diff --git a/modules/gui/pymod/export_panel_bar.cc b/modules/gui/pymod/export_panel_bar.cc
index e83a8cb2b0eefd19dffacfc06874d0a9f0cb5a1b..cfac8c128a7b8ea7c5d0a66abb62edaf1df4f144 100644
--- a/modules/gui/pymod/export_panel_bar.cc
+++ b/modules/gui/pymod/export_panel_bar.cc
@@ -98,17 +98,6 @@ object panels_get_menu(Panels* panels)
   return get_py_qobject<QMenu>(panels->GetMenu());
 }
 
-object panels_get_qwidget(Panels* panels)
-{
-  static object sip_module=import("sip");
-  static object pyqt4_module=import("PyQt4.QtGui");
-  object sip_handle((size_t)panels);
-  object qwidget = pyqt4_module.attr("QWidget");
-  object widget = sip_module.attr("wrapinstance")(sip_handle, qwidget);
-
-  return widget;
-}
-
 void panel_bar_add_widget_a(PanelBar * pb, Widget* widget, bool hidden=false)
 {
   pb->AddWidget(widget,hidden);
@@ -149,7 +138,6 @@ void export_PanelBar()
     .def("RemoveWidget", &panels_remove_widget_b)
     .def("RemoveWidget", &panels_remove_widget_c)
     .def("GetMenu", &panels_get_menu)
-    .def("GetQWidget", &panels_get_qwidget)
     .def("AddWidgetToPool", &panels_add_widget_to_pool_a)
     .def("AddWidgetToPool", &panels_add_widget_to_pool_b)
     .def("AddWidgetToPool", &panels_add_widget_to_pool_c)
diff --git a/modules/gui/pymod/sip_handler.hh b/modules/gui/pymod/sip_handler.hh
index 9eb6ac7c4d3ad0aba5196ed4f81ad808b5a08b53..f9002d4ff5944e69f924c4a9c294a28c1727f6ed 100644
--- a/modules/gui/pymod/sip_handler.hh
+++ b/modules/gui/pymod/sip_handler.hh
@@ -52,6 +52,9 @@ template <class O> object get_py_qobject(O* cpp_object)
 template <class O> O* get_cpp_qobject(object py_object)
 {
   if(py_object.ptr() != Py_None){
+    if(PyObject_HasAttrString(py_object.ptr(), "qobject")){
+      py_object = py_object.attr("qobject");
+    }
     static object sip_module=import("sip");
     unsigned long addr = extract<unsigned long>(sip_module.attr("unwrapinstance")(py_object));
     if(addr){
diff --git a/scripts/init.py b/scripts/init.py
index e892e1838d1eed87919b40e36a3783c3c92443ec..7ff24d5a656685df1edfd522d14041cd56d48c3c 100644
--- a/scripts/init.py
+++ b/scripts/init.py
@@ -53,7 +53,7 @@ def _InitFrontEnd():
   _InitMenuBar(app)
   _InitSpaceNav(app)
   _InitContextMenu(app)
-  main_area.AddPersistentWidget("3D Scene", "gl_win" , app.gl_win.qobject, int(QtCore.Qt.WindowMaximized))
+  main_area.AddPersistentWidget("3D Scene", "gl_win" , app.gl_win, int(QtCore.Qt.WindowMaximized))
   app.perspective.Restore()
   additional_modules=getattr(__main__, 'ADDITIONAL_GUI_MODULES', [])
   for module_name in additional_modules: