During the Prime Minister’s Budget announcement, Member for Chisholm, Ms Julia Banks MP, told Parliament that she would be resigning from the Liberal Party and moving to the crossbench for the remainder of the 45th Parliament.
Citing the leadership spill and the treatment of women in Parliament as contributing factors to her decision, Ms Banks stated that ‘equal representation of men and women in this Parliament is an urgent imperative that will create a culture change… there is a blinkered rejection of quotas and support of the merit myth, but tis is more than a numbers game’.
Former Liberal Party deputy leader and minister, the Hon Julie Bishop MP, commented that Ms Banks was ‘a strong, sensible centre female politician in our party, but I’m sure knowing her as well as I do, she would have thought long and hard about how she could best serve the interests of her electorate’.
This move further increases the power of the crossbench, now made up of seven independents, and reduces the votes of the Morrison Government to 73. Labor can thus gain a majority of 76 votes if it has the support of all seven independent members?—?an important factor for any motions Labor may seek to move (or oppose) in relation to the Government’s agenda.
Despite speculation earlier in the week, Liberal Member for Hughes, Mr Craig Kelly MP, seemed to rule out rumours that he too would be moving to the crossbench, due to the delay of his pre-selection for the seat of Hughes.
‘I have a contract with the people of Hughes… I entered into a contract to serve through this term as a Liberal member and that is what I’m proud to do’, said Mr Kelly.
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