Yahoo Finance ‘Cruel injustice’: Ministers under fire for taking mental health leave
The roles of two senior cabinet ministers at the centre of the Parliament House rape allegations scandals have been called into question as the pair take time off for mental health and sick leave.
A senior Labor official has publicly questioned whether Attorney-General and Minister for Industrial Relations Christian Porter and Defence Minister Linda Reynolds are fit to hold their positions.
"Are we all supposed to just pretend when Christian Porter comes back from leave that nothing has happened?” Labor home affairs spokeswoman Kristina Keneally said on Sunday.
"We need to be clear that he is a fit and proper person to hold the position of Attorney General, the first law officer of this country."
Porter has categorically denied the rape allegations by a woman who took her own life last year.
WATCH ABOVE: Attorney-General Christian Porter denies rape allegations
Thinktank McKell Institute also blasted the ministers’ decisions to take mental leave as “cruel injustice”, pointing out that many Australian workers do not have access to paid leave of any kind.
“There’s a cruel injustice when two Federal Ministers can take freely extendable mental health leave while 3.7 million Australians don’t have access to any paid leave - at all,” the Institute stated on Twitter.
“If it’s a benefit that’s ‘necessary’ for the health of Ministers under political pressure for their own mistakes - surely it’s necessary for all of us.”
There’s a cruel injustice when two Federal Ministers can take freely extendable mental health leave while 3.7 million Australians don’t have access to any paid leave - at all.
— McKell Institute (@McKellInstitute) March 7, 2021
McKell Institute CEO Michael Buckland told Yahoo Finance that it was "deeply hypocritical" for these ministers, who could access sick leave, to withhold it from others.
"I bet when they took their jobs neither Mr Porter nor Ms Reynolds anticipated needing stress leave, but it's a safety net they would be grateful for now and that's exactly the safety net we should all have," Buckland said.
"All working Australians deserve access to leave, including mental health leave, especially those on more modest incomes than ministers of the Crown.
"Unlike Mr Porter and Ms Reynolds, the average baggage handler experiencing stress does not have a cushion of money around him to help absorb the blow – he needs that leave to deal with life's unexpected challenges."
Some Australians took to social media to share their frustrations about the ministers’ ability to access sick leave.
“Christian Porter gets to take mental health leave for the [sic] being the suspect of allegations but yet if I take mental health leave for my mental illness, I risk losing my payments. Cool and normal,” tweeted user Skyler Nixon.
Meanwhile, Reynolds is taking sick leave for three weeks until 2 April under the advice of her cardiologist. But Keneally has described Reynolds’ position as Defence Minister as ‘untenable’.
Keneally, who wished her a full return to health, said that her job was under question on the basis of three issues: competence, capacity, and judgement.
“When it comes to the Minister's capacity, she needs to be able to turn up to the Parliament and answer questions. And if she is not well enough to do that, then we have to seriously ask, is she available to do the job as Defence Minister?” she told ABC Radio National on Monday.
“This is a key national security portfolio. I do wish her well. I hope she returns to health soon. But we need a Defence Minister who can turn up and answer questions in Parliament and in estimates.”
Revelations that Reynolds described rape allegations claimant Brittany Higgins as a ‘lying cow’ also “completely contradicts” the Defence Minister’s public statements, Keneally added.
Reynolds reportedly made the comment after Higgins, a former Liberal staffer in Reynolds' office, went public with her rape allegation.
“You cannot call the alleged victim of a rape in your own office a lying cow and think that has no consequences,” Keneally said on Sunday.
Independent senator for South Australia Rex Patrick told Yahoo Finance he did not begrudge people taking leave due to stress, but pointed out that this matter concerned “two very senior politicians in very senior positions”.
“This stress appears to be related to their roles. They have portfolios such as Defence and the administration of justice across Australia,” he said.
“And whilst I wish both of them well, it does give rise to concerns about their ability to discharge their functions perhaps in more stressful situations.”
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