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“I, I think… SIT!… Sorry, it’s a dog.”
Barnaby Joyce was about to answer a question on the ABC about whether he was happy with where his party leader Pauline Hanson was taking him when he growled at the dog off-screen.
It is unclear how close the dog was or what it was doing to provoke his anger, but the strange outburst was the climax of a nine-minute live interview in which he claimed Channel Seven had suggested Hanson meet British right-wing agitator Tommy Robinson and appeared to suggest One Nation might try to identify illegal immigrants using the medical system and parking fine data.
When Joyce pulled himself together, he said he changed his views, like many other Australians.
When journalist Sarah Ferguson asked whether he had set a limit on how far he was willing to go in defense of Hanson, Joyce did not answer directly.
“When you say set limits, you know, I’ve heard other things today, like she supports going back to a White Australia policy. She doesn’t, and she said that very clearly on stage,” he said.
Joyce growls at the offending dog.ABC
Joyce spoke on public television 7.30 The program follows Hanson’s highly publicized trip to Europe, during which she was spotted holidaying in Italy with billionaire friend Gina Rinehart, told the Conservative Political Action Conference in London not to apologize for being white, and appeared on a podcast and Channel Seven segment with Robinson.
Ferguson then asked if he supported Hanson’s call to bring Robinson to Australia, and Joyce immediately declared Seven’s program: Spotlightinvited Hanson and Robinson to meet.
When Joyce pressed Seven to deny it, he said he had read the emails and had a “different opinion.”
When asked if he agreed with Hanson’s remarks in Spotlight In a program that Muslims were propagating at the expense of Australian taxpayers, Joyce again defended his leader: “She also said that obviously this does not apply to every person of the Islamic faith. There is a problem in Australia that if people fall into a form of Balkanization where you… where there is no assimilation, where you move into a form of alternative culture that is contrary to the egalitarian spirit of Australia, then that creates huge problems. And we saw that in Bondi.”
One Nation leader Pauline Hanson speaks to Tommy Robinson.X/@TRobinsonNewEra
Earlier on Monday, Joyce backed Hanson’s call for mass deportations – which she later clarified to say it only applied to people in Australia illegally – and Ferguson put pressure on him.
“You said today that you could wait for visa overstayers to see a doctor or nurse. So will you require GPs and doctors to report visa overstays to the authorities?” asked Ferguson.
The mystery dog that angered Joyce then reappeared off-screen.
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“I have to apologize about the dog,” Joyce began his response, although this did not cause any concern for viewers.
“Don’t worry about the dog, just answer the question,” Ferguson insisted calmly.
Joyce bristled at this: “Don’t be rude, otherwise the interview will end in a dead end.”
Ferguson asked the question again, but Joyce interrupted him before she could finish.
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“Oh no, Sarah, that’s funny, if you don’t want to keep illegal immigrants here, then there’s no point in calling them illegals…”
Asked for the third time how One Nation would identify illegal immigrants facing deportation, Joyce said: “They will come across all sorts of things from time to time, be it health problems, parking fines or whatever. And when they do, they will be deported because otherwise it’s all a farce.”
The interview ended with another reference to the offended invisible dog.
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