No, it's not a new Australian reality TV show where contestants compete to drink the most beers and grow the most impressive facial hair while stranded on a tropical island (although that idea has some merit). Australia's federal communications minister Stephen Conroy caused the Senate to erupt into laughter by accidentally referring to Tasmania's Bruny Island as "Boony Island".
"Senator Bushby for example has complained that Telstra should not be allowed to remove pay phones from Boony island ... Bruny island, there's a typo here," Senator Conroy said. AAP reported that "it took some time for the Senate to calm down after Senator Conroy's inadvertent tribute to Boon".
The idea of renaming the island off the coast of Hobart after Boon, one of the most popular Tasmanian figures, would no doubt have plenty of fans. There's probably a Facebook campaign being launched as we speak. You can guarantee that most Australians would be more familiar with Boon than the man after which the island was named - the eighteenth-century French explorer Bruni d'Entrecasteaux.
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