‘Angry landscaper’ fined after giving the finger to PM Malcolm Turnbull

Plenty of voters no doubt imagine they might have some choice words for Malcolm Turnbull should they ever come fact to face with the prime minister, but one Brisbane man took it a little too far on Thursday night.

A man identified by the Courier Mail as an “angry landscaper” was reportedly detailed by the police after he gave the finger to Turnbull during a meet-and-greet at a pub in Carindale on Brisbane’s southside. The 26-year-old man was at the Carindale Hotel when Turnbull was meeting a group of Liberal National Party supporters.

A woman who was with the man told the newspaper that the man had “had a few” and “flipped” when he learned that the PM was in the vicinity. “He said something about taxes and just went at him,” the woman said.

The Brisbane Times, however, reported that the man got stroppy not over taxes, but because Turnbull got served before him at the bar. The man was pushed away by the PM’s own security team while Turnbull attempted to order a beer (Fat Yak, reportedly, and not the ‘official’ beer of Queensland, XXXX), then removed from the pub by the hotel’s security officers, before the police were called when he failed to leave the vicinity.

Photographs published by the news.com.au show the man with bright red hair and wearing a cream sweatshirt with his middle finger extended behind the PM’s head, while the Courier Mail had photographs from later on that showed the man in handcuffs. The Brisbane Times reported that the man was issued with an infringement notice for failing to leave a licensed premises.

In Queensland, such notices are issued for what are called public nuisance offences and involve the payment of a fine.

Turnbull got off more lightly than his predecessor Tony Abbott, who was headbutted by a man in Tasmania. The man admitted he had been drinking before approaching Abbott in the street in September. 

What would you like to say to Malcolm Turnbull if you had the opportunity?