Minchin puts his hand up to pursue shadow comms role

By Ben Grubb on Dec 1, 2009 11:54 AM
Filed under Telco/ISP

Minchin's office says he'd like to continue to take the fight to Conroy.

Senator Nick Minchin, who stood down as shadow communications minister after disagreeing with Malcolm Turnbull's stance on emissions trading last week, is likely to put his hand up for the job again after a leadership spill saw his co-conspirator Tony Abbott elected as the Liberal Party's new leader today.

Tony Abbott was today announced the Liberal Party's new leader, following a leadership spill and a ballot in which he was elected by a winning margin of just one vote.

A spokesman for Senator Nick Minchin said he now expected a significant portfolio reshuffle within the Liberal party, as several MPs were due to retire at the next election.

Minchin's spokesman said that the Senator "thoroughly" enjoyed the communications porfoilio.

"Senator Minchin would certainly relish in the opportunity to continue to hold Senator Conroy to account," he said.

However, the spokesman said the new leader, Tony Abbott, would have the prerogative to reassign new portfolios as he saw fit.

"It'll probably be a couple of days before we have any idea about what that make-up would be," he said.

In a media statement Nick Minchin congratulated his colleague Tony Abbott.

"Tony is a man of decency, strong character and conviction who is extremely well equipped to unite the Opposition and to hold the Rudd the Government to account," Minchin said.

Minchin puts his hand up to pursue shadow comms role

14 comments in this discussion

"JimboJones while I greatly respect your opinion I must point out that the reference you referred to was written before the election of Tony Abbott. I believe we will see a gigantic turnaround in ..."

By sydneyla

Tags

senator, minchin, senator, conroy, tony, abbott, emissions, trading

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Comments: 14

Mordd Dec 1, 2009 8:15 PM	Aww crap, Abbott is now the opposition leader? Poor Malcolm, never thought id say this about a Liberal leader but I respect him for sticking to his guns on climate change, it sure felt surreal watching the libs tear themselves apart over a supposedly "left wing environmental" issue but damm if you didn't have to give Turnbull 10 points for guts at the very least, shame he lost by only 1 vote.
Slatts Dec 1, 2009 8:23 PM	Minchin wrote: "Tony is a man of decency, strong character and conviction who is extremely well equipped to unite the Opposition and to hold the Rudd the Government to account," Minchin said. Tony's a prick. He's burying the remains of the coalition. I suspect Bob Hawke got it right. He won't be there long
Borgscan Dec 1, 2009 9:09 PM	"He's burying the remains of the coalition." How sad for them. The Liberal's wouldn't have a chance without the coalition sharing votes. It just goes to suggest that Labor party is more popular because it can stand up on it's own.
Sams Dec 1, 2009 10:37 PM	There was a theory mentioned today that the reason Abbott got so many votes is because the others didn't want to see Hockey jump on the grenade instead of Abbott - they would rather see him rise to power in a safer situation, given that Abbott is sure to fail. I don't know if there is a shred of truth to it, but it cheers me up thinking about it.
bcmobile Dec 2, 2009 8:01 AM	Damn! With Abbott in charge and being an 'ultra conservative', can we expect that the Libs will push for even tighter control over our internet usage? If they start bowing to the christian lobby groups that will be the final nail in their self-made coffin!
JimboJones Dec 2, 2009 8:18 AM	I have said this before, but with Abbott now the head he will no doubt put that party back 20yrs. This man is what you would call a right wing bible bashing fanatic. His views on abortion, womans rights and gay marrage is nothing short or archaic. Google it to refresh your mem. As for Minchin, who knows, Abbott may give him a bit o more of a 'glam' portfolio like forgien affairs or something for his and that loon tuckky's support in outing Malcom. But in the end, who cares? These guys will be slaughted come next election and we could have the greens as the fed opp.
sydneyla Dec 2, 2009 9:49 AM	JimboJones you are BIG on misconceptions. The Polls will show a big jump for Abbott. Minchin will probably continue in the Broadband portfolio and rightly defend Australia's Telstra against the blackmail of the Rudd Government. Abbott will rightly question the 43 billion waste of the proposed NBN monopoly.
JimboJones Dec 2, 2009 11:54 AM	@sydney.. Are you on crack? We are talking about Aust. politics here? Its one thing to support the the Libs for their stand on the Telstra split - all power too ya! But its another thing to be completely delisional (or ignorant?) on how mainstream Australia view this man. (and the Libs atm for that fact) The trigger is set for a DD, if Rudd takes it or not, thats up to him.. But surfice to say, next election, we will have Labor govt. controlling both houses similiar to the time when Howard had it. Be it now, be it later, after the election, if the Lab govt is still fixed on doing this it will happen. As for your "The polls will show a big jump" rubbish, read this; http://news.ninemsn.com.au/national/977126/abbott-leadership-confidence-low-poll And I have without a doubt in my mind that the next newspoll or gal poll will show the exact same. Ignorance is bliss huh?
TruthSphere Dec 2, 2009 12:36 PM	Shows you how strong Howard was (don't get me wrong I didn't vote for him) the guy was the only thoroughbred in the party, everyone else seems useless, indecisive and divided. The Rudd government looks like it could go down in history and outdo the Howard government in sheer strength and unity. To bad that some government has the likes of Conroy in there...
TruthSphere Dec 2, 2009 12:39 PM	I HATE politics, it's filled with those who are good at public speaking and persuasion.....not intelligence and logic.
Slatts Dec 2, 2009 1:26 PM	many pollis (ok, not all) have much in common with many (once again, not all) professional sports-people. We like to watch them beat the crap out of each other from the side lines but if they came through our front gate we'd set the dogs on them.
Digger11 Dec 3, 2009 1:47 PM	I don't mind Conroy or Minchin. Both pretty solid operators. Thank god the liberals have blocked that ridiculous pre-Copenhagen, feather in the cap ETS promotion by Rudd. Why on earth Aussies would want a new tax introduced on us - before the reast of the world has even discussed the issues in Copenhagen is just unbelievable. It is so clear that Rudd is putting is own self-promotion so far ahead of the Aussie "working-family" that he needs to get his arse kicked in the next election so he can understand who he is working for. Slightly off-topic but Professor Garnaut summed it up beautifully in his CO2 white paper, along the lines of "Australia should reduce its emissions in proportion and at the same time as the rest of the world". I still have not seen any logic from either side (the global warming sceptics and the lefty tree-huggers) that even comes close to changing my mind that Porfessor Garnaut is spot on. We produce 1.7% roughly of the CO2 in the world - we should join in when the rest of the world decides to lower emissions, any sooner would be lead to total financial and economic ruin, any later would not be fair to the rest of the world. Rudd appears to want to ruin us - is he a total conecited fool ???
Sams Dec 3, 2009 4:04 PM	Please don't feed the resident troll.
sydneyla Dec 4, 2009 9:10 AM	JimboJones while I greatly respect your opinion I must point out that the reference you referred to was written before the election of Tony Abbott. I believe we will see a gigantic turnaround in the Polls when they are presented. I liked Mr Turnbull but he was not liked in the community. It is a different matter with Mr Abbott and I believe that his attack on Labor for its unpopular carbon tax and the proposed waste of 43 billion on a white elephant NBN will strike a winning chord with the Australian voter.