Natalie Barr confronts Barnaby Joyce about his major lifestyle change

Sunrise presenter Natalie Barr has confronted Barnaby Joyce about giving up alcohol after footage of him lying on a footpath after too many drinks went viral.

It comes after Daily Mail Australia revealed a video of Joyce, 57, sprawled on the pavement on Lonsdale Street, in the Canberra suburb of Braddon, at 11.26pm on a Wednesday night in February.

On Monday, Barr asked Joyce about his intention to abstain from alcohol since that infamous night.

“I literally woke up the next morning and said, ‘That’s enough. I’ve given up smoking, I’ve given up alcohol,'” Joyce said.

‘It was my choice and no one else’s. I thought it was a shame, and I can’t do that again.’

Joyce said he had lost 30 pounds and felt “sharper” mentally than ever since he quit drinking. But he admitted life had been “boring” since he stopped drinking.

“Life is boring, having to talk to people at events. You know the nonsense they talk about? It’s unbelievable,” Joyce said.

Sunrise co-host Natalie Barr (left) quizzed Barnaby Joyce (right) about his decision to quit alcohol and asked if he would go back to drinking after admitting life without alcohol was ‘boring’

‘If you want to drink something, that’s absolutely your choice.

“I made a choice. Whether it’s for life or for as long as it lasts, I don’t know. I didn’t worry about it, I just woke up and stopped.”

Speaking from his office in Parliament House last week, Mr Joyce said he and Ms Campion no longer have alcohol in their home and that he has not touched a drop since that infamous night.

“I shamed myself and woke up the next morning and said, ‘That’s enough,’ so I didn’t drink anymore.”

His National Party MP colleagues said they have noticed a change in his behavior since returning to parliament after coalition leaders David Littleproud and Peter Dutton told him to take a break.

He claimed that in his spare time he ‘took up fencing’, did manual farm work, lost 15kg and was ‘sharper’ than ever.

Mr Joyce also revealed that someone who had looked closely at the footage told him his phone was upside down and that Ms Campion probably hadn’t heard what he said.

In the video, Joyce was seen lying on the sidewalk with his legs up and his jacket wide open.

He wore the same blue and white tie worn earlier that day during Question Time at Parliament House.

Mrs Campion said her husband was not referring to her when he called someone a “dead bastard” during the phone call.

“I think that’s what he called himself, he likes to flog himself,” she said.

Mr Joyce said he decided to give up drinking alcohol after he was filmed rolling on the floor and muttering curses into his phone on a Wednesday night in February (pictured)

Joyce described the scene at the time as “very embarrassing” in a statement to Daily Mail Australia.

“I was walking back to my accommodation after Parliament met at 10pm,” he said.

‘While I was on the phone, I sat on the edge of a planter, fell over, kept talking and very vividly referred to myself as having fallen.

“I got up and walked home.”

The couple also sold their Braddon apartment this year, which belonged to Mrs Campion, and Mr Joyce sold his family home in Tamworth for $1.1 million.

The couple married in November 2023 in a bush bash-style wedding at his property in Woolbrook, in the NSW Northern Tablelands.