Milton Dick, the man who was once thrown out of parliament for bringing in the Muppets, now runs the whole show.
The House of Representatives elected the Queensland Labor MP as its new speaker during the first session on Tuesday.
One of his key qualifications for the role – being on the panel of speakers, a list of people able to preside over debate in the lower house – was almost undone by a question-time joke.
Milton Dick and Luke Gosling mock the government with the Muppets on their desks in 2018. Credit: Alex Ellinghausen
Dick and his then desk pal Luke Gosling were kicked out of the chamber in 2018 for bringing a set of Muppet dolls to Question Time, which they wiggled around in front of the cameras. Former speaker Tony Smith was not amused and kicked the pair out for their antics.
Speaking in parliament on Tuesday, House leader Tony Burke thanked Smith for later agreeing to put Dick on the speaker’s panel list despite his bleak record.
“Maybe it was a difficult thing to put you on the president’s panel, and I should confess in parliament that it was my fault,” Burke said.
“It was totally my idea that you do that. You were elected on the basis that, at the time, you were the only member of the caucus who hadn’t been kicked out yet. So while it was a mess, it was a mess on the basis that you, until then, as a member of the opposition, had been too respectful of the system.”
Luke Gosling and Milton Dick leave the chamber under the 94th after taking the Muppets to Question Time. Credit: Alex Ellinghausen
The Muppets were a reference to a comment by Scott Morrison shortly after he took over as Prime Minister from Malcolm Turnbull. He said during a television interview that “the curtains have come down on that Muppet Show and a whole new curtain has gone up.”