Slippery Pete and Co. slip up
ATTEMPTS by Peter Slipper and ministers to label the behaviour of James Ashby part of a criminal conspiracy have backfired.
A federal court judge has said because of the claims, he can no longer force Mr Ashby to file a response to allegations of abuse of process for fear of incriminating himself.
Grubby tactics by Slipper, Labor MP Anthony Albanese, and of all people the Attorny General Nicola Roxon; Federal Court Justice Steven Rares to Slipper’s lawyer (my emphasis):
“You have raised the stakes, now in raising the stakes you cannot just pull back a bit . . . You don’t know how somebody might use that information in a criminal investigation. [Ashby] does not have to give his name if he is involved in and suspected of a crime . . . If we do not uphold those rights in our society we live in a police state.“
And to think Labor installed this bloke as Speaker of the House, a man now accused of sexually harrassing a male staffer many years his junior, and a man who is resorting – with help from his Labor mates – to some pretty low-life tactics. Yeck!
UPDATE
What does the Age run with? They’re still running with the prospect of Ashby being charged. Not a whiff of the pile of excrement Labor and Slipper have thrown.
*sigh*
UPDATE
Sinclair Davidson at Catallaxy Files:
Ouch. The government had been hoping to portray the whole thing as some kind of conspiracy and get the case thrown out of court.
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