National Party deputy leader Perin Davey revealed the real reason she was slurring her words during a Senate estimates hearing last week.
Senator Davey made headlines over the weekend when video surfaced of her making an incoherent statement at the late-night committee meeting.
He later admitted that he had had a couple of glasses of red wine earlier.
On Tuesday, the previously little-known federal senator from regional New South Wales told a Bathurst radio station that the incident was due to a medical emergency she had five years ago that still makes her “sometimes drag her legs.” words”.
In 2019, the Coalition leader underwent two emergency operations after an abscess in her tonsils “completely burst” on a flight to Germany, causing damage to her facial muscles and eye muscle tissue. throat.
“I had full-blown sepsis and I was in the hospital for 11 days and I lost count of the number of antibiotic transfusions I had,” Senator Davey explained to 2BS host Dusty Fitzpatrick.
National Party deputy leader Perin Davey (pictured) revealed the real reason she was slurring her words during a Senate estimates hearing last week.
When doctors asked Senator Davey at the time what her job was, she said she was campaigning to be a politician.
“They warned me that this would affect my speech,” he recalled.
‘I’ve been very conscious of it since then (but) I always thought I had achieved it very well.
Senator Davey, 52, added that when she is “tired or if I’ve had a glass of wine, or if I’m stressed, my throat gets blocked, sometimes I get a little bit of mucus and I get into a coughing fit.” . , sometimes I mumble the words.
He said he had never spoken publicly about his medical condition before because it was “personal.”
He is now speaking out due to scrutiny of his committee appearance, which came a few days after Daily Mail Australia published a video of colleague Barnaby Joyce talking loudly on his phone while lying on a footpath.
She said coverage of her slurred speech had left her “distraught” and she initially thought the meeting had gone well.
“I was so happy with my line of questioning that I actually cut the video down and sent it to some of my peers in the arts community because it was so important to keep track of the answers I was getting,” Senator Davey said.
“And then for someone to selectively crop the video to focus on the words I’m stumbling over and imply that I was incoherent throughout the entire process, it distresses me.”
The senator said the publicity around this was “really discouraging, and you can understand why young kids look at politics and say, do I want to be a part of that?”
‘Because you have to be one hundred percent pure. Now, I admit I had a couple drinks before attending the Senate estimates hearing, but I wasn’t drunk.
Senator Davey said I should be judged “by the content of what I do and not how I say it.”
Senator Davey (pictured) made headlines when video emerged of her making a rambling statement at a late-night committee meeting, then admitting she had had a couple of glasses of red wine beforehand.
National Senator Perin Davey (right) has often been photographed with a glass of wine.