Sarah Hanson-Young:

 "There's a bit of Nick Xenophon in her - and I don't mean that to be a double reference, but there's a bit of Nick Xenophon in her."

Just more slut shaming and boy’s club innuendo, which is continually aimed at Sarah Hanson-Young, so good on Richard Di Natalie for standing up to him. O’Sullivan was being a “pig”! 

Sophie

Not that I’m a fan, but Banks gave liberal a chance and like everything else they said they would address it. Bullying was her complaint. You know, like bullying we try to stop in schools, etc.  Nothing  

Some women are so hard on other women!  At least incorporate all the facts, not just what suits you. I think accusing someone in the Parliament of having an affair is disgusting behaviour, and it’s not the first time these guys have made disgusting comments. It’s not what I want them doing with their time.  

They say the culture discourages women from joining politics in the first place, so it reduces the number of quality candidates available (a point well proven by the coalition). 

Why do you even ask ‘if Women want equal rights?’.  Isn’t it accepted that a human being deserves the same rights as any other?  We acknowledge we have different strengths in different areas but ‘rights’ should be a given. 

Quote Sophie: “If more women put themselves forward..it stands to reason we shall have more to choose from.”

South Australian Liberal senator Lucy Gichuhi disagrees with you Sophie. She said:

"We have so many women in the directorship level. Why we don't get them to Canberra or to other state parliaments I don't know," she said. "But it must be just the way we do politics, just the way we pick our leaders. Something in [the] Liberal Party ... there's a bottleneck."

Well said Sophie and a sensible comment, I agree wholeheartedly the more women that register interest the more that will end up in parliament,

Kaz

I am a bit puzzled as to what "chance" Julia Banks gave the Liberals. If you go back to the beginning of Julia's political career..you'll see it was the Liberals who gave her a chance..who built her up and supported her..and..in return..she did not have the common decency to tell the PM what she planned to do. I am not a fan of Scott Morrison.. but he deserved that much..

I agree with you of course about the personal comments some male politicians make about women..not acceptable..so tell me please..if all these women abandon ship at the drop of a hat..how will any progress be made?

As for me..I am hard but fair I think to both men and women..and I will say it as I see it..

Thank you Jim..

Politics is tough for a man..let alone a woman unless she has a good family support system. I believe that is the real reason why many competent women hesitate to put themselves forward. In addition, who wants to fight a male/female battle in Parliament (if we believe what the ladies say) on a daily basis?

I think many thin skinned women exist in the house on the hill..prestige might be what they are looking for and when the going gets tough..they cry and whinge.. please stop the crying ladies..running away is not going to do it..stand and fight!

I can see a whole pile of gender nonesense come out of your post Sophie.

The reality is:

1.  women who get into parliament need to be able to stick up for themselves.  Running to the media is like the 5 year old who runs to the teacher and says she was pushed over to nobble some boy she does not like.

2.  the media needs to stop the "affair" storyline.  This is like the Royals.  It sells papers but if you turn on the TV you'll see this a mainstream behaviour these days.  No mention of that.  Even pronography seems to be allowable.  So why is any politician hounded because his relationship has broken down?  Is that not double standards ar what?

I'd like to see the media have some accountability and be held to malicious fake news which is political propaganda intended to destroy careers for no other reason than circulation or pushing a political dogma for a vested interest.  We seem to have lost the meaning of the words HONESTY and REALITY and allowed the media to run propaganda and detroy lives.  What sort of a society stands by and lets that sort of behaviour continue.

I am sorry MICK but I can't make head nor tail of your post. I suspect we may be on the same page..but I'm not quite sure due to the way you have worded it.

Anyway..Julia Banks in my opiion is a spineless person..not only has she betrayed women who are indeed earnestly fighting for women's rights..she has also sadly deceived those volunteers who worked tirelessly for her, thinking she was worth it.

Was going to put a link but The Australian won't let me.

True Franky 

Agreed.  She cried foul and then took her bat and ball and ran away.  How tough is that?

Interesting you claim "timing" OM.  Where attacks on Labor coincide with elections which are close timing seems not to be an issue with you.  Double standards maybe?

I agree with you about the demeaning comment with the photo, patti. I don't, however, agree that your "one size fits all" comment about having females as half the parliament because they are half of the population. When all occupations are equally shared by males and females then your call for a 50/50 parliament may make sense. The ACTU wants more females in the construction industry and wants special places made available for women. When it was pointed out that the teaching and nursing professions are dominated by females and special places should be set aside for males, the ACTU claimed that was different. Sorry, patti, you can't have equality for some just to suit your argument.

So what you are saying is that you were better than all or many of the males that you worked with throughout your life, was this self rated? I have often found that those who think they suffered because someone else got the job, were perhaps not as good as they thought they were, and that applied equally to males and females. In fact I can give comparisons, the secretary of a local council was given a memo regarding a new posting that was being advertised, the memo reminded the secretary that council had a policy of positive discrimination and that meant a women was required to fill this position, I thought this might be a one off unfortunately it wasn’t, there were other examples of positive discrimination for other groups, but strangely there were never any for white Anglo males, even though the area had high unemployment for that group.

Agree with you about those 3 women but in the interest of fairness I am led to ask: Can you identify any men who give male politicians a bad rap?

Of course, just watching Question Time is an embarrassment. 

One of the best comments I've seen on this topic.

May I just add , the focus (by voters as well as the politicians) on side issues such as this one, plus othe fashionable issues introduced by minority groups are in great part, the reason Australian politics are where they are now.

Top comment HD but you may want to add the islamic, aboriginal and refugee cards to the pack.  All of the above have been salt continually rubbed into the open wounds the media have engineered.

Life's like that Robi, unfair to some. The construction industry is 99% male, teaching is 84% female, nursing is 96% female. Why should a parliament have a quota when most other careers don't have. I want to see the best person doing the job, regardless of race, colour or gender.

Old Man, politicians represent us and 50% of us are women. There is no reason why we can’t have equal representation in other professions too, like teaching and nursing. Our world is changing Old Man, things don’t have to remain the way they have always been. This is one of the major problems the Libs have (that Labor doesn’t have) - protecting the men’s club and resisting change.

Yeah, those women are very fortunate to be in a men’s party, they should hold their tongues and be grateful, even when they are being bullied or overlooked for promotion. They should know their place!

NaB

You just named 3 women - does that tell you anything?  Any men you’d like to name? If you think about it, who would you like to represent you?  Those that cave to promises and donations, and do nothing, or those who have to upset the apple cart to get the truth out there?

I do agree with one thing - they should all be tossed, the whole party!

Any coalition blokes you want to stick it to?

Sorry Kaz don’t understand your comment, the only person I have taken a swipe at isn’t a politician, so what’s your point?

Do you not think resigning and shifting to the cross benches is a way of fighting? I think it makes a very powerful statement. It is very hard to bring about change in an entrenched system when you remain part of the system and part of the problem by virtue of your gender. The problem is that there are not enough women in the party so they are up against a large male power base; If they are bullied or otherwise demeaned and speak up about it they are hit with boy’s club mentality eg “if you can’t stand the heat get out of the kitchen” or labels of being a “wimp” or “princess”. Being a minority member of a party dominated by males who have a boy’s club mentality would make it very hard to fight from within. After Julia Banks made her first speech about the bullying problem, and other women supported her, she was vilified further, especially by the far right wing blokes in the party. She said:

“Often when good women call out or are subjected to bad behaviour, the reprisals, backlash and commentary portrays them as the bad ones; the liar, the troublemaker, the emotionally unstable or weak, or someone who should be silenced,” 

Sometimes, when up against an entrenched power system, one’s best option is to walk away. Banks felt let down by the Liberal Party and could not fight from within. However, she has made a powerful move which has got a most important conversation started. 

True colours Mick?  You’d fit right in the coalition

Well Robi, has she made a power full move, or has she deserted a sinking ship, there has been ample opportunity for these women to make these claims over many years, but many like Bishop have been happy to lap up the cream, but the minute things don’t go their way all the accusations come out, they want to take their ball and go, sounds like something a man might do, oh dear has equality come too far.

I'm not taking sides girls.  What I am saying is stop running and stand and fight.  If you want to achieve anything useful then you have to fight.  Got plenty of scares on that point most of which led to changes of one sort or another.  My better half always said 'let it go'.  As you can see from some of my posts I NEVER DO when I feel an injustice or dishonesty.

Please give credit where it is due rather than pour a woman's scorn on me for stating the facts.  As I said I take no sides in this but I just pointed out how this all looked.  Sorry if that offends you.  It shouldn't.