Australian Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull on Thursday banned sex between ministers and staff and rounded on his deputy for a "shocking error of judgment" by having an affair with a press secretary. Deputy Australian Prime Minister Barnaby Joyce, a Catholic who campaigned on "family values" and married for 24 years, is expecting a child with his former staffer in April. Turnbull denounced the affair at a press conference in Canberra after a week in which the scandal threw his centre-right government into turmoil and strained the alliance between his Liberal Party and Joyce's National Party. He stopped short of sacking Joyce, which would have put the government's narrow one-seat majority at risk were he expelled from parliament. But Turnbull said the scandal had prompted overdue changes to ministerial conduct rules, and announced new standards broadly similar to a ban on relationships between lawmakers and staffers adopted last week by U.S Congress. "In 2018, it is not acceptable for a minister to have a sexual relationship with somebody who works for them. It is a very bad workplace practice. And everybody knows that no good comes of it," he said.

Australian Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull on Thursday banned sex between ministers and staff and rounded on his deputy for a "shocking error of judgment" by having an affair with a press secretary. Deputy Australian Prime Minister Barnaby Joyce, a Catholic who campaigned on "family values" and married for 24 years, is expecting a child with his former staffer in April. Turnbull denounced the affair at a press conference in Canberra after a week in which the scandal threw his centre-right government into turmoil and strained the alliance between his Liberal Party and Joyce's National Party. He stopped short of sacking Joyce, which would have put the government's narrow one-seat majority at risk were he expelled from parliament. But Turnbull said the scandal had prompted overdue changes to ministerial conduct rules, and announced new standards broadly similar to a ban on relationships between lawmakers and staffers adopted last week by U.S Congress. "In 2018, it is not acceptable for a minister to have a sexual relationship with somebody who works for them. It is a very bad workplace practice. And everybody knows that no good comes of it," he said.