She’s Australia’s answer to Sarah Palin – and then some. Jacqui Lambie might not be the savviest person in Canberra – sharia law, she has confidently asserted, “obviously involves terorrism”. But the outspoken Senator is stirring up the staid world of Australian politics and, some say, injecting a large dose of realism.
Whether pronouncing on her taste in men (“heaps of cash” and “a package between their legs”), calling for the burka to be banned, or warning about an imminent Chinese invasion, Ms Lambie has rarely been out of the spotlight since arriving in the capital with next to no political experience – and having been out of work for 14 years.
But the combative 43-year-old – who has also been likened to Pauline Hanson, the right-wing firebrand whose political star burned briefly in the late 1990s – is not just a headline. As one of eight cross-benchers holding the balance of power in the upper house, she has genuine clout.
Mr Abbott’s own backbenchers can only watch with envy as Ms Lambie is wooed by the Prime Minister Tony Abbott and his Treasurer, Joe Hockey, who have held one-to-one meetings with her in an effort to win her support for unpopular budget measures.
A single mother, reformed alcoholic and former army corporal who declared in her maiden speech that she was in parliament because “God performed a miracle and put me in this place”, the combative Tasmanian was actually elected on the coat-tails of Clive Palmer, the eccentric mining tycoon and new MP.
Read the rest of the article here: http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/australasia/sharia-law-obviously...