May 8, 2025 • 24 mins
It will go down as one of the most resounding victories in Australian political history. Prime Minister Anthony Albanese out-performed the expectations of just about everyone last weekend, decimating the Liberal party to the extent where even its leader lost his own seat. So, what next for Labor? As the caucus gathers in Canberra on Friday, we look at the new faces in the team and discuss which are the ones to watch. Also, we try to decide whether the teals have gone backwards or consolidated power with their results. Chief Political Correspondent David Crowe, and Political Correspondent Paul Sakkal join Jacqueline Maley to discuss.
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S1 (00:00):
From the newsrooms of the Sydney Morning Herald and The Age.
This is inside politics. I'm Jacqueline Maley, it's Friday, May
the 9th. It will go down as one of the
most resounding victories in Australian political history. Prime Minister Anthony
Albanese outperformed the expectations of just about everyone last weekend,
(00:20):
decimating the Liberal Party to the extent where even its
own leader has lost his own seat. So what's next
for labor, as the caucus gathers in Canberra on Friday?
We look at the new faces in the team and
discuss which are the ones to watch. Also, we try
to decide whether the teals have gone backwards or consolidated
power with their results. Joining me to discuss, we have
(00:42):
our chief political correspondent, David Crowe and political correspondent Paul Satchell. Welcome, gentlemen.
S2 (00:48):
Hello, jacki. Hello, Paul.
S3 (00:49):
Hi, guys.
S1 (00:50):
Gosh, there is so much to cover. I hardly know
where to begin, but I want to start with a
walk through of the new faces in the labor caucus,
which will be meeting on Friday. In the last parliament,
Labour had 77 MPs. They're on track to have about
89 MPs at time of recording in the next parliament,
which will be the 48th Parliament of Australia. So which
of these new MPs are the of the most interest
(01:11):
to you, David?
S2 (01:12):
Well, I think there's been a lot of headlines about
Aly France, who clearly won the seat of Dixon and
defeated Peter Dutton. I mean, that's a monumental outcome for labor,
something that brings a lot of personal satisfaction to Anthony
Albanese as prime minister. But it's also really a story
about grit and determination because Aly France, I remember seeing
(01:35):
her in 2019, in the campaign. Then she had a
go at Dixon, didn't work out. She had another go
in 2022. She has made it on the third attempt
and that's something that we have to remember. Takes a
lot of grit and determination to really keep at it
in politics. And sometimes some of the best politicians are
those who've tried again and again and again to win
(01:56):
a seat. But Aly France was really part of a
wider trend in Queensland because there were so many women
running for labor seats. And I find some of these
personal stories really interesting. There's Renee Coffey, who won the
seat of Griffith for labor. She defeated Max Chandler-mather again,
a lot of satisfaction for labor there because he, as
(02:16):
the Greens MP, was such a fierce critic of labor.
I mean, really got under their skin. He was a
firebrand and I thought, you know, an incredible political force.
But Renee Coffey got the better of him in that electorate.
Another person who's emerged in Queensland is called Emma Colmer.
I don't really know much about her, except for the
(02:36):
fact that only about 8 or 9 weeks ago, labor
were looking for somebody to run for the seat of
Petrie in northern Brisbane. They didn't have a candidate, and
so they looked for volunteers. And Emma Comber, who was
working as an adviser, I think, and has got either
military background or maybe in the reserves, something like that.
(02:57):
She basically put her hand up and volunteered. And in
the space of a couple of months, suddenly she's a
member of Parliament.
S1 (03:04):
So, yeah, she's a former army officer cadet, and she's
quite young. She works in the office of Anthony Chisholm.
So she. Yeah, she was a former labor staffer. And
the reason why they didn't pre-select someone until six weeks
before the election is because they just didn't think that
was a winnable seat. That was Luke Horwath, the Liberal MP.
And he suffered a 6.79% swing against him to Labor
(03:26):
on Election day. So that's quite extraordinary, isn't it?
S2 (03:29):
Yeah. What I liked about that story is that it
all comes down to who's willing to volunteer, who's willing
to put their hand up and they go for it.
They throw everything into it and sometimes they fail. Like,
you know, there was a promising candidate for labor in
the seat of Longman just nearby, and it doesn't look
like she has actually made it. Local school teacher decided
(03:49):
to go for it. They put some resources into Longman,
but it didn't pan out. So you've got to respect
not just the ones who make it, but also the
ones who put a huge amount of effort into it
and do not make it. But there are women who
have come into the caucus at this election from other places.
Claire Clutterham, the seat of Sturt in South Australia, somebody
with a lot of experience, who's got a lot of
(04:10):
promise as a future minister, these kind of people are
coming in. And of course, there is Sarah Witty, the
Labour candidate for Melbourne, who has won that seat clearly
on the numbers. And that is a huge blow to
the Greens. That's the seat of the Greens leader Adam Bandt.
So these these labor victors are a really interesting part
(04:30):
of the story of this election.
S4 (04:32):
I lead with the Greens now having the sole balance
of power in the Senate. The government now can't blame
any independent senator for not making reforms.
S3 (04:43):
And when you have a win that's this big, unexpectedly big,
you just end up with a lot of kind of
accidental MPs. It's potentially a harsh term, but these are
MPs who were in seats that received either $0 from
head office or next to $0 in Victoria. You've got Matt,
Greg and Gabriel, Angie and Menzies and Deakin. About ten
days out, they'd receive no money. They put some money
(05:03):
in at the end and they won them. There's the
new member for banks who beat David Coleman. Never on
the agenda. There's 3 or 4 of them in Queensland.
There's the new member for Moore and was there'll be
about 10 or 12 MPs and some senators who have
won on the number three position in in Senate tickets,
such as Michelle Ananda-rajah and the 21 year old, who
never would have thought they'd be in Parliament.
S2 (05:23):
The other one we should mention is Madonna Jarrett, who
won the seat of Brisbane. That's her second attempt. I
think I saw her at the last campaign. I went
to a labor event and I got talking to a
woman there. It turned out to be Madonna, Jarrett's mum.
You know who? Uh, so I learned a bit about Madonna,
Jarrett's background, you know, business.
S1 (05:39):
Great source. She's the mums are always a great source.
S2 (05:42):
Business background has worked around the world. Came back to
Australia and decided to run for Parliament. I mean, we
often get the perception that it's a terrible gig. In fact,
Max Chandler-mather made some very critical remarks about Parliament on
Triple J after losing because.
S5 (06:00):
Like basically every time I stood up, I got screamed
and yelled at, like in terms of a workplace. It
was bloody awful and frankly, a lot of the times miserable.
And the only reason I kept going.
S2 (06:10):
I actually see it a different way. Elections are a
sad time because good people lose, but they're also a
time with an influx of new talent and new energy,
and that's actually something to be welcomed. And so I
think that that renewal is a really important thing.
S1 (06:28):
Yeah, absolutely. Let's move to the opposition side now, which
has somewhat less renewal. They do have a few new MPs. Possibly.
The counts aren't sort of all finalised at at the
moment of recording. But Paul talk us through some of
the new MPs that they might get. Obviously their seat
count is massively, drastically reduced. But who's been swapped in?
S3 (06:48):
Well, the one that we know with certainty is coming back.
Is Tim Wilson, the member for Goldstein in a south
eastern Melbourne, the wealthy seat that's based around the very
wealthy suburb of Brighton. Tim Wilson was a former junior
minister in the Morrison government, and he was the assistant
minister for energy under Angus Taylor. He's a contentious figure
in Australian politics. He was a IPA fellow and a
(07:12):
libertarian in his in his younger part of his life.
He's a small L liberal as well, kind of mix
between libertarian and liberal. He ended up working at the
Human Rights Commission. He was a strong advocate for same
sex marriage when he entered the parliament. He made a
famous speech on the floor of Parliament. He is gay himself.
S2 (07:31):
He proposed to his husband from the floor of parliament.
S3 (07:33):
During the.
S2 (07:34):
Speech on marriage equality, which was quite a moment.
S4 (07:37):
So there's only one thing left to do. Ryan, Patrick Bolger,
will you marry me?
S2 (07:43):
I saw his husband in the photographs of when Tim
was talking about winning the seat. So interesting. personal story.
S3 (07:49):
Very interesting. And despite being a fierce advocate for arguably
the most important progressive reform of the last decade or so,
he's a figure of of real ridicule among many on
the left.
S1 (08:01):
And so why? Why is that? Tell us why.
S3 (08:03):
Well, it's fascinating. I mean, I've talked I've talked to
him a lot about this over the period. And I
had a long conversation with him about two years ago
when we wrote the story showing that he was going
to run again, which I remember when I did that
story with him, he was sitting across from me in
a cafe, and it was the first time he'd he'd
said publicly that he was going to run. And as
as I turned the recorder on, he started to cry
a little bit. And he had to compose himself because
(08:26):
it was such a big moment for him to run again.
He told me yesterday in an interview, which I put
in a story today that, and I didn't know this
all at the time that he was seeing a psychologist.
He'd gone to London for a period to just sit
in Hyde Park and read books about Winston Churchill and
others who'd been in the political wilderness. He found it
really difficult with how much, particularly online, joy there was
(08:47):
at his loss. It was such a public humiliation. He
puts himself out there in an extremely confident way. Tim Wilson.
A lot of people look at that and sense that
he's an entitled toff who went to a private school.
These are quotes from him yesterday who's had everything handed
to him on a silver platter. He argues that where
he's what he's perceived as arrogance comes from is just
(09:10):
this innate sense of self-confidence that comes largely from his
getting through his troubles as a young man struggling with
his sexuality, particularly in a conservative party. He's very confident
of his own views and his own values that can
come across as brash and arrogant, and I think those
traits are reasonably observed of him sometimes. But he believes
he's misunderstood. I personally think he's a bit misunderstood as well.
(09:33):
He's a person with rough edges and a flawed character,
but he's got a lot to offer. I think he's
one of few liberals across the country at the moment
who you can guarantee will come into the Parliament and
love him or hate him. Fight and argue and be
on the front lines with no fear. Fighting for actual policies,
policy positions and the party's lack that.
S1 (09:55):
Which he has done in the past. And that might
explain the reason why he's a little bit reviled amongst
some on the left in particular. As you say. I mean,
that goes back to when he was appointed to the
Human Rights Commission, which a lot of people within that
sort of human rights space thought was a completely unmeritorious appointment.
And also, of course, in the 2019 election, he argued
(10:16):
very strongly against.
S3 (10:19):
Franking credits and negative credits.
S1 (10:21):
And negative gearing. So he was sort of seen, I think,
or painted in some parts of the left as being
someone who was standing up for these fat cat boomers
who were making too much money out of these tax perks.
S2 (10:32):
You can also argue that that showed his ability to
really go after labor on an economic issue. Yeah, and that's.
S1 (10:39):
Absolutely.
S2 (10:40):
That. The liberals did not do so well in the
last campaign. And so therefore they they might look at
Tim Wilson and think, okay, we want what he did.
That's what we.
S1 (10:49):
Need. Well, he was he was successful in that campaign. Yeah.
Highly successful. And also it was it was staunch liberal territory.
You know, it was a proper sort of liberal economic
policy that he was standing up for. So, um, which
is probably more than you can say about any of
the campaign that's just been run.
S3 (11:05):
Just one more point on that. There's there's been quite
a lot of consternation in the Liberal Party in recent months,
and more than that, about why the party hadn't made
more of this unrealised capital gains tax proposal from Labour.
They started talking about it with more vigour in the
last week or two of the campaign, but it was
deemed as far too late. This was something that Tim
Wilson says, I think today in a different paper that
(11:27):
he would have been talking about for a year. He
would have turned it into a huge campaign.
S1 (11:31):
Yeah. This is people with super superannuation balances above $3 million, right?
S3 (11:35):
That's right. Yep. And he, he unapologetically, uh, stands up for,
you know, people who want to make want to make
money and pass on wealth to their children. And ironically,
for all of the talk about winning the outer suburbs
and battlers and Dutton pitching to old labor voters to
win seats in the peri urban areas, they went backwards
(11:56):
in some of those areas and they ended up winning
a teal seat, potentially another teal seat in Kooyong and
potentially keeping the seat of Bradfield in in a Sydney
where people have a lot of money and where Dutton
spent very little time. Old school liberals came back to
the Liberal Party, at least to some extent.
S1 (12:11):
Yeah, and they're probably most likely to have balances in
surplus of $3 million in their superannuation. Just quickly, let's
talk about two of the other candidates that might or
might not get up at point of recording. We've got
Kooyong in Melbourne, so we've got Amelia Hammer, the Liberal candidate,
young woman who might knock off Monique Ryan. I actually
am not even sure there's 100, a few hundred votes
(12:33):
between them at the moment. And then we've got Giselle,
captain in Bradfield. So she's looking more likely to win
Bradfield against the teals contender, Nicolette Buller.
S2 (12:43):
I think whatever happens, both would be faces for the
future because they've got political backgrounds. Amelia Hammer is from
a political family, obviously with a grandfather who was a
senator and a grand uncle who was a premier of Victoria.
Giselle has been in the Liberal politics for a long
time and has worked as an adviser in Parliament House
(13:04):
in Canberra, so it's still close in terms of those votes.
Both of them are like Tim Wilson are coming in
in a way that sums up or embodies something that
Nick Greiner, the former New South Wales premier, said to
me the other day, which is that the future of
the Liberal Party is that it's got to be warm
and dry. That means liberal on social policies, dry on
(13:25):
economic policies. So that is something that liberals have really
struggled with. And Sky News After Dark really encourages them
to be, you know, vehemently conservative on social issues and
look for culture wars and, you know, go after these
woke agendas so-called.
S3 (13:41):
And advocating for government largesse on various things.
S2 (13:44):
Like government ownership of nuclear power stations. So, you know,
the warm and dry approach is something that some of
these new members can actually stand up for, and it's
going to be a really interesting dynamic, depending on how
many of those new members come in.
S3 (13:59):
And you might want to explain what dry and wet
mean to.
S2 (14:02):
Well, yeah. I mean, in the old days, like 30
years ago, the Liberal Party had wets and drys. The wets,
you know, were sort of, well, more moderate on economic policy.
But the drys won the argument. John Howard won the
argument on the economic side. But yeah. Free market.
S1 (14:23):
Yeah. So big on fiscal responsibility. Um, big on building surpluses. Um, yeah.
Free market. Um, uh, yeah. Uh, tax cuts. Yeah.
S2 (14:32):
But then they struggled to deal with marriage equality. Why
was that? Why did they why did the conservative economic
agenda lead them into a place where they were vehemently
conservative on a social agenda as well? And that is
something that they've really struggled with, and they will still
struggle with it in the future. It's going to be
a very interesting dispute within the party to resolve that,
(14:55):
so that they can reach out to voters who, let's
face it, just don't care about who marries whom.
S1 (15:01):
Yeah, right. Yeah. Dare I say it? They need more
diversity within their ranks. I wanted to deal really briefly
with the teals because there, you know, we talked about
them so much last election. We talked about them so
much this election. How have they actually done? They've gone
backwards in terms of their seat count. Um, is that right, David?
S2 (15:16):
Yeah. I think that that would be a reasonable interpretation
at the moment, because it looks very tough for the
teals in Kooyong with Monique Ryan. They've lost Goldstein. So
Zoe Daniel is out and it's line ball in Bradfield,
which was really the great hope for for the teals
with Nicolette Buhler taking on Giselle Terrien. So we have
(15:36):
to wait for all the results. But it clearly hasn't
been a banner banner year for the teals, even though
when I looked around at some of the funding, there
was an enormous amount of funding for some of these
independent candidates, they didn't knock off the Liberals. Dan Tehan
in the seat of Wannon, right. They threw everything at
that and they didn't knock him off.
S1 (15:56):
Could you say maybe, maybe this is overly optimistic, but
could you say that they have consolidated their power, particularly
in the Sydney seats that they hold and people like
Zali Steggall, Allegra Spender, Sophie Scamps up in Mackellar on
the northern beaches are looking pretty rusted on now. They're
looking like they might hold those seats for as long
as they want them. And also in a seat like Wannon,
the fact that a teal was even a contender there
(16:18):
surely an indicator that the movement's going okay.
S2 (16:20):
Oh, I think it's hard to tell at this stage
whether they've got momentum for the future. And some of
the really interesting developments have been people who've grown into
being more than teals. I mean, I think you'd say
Zali Steggall, you know, is much more than a teal
because she's got such a strong community base there in Warringah.
We've seen Allegra Spender really expand her interests far beyond integrity,
(16:44):
women and climate, which were those three issues that took
a lot of the teals into Parliament in the first place.
She talks about tax reform. She talks about an economic agenda.
S1 (16:52):
She was pretty much the only person talking about tax
reform in the last parliament, from what I could tell.
S2 (16:56):
Stepped up as a as a real contributor to Parliament.
And so this is where I think the people who
backed the community, independents have issues with the media, because
we all use the shorthand label of teal to describe them.
Let's face it, they all share a funding base in
climate 200, but they're much more than that as well.
So you've got to acknowledge both those sides. Climate 200
(17:19):
spent a lot of money and didn't get up all
the people that it wanted. So there are questions about
how they campaigned.
S1 (17:26):
I want to just acknowledge the Greens as well. Obviously
the Greens have gone massively backwards at the moment. They
look like they're going to hold one seat out of
the four seats they had in the last parliament. They've
lost their leader and it's unclear who's going to take
his place. That's Adam Bandt. I do want to move
swiftly onwards because we've got something a little bit special today.
(17:47):
I'm off on leave next week. I'm touring with my
new novel, and Crowley only has two weeks left before
he leaves his chief political correspondent role to move to
London and take up his new job as Europe correspondent.
So this is our Farewell Inside Politics podcast together. And
I want to pay tribute to Crowley because he's one
of the most intelligent, insightful, diligent, delightfully collegiate people I've
(18:09):
ever worked with. He's been in the press gallery in
Canberra for 20 years, eight of which were with the
Sydney Morning Herald and Age. David, if it's possible, can
you pick out a few highlights of your parliamentary career?
S2 (18:21):
Well, I'm almost lost for words after that, Jacqui, because,
you know, I'm very aware that my career has had
ups and downs and, uh, I guess diligent is a
good word because you've got to have stamina in this
kind of gig just to stick it out in journalism
and in covering politics. Sorry, what was your question? Highlights
of my career. Oh, look, I reckon some of the
(18:42):
highlights are really dramatic moments that not necessarily the best story. Well,
this one was a great story. I wrote it with
Bevan Shields, the Herald editor, after we were part of
a doorstop of Emmanuel Macron in Rome, where Andrew Probyn,
our nine colleague, basically found a way to corner Macron.
And I was part of the press pack that sort
(19:02):
of got around the French president. And of course, the
question was, did Scott Morrison lie to you.
S6 (19:08):
With his value? Do you think he lied to you?
I don't think I know.
S2 (19:13):
And that has gone down into folklore and just being
part of that. It was a reminder of how a
lot of journalism is planned, but a lot of it
is just being in the right place at the right time.
And thanks to people like Andrew Probyn at the time
who loitered outside this press event, And then, you know,
the security guards block me. When I came out and
(19:34):
tried to get to the scrum and so forth, but
it all worked beautifully in terms of just being able
to put the question to the French president in a
way that would not normally be possible. So I love that.
And then and then after that we flew to Glasgow
of all places for a climate summit, and me and
Bevan sat up, you know, with no sleep, filing the
story from the hotel lobby. It was just a real
(19:57):
adrenaline rush.
S1 (19:57):
Yeah. Yeah, well, the best journalists are the biggest pests, right?
What are the worst parts of the job? Because there
are long hours. You're under a great deal of pressure
all the time. There's enormous competition with your colleagues in
the press gallery to get stories, to get leaks. What
do you find the most difficult?
S2 (20:12):
Some of the worst aspects of the job are the hours.
Like you say, it's it's a hard slog sometimes. Sometimes
you can spend an entire day stressed about a story
and not even have a really good story at the
end of the day, and it can take you hours
and you've got nothing. Um, so that's frustrating. I found
when I look back, it's really bad points when I
(20:35):
write about people being sacked. I remember writing about a
minister in the Rudd-gillard years, and she was going to
be sacked, and I wrote that she was going to
be sacked because it was true and the numbers were
against her, and it's a brutal business. But then I
had a conversation with her, and I felt so bad
at The Heartless Way, in which I wrote about the
(20:56):
end of her career as a minister. Um, it was
a reminder that there is this human toll in the business,
and I often forget to be more human when I
write about people. Um, you get caught up in the moment,
and you.
S1 (21:11):
I would I would challenge that. Actually, I think you're
incredibly humane, but, um, it is very difficult sometimes to
to strike that correct balance between objectivity and a certain
coldness that we need to have. And, um, recognizing that
we're writing about people at the end of the day.
S3 (21:24):
Do you feel optimistic or pessimistic about the kind of
future of politics and governance in Australia. But from now,
compared to when you started.
S2 (21:31):
I feel quite optimistic. But, um, a lot of journalists
are very cynical and get get grimmer as they age.
But I found maybe it's just the election, the sense
of renewal, the sense of new people coming in. I
talked to a former Liberal president, Shane Stone, a few
days ago, and he said, this is a great time
for a conservative to come into Parliament. Things always turn.
(21:52):
So if I was young and I wanted to be conservative,
I would get into Parliament now. I found that really
interesting because I think he was right. There is always
renewal and there is always a place for new energy.
And I think that's what keeps me optimistic about Australian politics,
even though I'm very aware that social media makes it harder,
the 24 over seven news cycle makes it harder. I
(22:14):
think that the ease with which the people on either
end of the political spectrum can get headlines and can
sort of disrupt, uh, makes holding the centre harder. Um,
but all that said, I'm still optimistic.
S1 (22:29):
And perhaps this, um, this election result is a is
an affirmation of the common sense centre, I don't know.
S2 (22:35):
I think it is. I think it is. I'm going
to that's where I'm at with something I'm writing at
the moment. It's like the people in the centre have
shoved out their elbows and just pushed aside the people
on the edges to say, hang on a minute, we're
just going to hold the centre here.
S1 (22:48):
We should mention as well that Clive Palmer, I've lost
track of how many hundreds of millions he's spent on
the election, but they didn't win a single candidate to parliament.
So there's something in that.
S2 (22:58):
Thank goodness to donation law reform in the future will
have a better inkling of it. But right now, we
don't know how much you spent on this campaign.
S3 (23:06):
Well, a lot of it's come to our newspapers.
S1 (23:08):
I know actually, yeah. Let's not let's not mention the
advertising spend to to critically. Um, gentleman, that was so interesting.
And Crowley, this is not goodbye. It's just we'll see
you soon because I think we're going to have to
find a way to have you back on the podcast
in a new role.
S2 (23:22):
I'll dial in with some observations, but thank you, Jackie.
Thank you for having me on all those all those times.
It's been really good and I really appreciate it.
S1 (23:29):
All right, well, Chloe's off to have tea with the
King in a few weeks, and I will see you
in two weeks. Guys, thank you so much for coming on.
It's been really interesting, such a fascinating result. And, um,
we will say goodbye.
S3 (23:41):
See you. Jackie.
S2 (23:42):
Cheers.
S1 (23:44):
Today's episode was produced by Julia Katzel with technical assistance
from Debbie Harrington. Our executive producer is Tammy Mills, and
Tom McKendrick is our head of audio. To listen to
our episodes as soon as they drop, follow Inside Politics
on Apple, Spotify or anywhere else you listen to your
podcasts and to stay up to date with all the
election coverage and exclusives, visit The Age and The Sydney
(24:08):
Morning Herald websites to support our journalism. Subscribe to us
by visiting the page or. Subscribe. I'm Jacqueline Maley. Thank
you for listening.
From the newsrooms of the Sydney Morning Herald and The Age.
This is inside politics. I'm Jacqueline Maley, it's Friday, May
the 9th. It will go down as one of the
most resounding victories in Australian political history. Prime Minister Anthony
Albanese outperformed the expectations of just about everyone last weekend,
(00:20):
decimating the Liberal Party to the extent where even its
own leader has lost his own seat. So what's next
for labor, as the caucus gathers in Canberra on Friday?
We look at the new faces in the team and
discuss which are the ones to watch. Also, we try
to decide whether the teals have gone backwards or consolidated
power with their results. Joining me to discuss, we have
(00:42):
our chief political correspondent, David Crowe and political correspondent Paul Satchell. Welcome, gentlemen.
S2 (00:48):
Hello, jacki. Hello, Paul.
S3 (00:49):
Hi, guys.
S1 (00:50):
Gosh, there is so much to cover. I hardly know
where to begin, but I want to start with a
walk through of the new faces in the labor caucus,
which will be meeting on Friday. In the last parliament,
Labour had 77 MPs. They're on track to have about
89 MPs at time of recording in the next parliament,
which will be the 48th Parliament of Australia. So which
of these new MPs are the of the most interest
(01:11):
to you, David?
S2 (01:12):
Well, I think there's been a lot of headlines about
Aly France, who clearly won the seat of Dixon and
defeated Peter Dutton. I mean, that's a monumental outcome for labor,
something that brings a lot of personal satisfaction to Anthony
Albanese as prime minister. But it's also really a story
about grit and determination because Aly France, I remember seeing
(01:35):
her in 2019, in the campaign. Then she had a
go at Dixon, didn't work out. She had another go
in 2022. She has made it on the third attempt
and that's something that we have to remember. Takes a
lot of grit and determination to really keep at it
in politics. And sometimes some of the best politicians are
those who've tried again and again and again to win
(01:56):
a seat. But Aly France was really part of a
wider trend in Queensland because there were so many women
running for labor seats. And I find some of these
personal stories really interesting. There's Renee Coffey, who won the
seat of Griffith for labor. She defeated Max Chandler-mather again,
a lot of satisfaction for labor there because he, as
(02:16):
the Greens MP, was such a fierce critic of labor.
I mean, really got under their skin. He was a
firebrand and I thought, you know, an incredible political force.
But Renee Coffey got the better of him in that electorate.
Another person who's emerged in Queensland is called Emma Colmer.
I don't really know much about her, except for the
(02:36):
fact that only about 8 or 9 weeks ago, labor
were looking for somebody to run for the seat of
Petrie in northern Brisbane. They didn't have a candidate, and
so they looked for volunteers. And Emma Comber, who was
working as an adviser, I think, and has got either
military background or maybe in the reserves, something like that.
(02:57):
She basically put her hand up and volunteered. And in
the space of a couple of months, suddenly she's a
member of Parliament.
S1 (03:04):
So, yeah, she's a former army officer cadet, and she's
quite young. She works in the office of Anthony Chisholm.
So she. Yeah, she was a former labor staffer. And
the reason why they didn't pre-select someone until six weeks
before the election is because they just didn't think that
was a winnable seat. That was Luke Horwath, the Liberal MP.
And he suffered a 6.79% swing against him to Labor
(03:26):
on Election day. So that's quite extraordinary, isn't it?
S2 (03:29):
Yeah. What I liked about that story is that it
all comes down to who's willing to volunteer, who's willing
to put their hand up and they go for it.
They throw everything into it and sometimes they fail. Like,
you know, there was a promising candidate for labor in
the seat of Longman just nearby, and it doesn't look
like she has actually made it. Local school teacher decided
(03:49):
to go for it. They put some resources into Longman,
but it didn't pan out. So you've got to respect
not just the ones who make it, but also the
ones who put a huge amount of effort into it
and do not make it. But there are women who
have come into the caucus at this election from other places.
Claire Clutterham, the seat of Sturt in South Australia, somebody
with a lot of experience, who's got a lot of
(04:10):
promise as a future minister, these kind of people are
coming in. And of course, there is Sarah Witty, the
Labour candidate for Melbourne, who has won that seat clearly
on the numbers. And that is a huge blow to
the Greens. That's the seat of the Greens leader Adam Bandt.
So these these labor victors are a really interesting part
(04:30):
of the story of this election.
S4 (04:32):
I lead with the Greens now having the sole balance
of power in the Senate. The government now can't blame
any independent senator for not making reforms.
S3 (04:43):
And when you have a win that's this big, unexpectedly big,
you just end up with a lot of kind of
accidental MPs. It's potentially a harsh term, but these are
MPs who were in seats that received either $0 from
head office or next to $0 in Victoria. You've got Matt,
Greg and Gabriel, Angie and Menzies and Deakin. About ten
days out, they'd receive no money. They put some money
(05:03):
in at the end and they won them. There's the
new member for banks who beat David Coleman. Never on
the agenda. There's 3 or 4 of them in Queensland.
There's the new member for Moore and was there'll be
about 10 or 12 MPs and some senators who have
won on the number three position in in Senate tickets,
such as Michelle Ananda-rajah and the 21 year old, who
never would have thought they'd be in Parliament.
S2 (05:23):
The other one we should mention is Madonna Jarrett, who
won the seat of Brisbane. That's her second attempt. I
think I saw her at the last campaign. I went
to a labor event and I got talking to a
woman there. It turned out to be Madonna, Jarrett's mum.
You know who? Uh, so I learned a bit about Madonna,
Jarrett's background, you know, business.
S1 (05:39):
Great source. She's the mums are always a great source.
S2 (05:42):
Business background has worked around the world. Came back to
Australia and decided to run for Parliament. I mean, we
often get the perception that it's a terrible gig. In fact,
Max Chandler-mather made some very critical remarks about Parliament on
Triple J after losing because.
S5 (06:00):
Like basically every time I stood up, I got screamed
and yelled at, like in terms of a workplace. It
was bloody awful and frankly, a lot of the times miserable.
And the only reason I kept going.
S2 (06:10):
I actually see it a different way. Elections are a
sad time because good people lose, but they're also a
time with an influx of new talent and new energy,
and that's actually something to be welcomed. And so I
think that that renewal is a really important thing.
S1 (06:28):
Yeah, absolutely. Let's move to the opposition side now, which
has somewhat less renewal. They do have a few new MPs. Possibly.
The counts aren't sort of all finalised at at the
moment of recording. But Paul talk us through some of
the new MPs that they might get. Obviously their seat
count is massively, drastically reduced. But who's been swapped in?
S3 (06:48):
Well, the one that we know with certainty is coming back.
Is Tim Wilson, the member for Goldstein in a south
eastern Melbourne, the wealthy seat that's based around the very
wealthy suburb of Brighton. Tim Wilson was a former junior
minister in the Morrison government, and he was the assistant
minister for energy under Angus Taylor. He's a contentious figure
in Australian politics. He was a IPA fellow and a
(07:12):
libertarian in his in his younger part of his life.
He's a small L liberal as well, kind of mix
between libertarian and liberal. He ended up working at the
Human Rights Commission. He was a strong advocate for same
sex marriage when he entered the parliament. He made a
famous speech on the floor of Parliament. He is gay himself.
S2 (07:31):
He proposed to his husband from the floor of parliament.
S3 (07:33):
During the.
S2 (07:34):
Speech on marriage equality, which was quite a moment.
S4 (07:37):
So there's only one thing left to do. Ryan, Patrick Bolger,
will you marry me?
S2 (07:43):
I saw his husband in the photographs of when Tim
was talking about winning the seat. So interesting. personal story.
S3 (07:49):
Very interesting. And despite being a fierce advocate for arguably
the most important progressive reform of the last decade or so,
he's a figure of of real ridicule among many on
the left.
S1 (08:01):
And so why? Why is that? Tell us why.
S3 (08:03):
Well, it's fascinating. I mean, I've talked I've talked to
him a lot about this over the period. And I
had a long conversation with him about two years ago
when we wrote the story showing that he was going
to run again, which I remember when I did that
story with him, he was sitting across from me in
a cafe, and it was the first time he'd he'd
said publicly that he was going to run. And as
as I turned the recorder on, he started to cry
a little bit. And he had to compose himself because
(08:26):
it was such a big moment for him to run again.
He told me yesterday in an interview, which I put
in a story today that, and I didn't know this
all at the time that he was seeing a psychologist.
He'd gone to London for a period to just sit
in Hyde Park and read books about Winston Churchill and
others who'd been in the political wilderness. He found it
really difficult with how much, particularly online, joy there was
(08:47):
at his loss. It was such a public humiliation. He
puts himself out there in an extremely confident way. Tim Wilson.
A lot of people look at that and sense that
he's an entitled toff who went to a private school.
These are quotes from him yesterday who's had everything handed
to him on a silver platter. He argues that where
he's what he's perceived as arrogance comes from is just
(09:10):
this innate sense of self-confidence that comes largely from his
getting through his troubles as a young man struggling with
his sexuality, particularly in a conservative party. He's very confident
of his own views and his own values that can
come across as brash and arrogant, and I think those
traits are reasonably observed of him sometimes. But he believes
he's misunderstood. I personally think he's a bit misunderstood as well.
(09:33):
He's a person with rough edges and a flawed character,
but he's got a lot to offer. I think he's
one of few liberals across the country at the moment
who you can guarantee will come into the Parliament and
love him or hate him. Fight and argue and be
on the front lines with no fear. Fighting for actual policies,
policy positions and the party's lack that.
S1 (09:55):
Which he has done in the past. And that might
explain the reason why he's a little bit reviled amongst
some on the left in particular. As you say. I mean,
that goes back to when he was appointed to the
Human Rights Commission, which a lot of people within that
sort of human rights space thought was a completely unmeritorious appointment.
And also, of course, in the 2019 election, he argued
(10:16):
very strongly against.
S3 (10:19):
Franking credits and negative credits.
S1 (10:21):
And negative gearing. So he was sort of seen, I think,
or painted in some parts of the left as being
someone who was standing up for these fat cat boomers
who were making too much money out of these tax perks.
S2 (10:32):
You can also argue that that showed his ability to
really go after labor on an economic issue. Yeah, and that's.
S1 (10:39):
Absolutely.
S2 (10:40):
That. The liberals did not do so well in the
last campaign. And so therefore they they might look at
Tim Wilson and think, okay, we want what he did.
That's what we.
S1 (10:49):
Need. Well, he was he was successful in that campaign. Yeah.
Highly successful. And also it was it was staunch liberal territory.
You know, it was a proper sort of liberal economic
policy that he was standing up for. So, um, which
is probably more than you can say about any of
the campaign that's just been run.
S3 (11:05):
Just one more point on that. There's there's been quite
a lot of consternation in the Liberal Party in recent months,
and more than that, about why the party hadn't made
more of this unrealised capital gains tax proposal from Labour.
They started talking about it with more vigour in the
last week or two of the campaign, but it was
deemed as far too late. This was something that Tim
Wilson says, I think today in a different paper that
(11:27):
he would have been talking about for a year. He
would have turned it into a huge campaign.
S1 (11:31):
Yeah. This is people with super superannuation balances above $3 million, right?
S3 (11:35):
That's right. Yep. And he, he unapologetically, uh, stands up for,
you know, people who want to make want to make
money and pass on wealth to their children. And ironically,
for all of the talk about winning the outer suburbs
and battlers and Dutton pitching to old labor voters to
win seats in the peri urban areas, they went backwards
(11:56):
in some of those areas and they ended up winning
a teal seat, potentially another teal seat in Kooyong and
potentially keeping the seat of Bradfield in in a Sydney
where people have a lot of money and where Dutton
spent very little time. Old school liberals came back to
the Liberal Party, at least to some extent.
S1 (12:11):
Yeah, and they're probably most likely to have balances in
surplus of $3 million in their superannuation. Just quickly, let's
talk about two of the other candidates that might or
might not get up at point of recording. We've got
Kooyong in Melbourne, so we've got Amelia Hammer, the Liberal candidate,
young woman who might knock off Monique Ryan. I actually
am not even sure there's 100, a few hundred votes
(12:33):
between them at the moment. And then we've got Giselle,
captain in Bradfield. So she's looking more likely to win
Bradfield against the teals contender, Nicolette Buller.
S2 (12:43):
I think whatever happens, both would be faces for the
future because they've got political backgrounds. Amelia Hammer is from
a political family, obviously with a grandfather who was a
senator and a grand uncle who was a premier of Victoria.
Giselle has been in the Liberal politics for a long
time and has worked as an adviser in Parliament House
(13:04):
in Canberra, so it's still close in terms of those votes.
Both of them are like Tim Wilson are coming in
in a way that sums up or embodies something that
Nick Greiner, the former New South Wales premier, said to
me the other day, which is that the future of
the Liberal Party is that it's got to be warm
and dry. That means liberal on social policies, dry on
(13:25):
economic policies. So that is something that liberals have really
struggled with. And Sky News After Dark really encourages them
to be, you know, vehemently conservative on social issues and
look for culture wars and, you know, go after these
woke agendas so-called.
S3 (13:41):
And advocating for government largesse on various things.
S2 (13:44):
Like government ownership of nuclear power stations. So, you know,
the warm and dry approach is something that some of
these new members can actually stand up for, and it's
going to be a really interesting dynamic, depending on how
many of those new members come in.
S3 (13:59):
And you might want to explain what dry and wet
mean to.
S2 (14:02):
Well, yeah. I mean, in the old days, like 30
years ago, the Liberal Party had wets and drys. The wets,
you know, were sort of, well, more moderate on economic policy.
But the drys won the argument. John Howard won the
argument on the economic side. But yeah. Free market.
S1 (14:23):
Yeah. So big on fiscal responsibility. Um, big on building surpluses. Um, yeah.
Free market. Um, uh, yeah. Uh, tax cuts. Yeah.
S2 (14:32):
But then they struggled to deal with marriage equality. Why
was that? Why did they why did the conservative economic
agenda lead them into a place where they were vehemently
conservative on a social agenda as well? And that is
something that they've really struggled with, and they will still
struggle with it in the future. It's going to be
a very interesting dispute within the party to resolve that,
(14:55):
so that they can reach out to voters who, let's
face it, just don't care about who marries whom.
S1 (15:01):
Yeah, right. Yeah. Dare I say it? They need more
diversity within their ranks. I wanted to deal really briefly
with the teals because there, you know, we talked about
them so much last election. We talked about them so
much this election. How have they actually done? They've gone
backwards in terms of their seat count. Um, is that right, David?
S2 (15:16):
Yeah. I think that that would be a reasonable interpretation
at the moment, because it looks very tough for the
teals in Kooyong with Monique Ryan. They've lost Goldstein. So
Zoe Daniel is out and it's line ball in Bradfield,
which was really the great hope for for the teals
with Nicolette Buhler taking on Giselle Terrien. So we have
(15:36):
to wait for all the results. But it clearly hasn't
been a banner banner year for the teals, even though
when I looked around at some of the funding, there
was an enormous amount of funding for some of these
independent candidates, they didn't knock off the Liberals. Dan Tehan
in the seat of Wannon, right. They threw everything at
that and they didn't knock him off.
S1 (15:56):
Could you say maybe, maybe this is overly optimistic, but
could you say that they have consolidated their power, particularly
in the Sydney seats that they hold and people like
Zali Steggall, Allegra Spender, Sophie Scamps up in Mackellar on
the northern beaches are looking pretty rusted on now. They're
looking like they might hold those seats for as long
as they want them. And also in a seat like Wannon,
the fact that a teal was even a contender there
(16:18):
surely an indicator that the movement's going okay.
S2 (16:20):
Oh, I think it's hard to tell at this stage
whether they've got momentum for the future. And some of
the really interesting developments have been people who've grown into
being more than teals. I mean, I think you'd say
Zali Steggall, you know, is much more than a teal
because she's got such a strong community base there in Warringah.
We've seen Allegra Spender really expand her interests far beyond integrity,
(16:44):
women and climate, which were those three issues that took
a lot of the teals into Parliament in the first place.
She talks about tax reform. She talks about an economic agenda.
S1 (16:52):
She was pretty much the only person talking about tax
reform in the last parliament, from what I could tell.
S2 (16:56):
Stepped up as a as a real contributor to Parliament.
And so this is where I think the people who
backed the community, independents have issues with the media, because
we all use the shorthand label of teal to describe them.
Let's face it, they all share a funding base in
climate 200, but they're much more than that as well.
So you've got to acknowledge both those sides. Climate 200
(17:19):
spent a lot of money and didn't get up all
the people that it wanted. So there are questions about
how they campaigned.
S1 (17:26):
I want to just acknowledge the Greens as well. Obviously
the Greens have gone massively backwards at the moment. They
look like they're going to hold one seat out of
the four seats they had in the last parliament. They've
lost their leader and it's unclear who's going to take
his place. That's Adam Bandt. I do want to move
swiftly onwards because we've got something a little bit special today.
(17:47):
I'm off on leave next week. I'm touring with my
new novel, and Crowley only has two weeks left before
he leaves his chief political correspondent role to move to
London and take up his new job as Europe correspondent.
So this is our Farewell Inside Politics podcast together. And
I want to pay tribute to Crowley because he's one
of the most intelligent, insightful, diligent, delightfully collegiate people I've
(18:09):
ever worked with. He's been in the press gallery in
Canberra for 20 years, eight of which were with the
Sydney Morning Herald and Age. David, if it's possible, can
you pick out a few highlights of your parliamentary career?
S2 (18:21):
Well, I'm almost lost for words after that, Jacqui, because,
you know, I'm very aware that my career has had
ups and downs and, uh, I guess diligent is a
good word because you've got to have stamina in this
kind of gig just to stick it out in journalism
and in covering politics. Sorry, what was your question? Highlights
of my career. Oh, look, I reckon some of the
(18:42):
highlights are really dramatic moments that not necessarily the best story. Well,
this one was a great story. I wrote it with
Bevan Shields, the Herald editor, after we were part of
a doorstop of Emmanuel Macron in Rome, where Andrew Probyn,
our nine colleague, basically found a way to corner Macron.
And I was part of the press pack that sort
(19:02):
of got around the French president. And of course, the
question was, did Scott Morrison lie to you.
S6 (19:08):
With his value? Do you think he lied to you?
I don't think I know.
S2 (19:13):
And that has gone down into folklore and just being
part of that. It was a reminder of how a
lot of journalism is planned, but a lot of it
is just being in the right place at the right time.
And thanks to people like Andrew Probyn at the time
who loitered outside this press event, And then, you know,
the security guards block me. When I came out and
(19:34):
tried to get to the scrum and so forth, but
it all worked beautifully in terms of just being able
to put the question to the French president in a
way that would not normally be possible. So I love that.
And then and then after that we flew to Glasgow
of all places for a climate summit, and me and
Bevan sat up, you know, with no sleep, filing the
story from the hotel lobby. It was just a real
(19:57):
adrenaline rush.
S1 (19:57):
Yeah. Yeah, well, the best journalists are the biggest pests, right?
What are the worst parts of the job? Because there
are long hours. You're under a great deal of pressure
all the time. There's enormous competition with your colleagues in
the press gallery to get stories, to get leaks. What
do you find the most difficult?
S2 (20:12):
Some of the worst aspects of the job are the hours.
Like you say, it's it's a hard slog sometimes. Sometimes
you can spend an entire day stressed about a story
and not even have a really good story at the
end of the day, and it can take you hours
and you've got nothing. Um, so that's frustrating. I found
when I look back, it's really bad points when I
(20:35):
write about people being sacked. I remember writing about a
minister in the Rudd-gillard years, and she was going to
be sacked, and I wrote that she was going to
be sacked because it was true and the numbers were
against her, and it's a brutal business. But then I
had a conversation with her, and I felt so bad
at The Heartless Way, in which I wrote about the
(20:56):
end of her career as a minister. Um, it was
a reminder that there is this human toll in the business,
and I often forget to be more human when I
write about people. Um, you get caught up in the moment,
and you.
S1 (21:11):
I would I would challenge that. Actually, I think you're
incredibly humane, but, um, it is very difficult sometimes to
to strike that correct balance between objectivity and a certain
coldness that we need to have. And, um, recognizing that
we're writing about people at the end of the day.
S3 (21:24):
Do you feel optimistic or pessimistic about the kind of
future of politics and governance in Australia. But from now,
compared to when you started.
S2 (21:31):
I feel quite optimistic. But, um, a lot of journalists
are very cynical and get get grimmer as they age.
But I found maybe it's just the election, the sense
of renewal, the sense of new people coming in. I
talked to a former Liberal president, Shane Stone, a few
days ago, and he said, this is a great time
for a conservative to come into Parliament. Things always turn.
(21:52):
So if I was young and I wanted to be conservative,
I would get into Parliament now. I found that really
interesting because I think he was right. There is always
renewal and there is always a place for new energy.
And I think that's what keeps me optimistic about Australian politics,
even though I'm very aware that social media makes it harder,
the 24 over seven news cycle makes it harder. I
(22:14):
think that the ease with which the people on either
end of the political spectrum can get headlines and can
sort of disrupt, uh, makes holding the centre harder. Um,
but all that said, I'm still optimistic.
S1 (22:29):
And perhaps this, um, this election result is a is
an affirmation of the common sense centre, I don't know.
S2 (22:35):
I think it is. I think it is. I'm going
to that's where I'm at with something I'm writing at
the moment. It's like the people in the centre have
shoved out their elbows and just pushed aside the people
on the edges to say, hang on a minute, we're
just going to hold the centre here.
S1 (22:48):
We should mention as well that Clive Palmer, I've lost
track of how many hundreds of millions he's spent on
the election, but they didn't win a single candidate to parliament.
So there's something in that.
S2 (22:58):
Thank goodness to donation law reform in the future will
have a better inkling of it. But right now, we
don't know how much you spent on this campaign.
S3 (23:06):
Well, a lot of it's come to our newspapers.
S1 (23:08):
I know actually, yeah. Let's not let's not mention the
advertising spend to to critically. Um, gentleman, that was so interesting.
And Crowley, this is not goodbye. It's just we'll see
you soon because I think we're going to have to
find a way to have you back on the podcast
in a new role.
S2 (23:22):
I'll dial in with some observations, but thank you, Jackie.
Thank you for having me on all those all those times.
It's been really good and I really appreciate it.
S1 (23:29):
All right, well, Chloe's off to have tea with the
King in a few weeks, and I will see you
in two weeks. Guys, thank you so much for coming on.
It's been really interesting, such a fascinating result. And, um,
we will say goodbye.
S3 (23:41):
See you. Jackie.
S2 (23:42):
Cheers.
S1 (23:44):
Today's episode was produced by Julia Katzel with technical assistance
from Debbie Harrington. Our executive producer is Tammy Mills, and
Tom McKendrick is our head of audio. To listen to
our episodes as soon as they drop, follow Inside Politics
on Apple, Spotify or anywhere else you listen to your
podcasts and to stay up to date with all the
election coverage and exclusives, visit The Age and The Sydney
(24:08):
Morning Herald websites to support our journalism. Subscribe to us
by visiting the page or. Subscribe. I'm Jacqueline Maley. Thank
you for listening.
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