EXCLUSIVE TO THE BUG:

Former federal treasurer Josh Frydenberg has blamed the ABC’s national political lead* David Speers for the rampant and damaging speculation in the past few days about a likely comeback to federal politics via his former seat of Kooyong.

Mr Frydenberg yesterday used social media to issue the following statement quelling speculation about his plans: “My position on contesting the next election remains unchanged. I  will continue to support the Liberal Party and our local candidate Amelia Hamer.”

Stories about the Liberal Party dumping already-selected candidate Ms Hamer to make way for Mr Frydenberg in Kooyong drew widespread criticism about the party which is already perceived to be unfriendly towards women candidates in winnable seats.

Speaking exclusively to The Bug, Mr Frydenberg said the attacks on him could be directly linked to an “exclusive” but false story initially aired on Sunday morning by Speers as host of ABC TV’s political discussion program Insiders.

“The statement I issued on Monday was no different to the one I gave verbally to David Speers over the phone on Sunday morning which he managed to totally misrepresent,” Mr Frydenberg explained.

“When David asked about my intentions in Kooyong I said: ‘My position on contesting the next election remains unchanged. I will ….’.

“But at that point David interrupted me, as he is wont to do, so I didn’t get to finish the sentence with the words ‘…continue to support the Liberal Party and our local candidate Amelia Hamer’.

“David cut short our phone conversation so that he could go on air during Insiders and brag about his so-called ‘exclusive’ story. It was all his fault really.

“I’d forgotten how bad he is at interrupting, but I should have been warned on Sunday morning when I answered his call and he managed to interrupt me after I’d said ‘good’ and before I said ‘morning’,” Mr Frydenberg said.

* Whatever the fuck that means.

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