Labor leader Bill Shorten has told Sam Dastyari to quit senior positions in parliament’s upper house as the embattled senator faces questions about his dealings with China.
‘I told Senator Dastyari that his mischaracterisation of how he came to make comments contradicting Labor policy made his position untenable,’ Mr Shorten said in a statement on Thursday.
‘I also told him that while I accept his word that he never had, nor disclosed, any classified information, his handling of these matters showed a lack of judgment.’
Labor leader Bill Shorten has told Sam Dastyari to quit senior positions in parliament’s upper house as the embattled senator faces questions about his dealings with China
Senator Dastyari is the deputy opposition whip and chairman of the Select Committee on the Future of Public Interest Journalism.
Senior Turnbull government ministers had zeroed in on Senator Dastyari after leaked audio suggested he defended Beijing’s controversial South China Sea policy in defiance of Labor’s position.
‘The Chinese integrity of its borders is a matter for China,’ he said in the audio from a press conference with Chinese reporters in June 2016 and published in various media outlets on Wednesday.
Senator Dastyari had previously said he had only ‘incorrectly’ mumbled an answer to a question he should not have taken.
Senator Dastyari (with Mr Huang) is the deputy opposition whip and chairman of the Select Committee on the Future of Public Interest Journalism
Senior Turnbull government ministers had zeroed in on Senator Dastyari (with Mr Huang) after leaked audio suggested he defended Beijing’s controversial South China Sea policy in defiance of Labor’s position.
Attorney-General George Brandis would not go as far as saying the senator’s actions were treasonable.
‘What I’m saying is that Senator Dastyari’s position, on the basis of what we know, is completely impossible,’ he told ABC radio.
‘Senator Dastyari took deliberate steps to undermine or subvert what he believed to be or what he believed might be an intelligence investigation.’
Foreign Minister Julie Bishop also called for the senator’s scalp while Defence Minister Marise Payne said his ‘recklessness’ showed Labor could not be trusted on defence and national security.
Foreign Minister Julie Bishop also called for the senator’s scalp while Defence Minister Marise Payne said his ‘recklessness’ showed Labor could not be trusted on defence and national security
Labor leader Bill Shorten has told Sam Dastyari to quit senior positions in parliament’s upper house as the embattled senator faces questions about his dealings with China
Australian Conservatives senator Cory Bernardi called on Senator Dastyari to resign from the parliament.
‘This really has the smell of something that should never have crept into Canberra politics,’ he told ABC radio.
Senator Dastyari spent a brief spell in the doghouse over earlier dealings with Chinese Communist Party linked businessman Huang Xiangmo.
The latest audio comes after the NSW Labor powerbroker was reported to have warned the donor his phone was likely being bugged by intelligence agencies during a meeting in Sydney in October 2016.
Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull said Senator Dastyari was ‘not on Australia’s side’.
‘I expect Turnbull and the Liberals to smear me, but for he and his colleagues to suggest that I am not a true or loyal Australian is incredibly hurtful – and hurtful to all overseas-born Australians,’ Senator Dastyari told AAP.