This is what Tony Abbott had to say in June 2009:
Let us be absolutely upfront about this. The greatest political crime that a member of this parliament can commit is to mislead this House. A member of parliament can maladminister a portfolio. A member of parliament can squander billions of dollars. A member of parliament can run naked down George Street and survive. But a member of parliament cannot mislead this place and survive. Any member of parliament who misleads this House must resign, if he or she has any integrity, or must be forced to resign, if the party leader has any integrity. That is the point here.
The issue isn’t important. But his message was. I agree with him, by the way.
Now let’s jump forward to July 2015:
Prime Minister Tony Abbott’s office knew Foreign Minister Julie Bishop had misled Parliament about Sydney siege gunman Man Haron Monis three days before the government eventually owned up to the mistake.
The delay in correcting the parliamentary record until the end of a sitting fortnight meant the government faced no scrutiny in question time over its handling of the case.
The newly released, heavily redacted documents show Mr Abbott’s office knew Ms Bishop had relied on false evidence to defuse Labor’s line of attack about why the letter from Monis to Attorney-General George Brandis had not been taken seriously.
What more can I say, other than “Tony, where are you?”
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