Australia PM bans sex between ministers and staff after deputy’s “shocking” affair

DHAKA, Feb. 15 (NsNewsWire) — Australian Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull on Thursday banned sex between ministers and staff and rounded on his deputy for a “shocking error of judgment” by having an affair with a press secretary, reports Reuters.

Deputy Australian Prime Minister Barnaby Joyce, a Catholic who campaigned on “family values” and married for 24 years, is expecting a child with his former staffer in April.

Turnbull denounced the affair at a press conference in Canberra after a week in which the scandal threw his centre-right government into turmoil and strained the alliance between his Liberal Party and Joyce’s National Party.

He stopped short of sacking Joyce, which would have put the government’s narrow one-seat majority at risk were he expelled from parliament.