Stuart Robert to be sacked as minister over China trip scandal
News Corp reported on Friday Mr Robert had written to Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull asking not to be considered in this weekend’s frontbench reshuffle, while Fairfax reported the minister had been “sacked”.
The Human Services Minister has been under fire since Monday, when details of his secretive off-the-books August 2014 trip first emerged.
Robert has shown a failure to understand that, as a minister, he is always seen as that-particularly when overseas- and that any “private” action he takes in relation to an Australian company unmistakably comes with the assumed imprimatur of his government.
In a statement on Friday, Turnbull said Robert told Parkinson that when he made the visit he did not believe he had any interest in or connection to Nimrod Resources.
Turnbull said Robert recognised the connection with Nimrod would create the impression that when he went to Beijing he had something personally to gain from the Nimrod project.
“He told Dr Parkinson that this had been done without his knowledge”.
Yesterday the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade (DFAT) says Chinese officials believed they were meeting Mr Robert in an official capacity when he travelled to Beijing a year ago.
The minister also admitted to the inquiry Metallum Holdings had an interest in Nimrod Resources.
Mr Robert appeared to have not received any financial benefit and the conduct in question did not directly relate to his ministerial duties, Dr Parkinson said.
Treasurer Scott Morrison earlier in the week said it was a “ridiculous beat-up” by the Labor opposition and media.
The demotion will come after a bleak two months for Mr Turnbull in which he dropped former Cities Minister Jamie Briggs for a late-night incident in Hong Kong, and ordered Special Minister of State Mal Brough to stand aside pending a police investigation of matters related to the stolen diary of former Speaker Peter Slipper.
Bowen said Morrison had tried “to save the career of a minister who had clearly, in an open-and-shut manner, breached the ministerial code of conduct”.
There is speculation Mr Robert may be cleared of wrongdoing because the personal leave and homeward flight from Beijing to Singapore were endorsed by then prime minister Tony Abbott.