With Abbott trying to reverse action on climate change through the new Senate and Scott Morrison admitting to the crime of refoulement of refugees, senior correspondent Barry Everingham details the breathtaking arrogance, incompetence and deceit of Tony Abbott and his gang.

PRIME MINISTER TONY ABBOTT has notched up a few firsts in his life and the most telling so far is that he is one of the world's most unpopular prime ministers, yet there is no end to his arrogance.

His is a Government by arrogance — the arrogance of secrecy, the arrogance of the destruction of decency in Parliament and the arrogance of absolute dishonesty.

The list is long.

Tony Abbott’s life skills are thin on the ground and its well to list them here.

His main stock in-trade was his Rhodes scholarship to Oxford; he walked away with a Blue in boxing and, frankly, not much more.

He then entered a Roman Catholic seminary to train for the priesthood. That was short lived and we are grateful that Michael Duffy, along with David Marr, unearthed his reasons for quitting a life meant to be celibate.

His wandering eyes caught the attention of one of his female parishioners and, unlike many of his erstwhile colleagues, he was attracted to women. So that put paid to that scant part of his fledging career.

Abbott's next foray into real life was a doozey if ever there was one. He became the director of one of the most Mickey Mouse organisations around — Australians for Constitutional Monarchy. There, David Flint who became his guide and mentor, which no doubt says volumes for the Tony Abbott we see today.

#auspol Just over two months in and its "Tony Abbott Mad Monk Trashy Leader" #Indonesia pic.twitter.com/9LOOMMbC71 — choosing (@ch150ch) November 21, 2013

Then he popped up writing for The Bulletin and later for the Liberal Party’s house magazine The Australian. It was there he became the Mad Monk, a name by which in many circles, including the Left of his own Party, he is known to this very day.

Abbott was relentless in his ambition to gain a Parliamentary seat, which he achieved after catching the eye of John Howard — a man he claims is his political father, coupled with current Speaker Bronwyn Bishop. The mind recoils.

On Howard’s defeat, he became press secretary to unloseable election loser John Hewson.

Fast forward to 2009, while Malcolm Turnbull was Opposition Leader, the Catholic Right moved into top gear and, with the help of Peter Slipper’s vote, Abbott became leader and the Party was never the same again.

A measure of Abbott’s lack of understanding of human nature was seen in full flight when he plucked the likes of Sophie Mirabella and Christopher Pyne from the backbench and elevated them to the front bench.

Abbott became a relentless Opposition Leader and his non-stop negativity helped demoralise and disintegrate a fractured Government — and the rest is history.

Although Julia Gillard and Kevin Rudd handed him government of a silver platter, it hasn't stop him lying to the Australian public — a trait he hasn’t been able to shake, even from the security of The Lodge.

His Sovereign Borders protection mantra is a disgrace. He even lies when he refers to asylum seekers as “illegal" entrants – which they are not. Because they are not white South Africans or former white Rhodesian farmers, they are labelled by this Government as threats to our security.

Perhaps the most arrogant breach of tradition is the disintegration of any semblance of impartiality by Abbott's political parent and Australia's worst ever Speaker Bronwyn Bishop.

She is an absolute disgrace and, in concert with – and directed by – Leader of Government Business in the House Christopher Pyne, her partisanship and open abhorrence of Opposition members makes a mockery of Westminster traditions.

She has even stooped to throwing out an ALP frontbencher for laughing.

My sources tell me the (admittedly attentuated) left wing of the Liberal Party is losing its patience with this open contempt for convention and abrogation of decency.

Finally, and most distressing of all, the appointment of the likes of Scott Morrison to such a sensitive portfolios as immigration and “border protection” beggars belief.

The man is an arrogant oaf, refusing to honestly answer when questioned about the motives of the Abbott Government in its cruel and heartless treatment of the most vulnerable people in the world.

Abbott himself is displaying not only ignorance but arrogance when he lies that the violent, repressive Sri Lankan Rajapaksa regime is, in fact, a peaceful nation that does not violate human rights — which flies in the face of criticism from the UN and the Governments of such nations as Britain, New Zealand and Canada.

Indeed, Australia’s assessment of Sri Lanka at the UN’s most recent Universal Periodic Review accused the government of complicity in human rights abuses.

Former Prime Minister Malcolm Fraser says sending asylum seekers back to their persecutors is redolent of sending Jews back to Germany.

Handing AS back to SL navy at sea redolent off handing Jews to Nazis in 1930s — Malcolm Fraser (@MalcolmFraser12) July 4, 2014

Today, we received confirmation that Morrison had indeed committed the crime of refoulement by sending Tamil asylum seekers back to the persecutors — and Abbott's Government reached a dismal, despicable, new nadir.

How long the Australian public will stand for this arrogant, incompetent, deceitful and criminal Government remains to be seen.

With Australians around the country marching in increasing strength every month to protest against Abbott and his criminal cronies, it may not be too long.



This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 Australia License

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Morrison urged to visit war-torn north during trip to Sri Lanka http://t.co/JAQkPHxC5t #auspol ditch your minders Morrison! — amjulie (@amjemmo) July 7, 2014

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