Federal MP Clive Palmer copied large parts of one of JFK's 1961 speeches but denies that he plagiarised the speech of the former American President.

Palmer reportedly did not attribute any of the huge chunks of the speech to the former U.S. President while speaking for the National Press Club.

The paragraphs that Mr Palmer copied from the 52-year-old speech were slightly altered according to ABC. John F Kennedy's original speech is titled "The President and the Press."

The MP's changes include an update of the line discussing press capitalism but basically, the speech is the same. Palmer denies however that he plagiarised John F Kennedy by saying that he only "retold history".

According to ABC, Mr Palmer said, "So I told them the same story, because that was the historical facts" adding that if a person comments about the Second World War that person is not plagiarising the Second World War because "that's history".

This is not the first time that a government official stole or copied parts of a speech. Anthony Albanese, a former Deputy Prime Minister copied lines from the film "The American President". Mr Albanese said however that his staff wrote the speech and that he hasn't seen the Michael Douglas film.

The Labour Party member seemed to have had the magic words according to CBS and added that it was "movie magic" because it was the same speech as that of the fictional character U.S. President Andrew Shepherd in "The American President". The Telegraph reported at the time that Brian Loughnane thought that the words seemed familiar. The film was written by Aaron Sorkin; Sorkin later created "The West Wing".

Politicians overseas also have their fair share of plagiarising including Stephen Harper, a Canadian Opposition Leader, who in 2003 copied large parts of John Howard's speech on Iraq. Harper had to apologise for the copied content.

Philippine senator Tito Sotto was accused of plagiarising a blogger during his rebuttal speech against the Southeast Asian nation's Reproductive Health Bill. The blogger, Sarah Pope, wrote about the experience saying that the senator lifted entire sections of what she wrote.

Based on comments from netizens, Mr Clive Palmer could have been forgiven if he practised "a little humility".