"But the Newspoll two party vote remains much worse than the last days of Malcolm Turnbull, and the controversy over his ousting continues. In an interview on Nine on Sunday night former foreign minister Julie Bishop said she had had many calls from foreign ministers “asking why I’m no longer the foreign minister and what happened to the prime minister?
"They have been some rather unkind comments about Australia being the Italy of the South Pacific and the coup capital of the world,” she said.
Bishop said the change was perplexing “because Malcolm Turnbull was way ahead as preferred prime minister. We were coming back in the polls. It was quite close and there were no deep policy issues that divided the party”, because Turnbull had given way on a number of issues.
Bishop renewed her criticism of parliament’s Question Time, saying it “probably does more damage to the reputation of the political class than any other issue.”
