Award winning political reporter Argus Tuft asks if Bob Katter senior has lost the plot or needs an autocue .
CANBERRA : Whenever the Queensland Marlboro Man imitator and egg tosser, Bob Katter , rises in the House of Representatives at Question Time it becomes something of a giggle , as this shot clearly illustrates .
Why? Because , reading from a wad of notes, he rambles on and on before , at times , actually asking a question . Hansard shows that after one puzzling peroration, a Turnbull minister said it was surprising that after having been in parliament for so long , Katter did not know how to ask a question . A titter went through the pollies .
During this week's sitting of parliament, the Speaker, Tony Smith , started to grimace when Katter rose , topped by what surely can't be hair - a Davy Crockett cap made from an albino skunk?-and began rambling on .
It got to a stage where the Speaker told Katter to sit down, that he had more than 45 seconds to ask his question . But when Katter went on and protested , the Speaker insisted , said he would not stand him passing aspersions at the impartiality of the chair .
Katter , looking glum, sat down . Strange that the Queensland media apparently did not report that Katter had been told to sit down and shut up. Katter was a minister in the Bjelke-Petersen Queensland government and like Joh feeds the media pullets up north a lot of cracked corn nowadays .
It seems Katter and Deputy PM , Kiwi Kid Barnaby Joyce , soon to be busier than a frog in a sock chased by a hungry python at a by-election if the High Court finds against him , have mutual admiration for each other . Waving his arms about , Barnaby recently said he had fond memories of good old days with Katter . As usual, the good old days in question were hard to work out .
