Abbott Government: Week 4 in review

A relatively quiet second  half of the week as Abbott seeks to consolidate progress made on ruining Australia.

• In the wake of rortgate, Abbott rules out reform on MP expenses
• Tony and Mal Brough take home the silverware at the Ernies
• Clive Palmer thinks he has Abbott on the ropes, legislatively speaking
• Abbott speaks of his desire for three Free Trade Agreements in 12 months. And a pony.
• Scott Morrison takes a break from hoping people don't notice any boats to hoping people won't notice he paid back expenses.
• Soon afterwards the Coalition claimed GREAT SUCCESS as only one boat arrived this week.
• Scott also convinced some asylum seekers that the Coalition has made Australia so terrible, they went back where they came from.
• Everyone loves a good expenses scandal, even the Poms.
• George "I'm a QC you know" Brandis confirms the Government feels threatened by gay marriage and will challenge the ACT's prospective laws.

Brough and Abbott take home Ernies

The organisers of the Ernie awards for sexist comments have given Prime Minister Tony Abbott the ''repeat offender'' award, while another Liberal MP, Mal Brough, took out the political Ernie for the ''Julia Gillard Kentucky Fried Quail'' menu Fairfax

Midweek roundup: Week 3

Recent happenings in Abbottstralia

• Tony goes for a trip to Indonesia, avoids having to see many brown people by bringing a bunch of rich white fat cats with him
• The trip makes global headlines.
• A frank discussion is had about sovereignty. And people smugglers.
• Scott Morrison's office accuses people of being absolutely and totally wrong, without any trace of irony
• Air Marshal Binskin stands loyally at Scott's side, and he brought visual aids
• Asylum seekers call deterrence ineffective, say Australia PNG still better than Sri Lanka
• Abbott sincerely apologises for all the nasty things Labor/4 corners did to Indonesia 
• Also the boat buyback scheme is quietly dropped.
• Environment Minister Greg Hunt misleads on carbon. 
• Mal Brough fights off Clive Palmer.
• Industry Minister Ian Macfarlane is not sure how much money the federal government can give Holden, or where it will come from, but don't worry, we'll get it sorted for the next 100 years.
• Clive Palmer will be throwing his weight around in the new Senate

Palmer v Brough

Clive continues sticking the boot into his old party.  Mal Brough just filed his defence of Palmer's defamation allegations.

In August, Mr Palmer claimed Mr Brough had approached him to fund a sexual harassment case against former Speaker Peter Slipper. Mr Brough denied the claims.

Mr Palmer later lodged an $800,000 defamation suit against the new Member for Fisher. News

In other Clive news,  he won Fairfax by 7 votes.