Michael McCormack has said Nationals cabinet ministers have kept their roles to cause “minimal disruption” to the government, but refused to deny that he considered dumping Barnaby Joyce loyalists, including the Indigenous affairs minister, Nigel Scullion.
The reshuffle announced on Thursday attempts to undo damage from Joyce’s December reshuffle by returning key allies Darren Chester and Keith Pitt to frontbench roles but not to cabinet, and keeping Joyce loyalists David Littleproud and Matt Canavan in cabinet.
Asked on Sky News on Friday about a report that he considered dumping Littleproud, Scullion and Canavan, the deputy prime minister said that all were “fine people in cabinet” who had been “rewarded for the great jobs they’ve done in the past, the jobs they’re doing now and will continue to do in the future”.
McCormack said that Scullion had “done a very, very good job” but did not deny that at one point he considered dumping him, brushing off the report as “lots of talk about who was going in and who was going out”.
“I looked at my portfolio areas and I wanted to keep the portfolio roles to cause minimal disruption to the government,” he said. “We need to get the narrative back not on ourselves but on the things we need to be talking about.”
Asked if he had considered “payback” against Joyce’s supporters, McCormack replied: “I didn’t get rid of Barnaby supporters, I didn’t want retribution – I wanted the best people in those cabinet positions, and I got them.”
On Friday Chester, who became minister for veterans’ affairs, minister for defence personnel and minister assisting for the centenary of Anzac, praised the reshuffle.
Chester said McCormack was determined to lead a “united team” and had put together a “strong outfit, which has experience, has some youth, and has a lot of energy about it”.
He said the reshuffle included “tough decisions”, in reference to the decision to relegate Damian Drum and Luke Hartsuyker to the backbench.
Since his elevation to Nationals leader on Monday, McCormack has come under pressure for a series of homophobic editorials he wrote in the 1990s in which he said gay people engaged in “sordid behaviour”.
In one, he said that “if the disease their unnatural acts helped spread doesn’t wipe out humanity, they’re here to stay”.
McCormack has since apologised for the editorials, and disowned the views in several editorials uncovered by Guardian Australia in which he advocated for the death penalty, opposed anti-gay hate laws and compared women’s soccer to an “egg and spoon” race.
On Friday, McCormack said that “society was different then”, citing the “huge, intense” public health campaign around Aids, featuring the Grim Reaper. The premise of the 1987 campaign was that Aids does not only affect gay people and intravenous drug users.
McCormack noted at the time there was “a rise in Aids and concern around that”. “I shouldn’t have written those words.”
“Words hurt and hurt lasts. I apologised at the time and I’ve apologised since,” he said, including during the marriage equality debate.
The deputy prime minister said he voted in favour of marriage equality because the government had outsourced the decision to the Australian people and it was important for parliament to uphold “the will of the people”.
In an interview with Guardian Australia, McCormack said he expected Joyce to “get in behind me and support me as leader”. Joyce has not ruled out a return to the frontbench or Nationals leadership.
On Friday, McCormack said that Joyce “will be used” by the Nationals and the government and praised his “marvellous work” for rural and regional Australia.
