Prime minister Anthony Albanese says Barnaby Joyce should be sacked from shadow cabinet after the National party MP likened ballot papers to “bullets” during a protest against wind turbines.
Speaking to an anti-renewables rally at Lake Illawarra south of Sydney on Sunday, Joyce compared ballot papers to bullets and urged the crowd to “load that magazine” at the voting booth against the prime minister, Anthony Albanese, and the energy minister, Chris Bowen.
“And the bullet you have is that little piece of paper and it goes in their magazine called the voting box and it’s coming up,” he said in footage of the rally shown on the Seven network.
“Get ready to load that magazine. Goodbye, Chris. Goodbye, Albo.”
Joyce, the shadow minister for veterans’ affairs, apologised on Monday morning, but Albanese said the comments were beyond the pale and needed action from Coalition leader Peter Dutton.
“Peter Dutton has had four [shadow ministry] reshuffles – he should have a fifth and Barnaby Joyce should go,” Albanese said in an interview with Sky News.
“This is the sort of language which has no place in any part of Australian society, let alone in public life. And here you have a guy going to a rally calling for action, using analogies of guns, bullets, magazines, and goodbye to three members of the government. What does this bloke have to do to lose his job?”
Bowen said he had not received a personal apology or explanation from Joyce and believed that Joyce’s resignation from the shadow ministry “would be the appropriate course of action”.
“The fact that Mr Joyce thought that such language could be acceptable in any circumstances reflects on his judgement and his character,” Bowen said.
“In an era of violence and tension, it is incumbent on all political leaders to keep their language within civil and non violent norms.”
Joyce was asked about the comments during his regular appearance on the Seven network breakfast show, Sunrise, on Monday. At first the former Nationals leader defended his use of the metaphor.
“The ballot paper is the weapon you have – it shouldn’t be a bullet, it should be a ballot paper and the ballot box,” he said on Monday morning, before continuing to criticise wind turbines.
“It is like saying the fertilising capacity and the beauty of dog turd on your lawn in the middle of the morning works as well. [It’s] absolutely disgusting. Nobody wants them.”
Pressed on the use of the word “bullet” in the wake of the assassination attempt of former US president Donald Trump, Joyce again fell back on the metaphor.
“I said ballot paper and ballot box. That’s what people should be using … People don’t like these wind turds out in the ocean or all over the environment.”
It was only after his sparring guest on the show, Labor MP Bill Shorten, told him that the “smartest call here would be just to apologise for using that metaphor because we’ve had the Donald Trump assassination” that Joyce did.
“Here we go. I apologise for using that metaphor,” he said.
The deputy Liberal leader, Sussan Ley, rebuked her Coalition colleague in a separate interview, saying it was not “language I would have used”, but said she wouldn’t go as far as condemning it.
“Barnaby, as we know, does use colourful language, but I haven’t seen the comments in the entire context,” she said.
“But when it comes to promoting social cohesion, everyone in their language and their words should be lifting the debate to what brings people together, not what pushes people apart, and I think all of us do that.
“So, by focusing and trying to interrogate individual comments at different times, I don’t think that’s particularly helpful.”
Health minister Mark Butler said the Coalition should be holding Joyce to account.
“I have to say that at a time when the head of the federal police has testified before this parliament about a sharp rise in explicit threats against members of parliament, and within just a fortnight of the assassination attempt against former President Trump, it is simply extraordinary that a senior frontbencher would use such explicit, violent language about the prime minister of this country and other senior political leaders,” he said.
In 2018 Joyce provided a victim impact statement to the Armidale local court after a 74-year-old man pleaded guilty to charges of stalking and intimidation against Joyce, which included sending a bullet and threatening note to his electoral office.
In reports from the court proceedings of the time, Joyce’s statement said the bullet and note made him feel nervous and he thought the actions set a bad precedent for others in public life.
It is not the first time an Australian politician apologised over mixing gun violence with voting in an election.
In 2016, independent MP Bob Katter released an election campaign ad depicting himself shooting dead Liberal and Labor party members, which was released just days after the Orlando Pulse nightclub massacre in the US.