The Prime Minister, John Howard, has this afternoon been interrogated about the two crises besetting his government: the allegations and revelations about the “children overboard” story, and the allegations confronting the Governor-General.
For more than 30 minutes, Howard took a series of often aggressive questions from the Canberra press gallery. He refused to say he would seek the resignations of members of his staff, and defended the actions of his foreign policy advisor, Miles Jordana.
Last night, it was revealed that prior to last year’s election Mr. Jordana was in receipt of advice from the Defence Department that there were doubts about allegations of children thrown overboard from a refugee vessel.
Howard argued that the Speaker’s position was the one job that was decided by the party-room. He claimed that he was satisfied with being able to choose the ministry, the Senate leadership and the party Whips, but that he had only one vote in the party-room for the Speaker’s position.
The editorial says “Mr Howard should resist pressure to return Mr. Andrew to the chair in which he did not distinguish himself”.