The police minister in Australia’s most populous state was forced to quit yesterday over reports he “dirty danced” in underwear over the chest of a female colleague in a drunken late-night office party.
Matt Brown resigned just three days after being sworn in as police minister of New South Wales state, which includes Sydney.
“I’m a human being and I made a mistake and I am going to cop the consequences,” Brown told reporters.
“I am not wanting to duck or weave this issue. As you can imagine this is a pretty tough day for me,” he said.
Witnesses said Brown stripped down to his underpants and danced to loud techno music on a green leather Chesterfield lounge before he “mounted the chest” of a female politician and simulated a sex act.
Brown did not deny stripping, but said he had not tried to simulate sex with his colleague. The party occurred in parliament three months before Brown was sworn in as police minister.
Noreen Hay, the woman whom a witness said Brown “mounted,” denied yesterday that anything untoward happened during the alcohol-fueled party three months ago that her adult daughter also attended.
“I don’t want to do myself any disservice here, but there are a number of very attractive young women in that parliament and to suggest that Matt Brown would do something like that, particularly with me, is ridiculous,” she said.
Hay, 51, denied a claim in the Australian newspaper that a near-naked Brown had straddled her on a green leather couch and then called out a lewd comment about Hay to her daughter.
Brown’s resignation was a blow to the center-left state government, already reeling from months of political scandal, leadership instability and poor opinion polls.
New South Wales Premier Nathan Rees, sworn in with Brown after a leadership tussle, promised a more accountable government and said Brown had to go because he initially promised that “absolutely nothing untoward” occurred during the party.
“I subsequently put it to former minister Brown late last night that ‘there are too many reports of you in your underwear for me to ignore,’” Rees told local radio.
“Embarrassed doesn’t begin to describe it. He conceded he’d been in his underwear and that gave me no option but to demand his resignation,” Rees said.
The Philippines yesterday said its coast guard would acquire 40 fast patrol craft from France, with plans to deploy some of them in disputed areas of the South China Sea. The deal is the “largest so far single purchase” in Manila’s ongoing effort to modernize its coast guard, with deliveries set to start in four years, Philippine Coast Guard Commandant Admiral Ronnie Gil Gavan told a news conference. He declined to provide specifications for the vessels, which Manila said would cost 25.8 billion pesos (US$440 million), to be funded by development aid from the French government. He said some of the vessels would
Hundreds of thousands of Guyana citizens living at home and abroad would receive a payout of about US$478 each after the country announced it was distributing its “mind-boggling” oil wealth. The grant of 100,000 Guyanese dollars would be available to any citizen of the South American country aged 18 and older with a valid passport or identification card. Guyanese citizens who normally live abroad would be eligible, but must be in Guyana to collect the payment. The payout was originally planned as a 200,000 Guyanese dollar grant for each household in the country, but was reframed after concerns that some citizens, including
Airlines in Australia, Hong Kong, India, Malaysia and Singapore yesterday canceled flights to and from the Indonesian island of Bali, after a nearby volcano catapulted an ash tower into the sky. Australia’s Jetstar, Qantas and Virgin Australia all grounded flights after Mount Lewotobi Laki-Laki on Flores island spewed a 9km tower a day earlier. Malaysia Airlines, AirAsia, India’s IndiGo and Singapore’s Scoot also listed flights as canceled. “Volcanic ash poses a significant threat to safe operations of the aircraft in the vicinity of volcanic clouds,” AirAsia said as it announced several cancelations. Multiple eruptions from the 1,703m twin-peaked volcano in
A plane bringing Israeli soccer supporters home from Amsterdam landed at Israel’s Ben Gurion airport on Friday after a night of violence that Israeli and Dutch officials condemned as “anti-Semitic.” Dutch police said 62 arrests were made in connection with the violence, which erupted after a UEFA Europa League soccer tie between Amsterdam club Ajax and Maccabi Tel Aviv. Israeli flag carrier El Al said it was sending six planes to the Netherlands to bring the fans home, after the first flight carrying evacuees landed on Friday afternoon, the Israeli Airports Authority said. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu also ordered