23 February 2012

Hargreaves gone as whip after passing Alistair Coe a note

| johnboy
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The ABC brings word of the Government Whip John Hargreaves resigning as whip after the Liberals’ humourless Alistair Coe decided now was a good time to take offence about a note passed 18 months ago:

Mr Hargreaves says it has been suggested by Mr Coe that he had intended the note as a homophobic slur against Deputy Chief Minister Andrew Barr.

“The note was in poor taste and referred to the mountain bike race at Stromlo Park. It has been suggested by Mr Coe that I intended it as a gay slur and as a slur against the Deputy Chief Minister,” he said.

“I need the record to show that I reject Mr Coe’s premise regarding the note I have a record going back decades in which I have championed the cause of gays and lesbians in this town.”

Mr Hargreaves says he has resigned as whip to spare the government any political damage.

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Was the note written on the back of a timesheet or something????

Hargreaves: the MLA you get the day after the night before.

Hargreaves is an absolute moron, as is anybody that actually voted for him at the last election. Having said that, the comment is more amusing than offensive.

vg said :

So the remark is less stupid, offensive and below that of a politician (OK, OK I know I’m talking the council) because Coe waited 18 months?

Nice work at justifying that drunk’s behaviour

More just that the politics of offense taking is particularly ugly from anyone pretending to be a liberal, and he appears to have played into the government’s hands so it was dumb as well as peurile.

Why let a retiring government member nobly fall on his sword when your own leader is under this kind of pressure?

So the remark is less stupid, offensive and below that of a politician (OK, OK I know I’m talking the council) because Coe waited 18 months?

Nice work at justifying that drunk’s behaviour

Ben_Dover said :

God, how boring will local parochial politics get if every single bloody politician with any spark of originality and personality is replaced with bland boring party line toeing apparatchiks who have never existed outside of local politics?

zzzzzz, huh? ..um, sorry, what? i was sleeping… is it not like that already? but how utterly fascinately boring can they become – we watch with bated breath.

EvanJames said :

Coe maintained his outrage for 18 months? How utterly infantile.

Yes well Alastair is prone to bemoaning, usually well after the fact. i still don’t really understand why JH handed him the note?? Seems to me that JH was looking to get a reaction, albeit somewhat later than he had planned. Coe of course ‘found’ the offensive note just in time to move the spot light off his boss and Tio.

God, how boring will local parochial politics get if every single bloody politician with any spark of originality and personality is replaced with bland boring party line toeing apparatchiks who have never existed outside of local politics?

EvanJames said :

Coe maintained his outrage for 18 months? How utterly infantile.

apparently, he filed his outrage on the bottom of a pile of more important matters and was only reminded of it again when he heard hargreaves speaking in’t chamber last week and searched his records – he must have had his i-pod phones in for the past eighteen months (doubtless with notorious b.i.g and a-ha atop his play list)

EvanJames said :

Coe maintained his outrage for 18 months? How utterly infantile.

You expect better? He is only about 12 isn’t he?

Coe maintained his outrage for 18 months? How utterly infantile.

Holden Caulfield11:22 am 23 Feb 12

I only approve of tit-for-tat if both chicks are hot.

It appears to just be tit-for-tat. This whole government/opposition is a joke.

dungfungus said :

Keijidosha said :

He should at least get detention for passing notes in class.

He doesn’t know how to Twitter yet.

i think the verb is ‘tweet’…

if coe was doing this for its publicity value, he must hate krudd! 🙂

Keijidosha said :

He should at least get detention for passing notes in class.

He doesn’t know how to Twitter yet.

He doesn’t seem to be a chess player.

Throwing Hargreaves under the bus a few months early just makes call for Zed’s head more righteous.

It’d be nice to see an ability to think a few months ahead.

Will this go down as the worst attempted SQUIRREL! moment of all time by Coe?

dpm said :

So, do we know what it said?

Probably something about riding moutainbikes downhill without a seat?

I thought it was a funny comment, as was his Vicki Dunne joke. But doesn’t excuse the fact he is a rude, arrogant old man who is highly prone to this sort of thing.

He should at least get detention for passing notes in class.

So, do we know what it said?

Seriously its John Hargreaves, are we that surprised. Secondly, why would he be passing a note to the Opposition? And is he that naive/stupid to think that it wouldn’t come back to bite him one day?

Does this mean Andrew Barr doesn’t like the whip anymore?

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