Federal MP Bob Katter has had many memorable moments in front of the television cameras, but possibly the most famous is his reaction to marriage equality being achieved in Australia.
As Australia votes YES in response to the postal survey on marriage equality in November 2017 the Queensland MP delivered his now iconic line. At first the MP was surprisingly welcoming of diversity in sexuality, before suddenly switching to angry concern about crocodiles.
“I mean, you know, people are entitled to their sexual proclivities. Let a thousand blossoms bloom, as far as I’m concerned.” Katter joyfully said.
But his tone quickly changed as he added, “But I ain’t spending any time on it because in the meantime, every three months, a person is torn to pieces by a crocodile in north Queensland.”
Now in a new interview with Crikey it seems Katter has no recollection of the moment.
Katter recently gave an interview where he discussed an amendment he put forward to the NBN Companies Act, and he used a turn of phrase that was eerily familiar.
“The Queensland budget [put aside] $36 billion on tunnels in Brisbane, where we’ve got a person dying every three weeks, maybe, in Far North Queensland, mainly because we haven’t got that tunnel,” Katter said referring his push for more infrastructure projects in his Queensland electorate.
When the reporter noted that this was very similar to his line about people in north Queensland dying every three weeks from crocodiles the politician said he didn’t know what they were referring to.
Crikey points out that the politicians website has a series of promotional products from mugs to T-shirts that feature the famous quote.
The 79 year old politician was a member of the Queensland parliament from 1974 until 1992 where he was a member of The Nationals. He moved to the federal arena in 1993 but quit the party in 2001 to run as an independent.
Since 2022 he has held the honourary title of Father of the Australian House of Representatives, as the longest serving representative.
