Minister tweets to script

AustrAlian cabinet minister Anthony Albanese has been caught out after using lines from a Hollywood film to attack opposition leader Tony Abbot.

Mr Albanese told the National Press Club yesterday that Australia had serious challenges and that Mr Abbott was uninterested in solving them.

He said Abbott “is only interested in two things: making Australians afraid of it and telling them who’s to blame for it”.

His words were nearly identical to lines delivered by Michael Douglas in the 1995 film The American President, penned by West Wing writer Aaron Sorkin.

Liberal Party federal director Brian Loughnane quickly posted a YouTube video comparing the speeches.

In a media release headed “Albo, you’re no Michael Douglas”, he said a divided Labour Party had sent out a so-called “heavy hitter’” to attack Mr Abbott, but “Labour is now so unoriginal and devoid of ideas that the best Albo could do was to plagiarise his attack lines directly from an American movie.”

Mr Albanese tweeted: “D’oh! Stuff up,” with the appropriate Homer Simpson attribution.