So Speaker Bronwyn Bishop charged taxpayers to travel to Albury in 2006 on the same weekend as the wedding of her colleague Sophie Mirabella. But she says that's ok because she also had some official business to take care of. Which was convenient.
A spokesman for Bishop told News Corp that the MP also held a secret meeting that weekend with an unknown person to discuss work/life balance in her role on parliament's family and human services committee.
By attending to some official business, Bishop was allowed to claim her travel to and from Albury under parliamentary entitlements. The fact that she also needed to attend a wedding is just lucky.
In a similar stroke of luck, Bishop was also able to attend to some official business in Brisbane on the weekend of the 2007 wedding of another colleague, Liberal backbencher Teresa Gambaro.
In that case, Bishop charged the taxpayer $288 in travel entitlements, but managed to squeeze in a meeting with an unnamed academic as part of an inquiry into drug use in Australia. Phew.
Foreign minister Julie Bishop now says the Speaker should "consider her position" and Sky News is reporting that Bronwyn Bishop's colleagues are moving to oust her.
#BREAKING: Sky News understands Liberal Party research shows Bronwyn Bishop is now the number one concern for the government.
But this could all be fixed if we could just find the person or people who met with Bronwyn Bishop for these top secret meetings. So, was it you?
If this sounds like you, we have some questions.
1. Was there a secret handshake at the secret meeting?
2. Did you sit behind a newspaper with the eyeholes cut out?
3. Was there a password?
4. What does a meeting about work/life balance need to be a secret?
5. How was the meeting? Was there tea?
6. Sandwiches?
7. Were you happy with the outcome of the committee's work?
8. How's your work/life balance?
9. Really though, how is it?
10. Why didn't you come forward sooner?
So please, if you met with Bronwyn Bishop on that weekend in 2006, contact us at Rob.Stott@BuzzFeed.com. Thanks in advance.
