Michael McCormack has defended his Nationals colleagues as the “finest people in regional Australia” after Barnaby Joyce’s partner, Vikki Campion, alleged party members suggested she terminate her pregnancy to save Joyce’s career.
Campion made the allegations as part of a $150,000 “tell-all” interview she and Joyce negotiated with the Seven Network, which drew in just 630,000 viewers across the five metro markets on Sunday night.
“They came to me, they said, ‘uh, you’re pregnant and you have to get an abortion’, and I said, ‘it’s too late, it has a heartbeat’,” Campion said in the interview.
“And they said, ‘if you don’t, they’re going to come after you’.”
“And they did,” Joyce added. “And they did,” Campion agreed.
McCormack refused to comment on the allegations.
“Again I say the people I serve with are the finest people in regional Australia, I can’t emphasise that enough,” he told Sky News.
“If there was a conversation made then, that was a conversation made between the alleged person who said it and Barnaby and Vikki.
“I know nothing about it. I, like everyone else, only saw what I saw last night.
“Again I say, the people who I serve with in the National party, I am proud to serve with each and everyone of them, they are there fiercely representing the interests of regional Australians and if there is anything else to be said, that should be between Barnaby and Vikki and whoever they are alleging made the comments.”
The National party, which typically campaigns on traditional family values, including an anti-abortion stance, were rocked by the breakdown of the New England MP’s 24-year-old marriage, which eventually forced Joyce to stand down as both party leader and deputy prime minister.
As part of the interview, Joyce said he knew as soon as he learned his partner was pregnant – when he was still married – he would need to resign, but held on to the position until it became absolutely untenable “out of spite”.
That has been taken as a response to Malcolm Turnbull’s decision to add a “morality clause” to the ministerial code of conduct, which banned relations between ministers and their staffers, in the wake of Joyce’s affair with Campion, a former staffer in his office, becoming public.
It was not until a harassment claim lodged with the WA arm of the party became public that Joyce resigned from his leadership positions and moved to the backbench. That claim is still under investigation.
Meanwhile, other senior Coalition MPs are doing their best to move on from the interview, with Peter Dutton telling Sky News the broadcast had drawn “a line in the sand under this issue”.
“It’s now a private issue, not a political issue,” he said.
The minister for agriculture, David Littleproud, who has joined the prime minister on his “listening tour” of drought-stricken Queensland and NSW communities, also said it was a private matter while speaking to the ABC, while Angus Taylor it was “time to move on”.
The treasurer, Scott Morrison, said he chose to watch a reality singing competition over the Joyce interview, but echoed his colleagues that it was a “private matter”.
“I don’t know what his state of mind was at that time, or how it’s changed, I don’t know,” he said.
“These events are now done. And I think it’s important that all those involved can now just get on with their lives, and I wish them well in doing that because I imagine it would be very difficult for all those involved to do that.
“But having had all those matters aired, I think it’s time to move on for everyone.”
Joyce remains on medical leave until 15 June.
