The real question about last night’s Four Corners on political sexual shenanigans is: what took so long?
Not to the ABC team, who obviously fought unprecedented legal battles and political backlash to get the program to air. But why did it take until now for any meaningful follow-up to former prime minister Malcolm Turnbull’s infamous “bonk ban” in February 2018?
At the time, the usual predominantly male, right-wing suspects frothed that it would lead to an avalanche of salacious stories about the private lives of innocent politicians. Yet, surprisingly, nothing. Either there was never anything to see there, or the offending pollies had put it back in their pants.
As if.
I recall at the time of the rumours about Nationals leader and deputy prime minister Barnaby Joyce — which were doing the rounds long before a front page photo of his pregnant mistress provided confirmation — I asked around Canberra for the names of the most notorious pants men in the senior levels of government.
The same handful of names came up over and over from press gallery journos to staffers, followed by knowing nods from some pollies when those names were mentioned.
Joyce was the most obvious at the time, even though the public knew nothing. It appears even if you drove down the main street of his home town with a bullhorn shouting about his affair it still wouldn’t make the media.
Once he was exposed and Turnbull instituted the wholly reasonable ministerial code of conduct to rein in ministers sleeping with staffers, it seemed only a matter of time until others were outed. If there was a flurry of staffers suddenly switching between bosses it might suggest something was afoot. Or there might be sacked staffers daring to vent their outrage publicly.
Again, a deafening silence for two years, even when Me Too allegations exploded around the world and everywhere from board rooms to the High Court.
One of the main obstacles for the Australian media is not just our usual reticence to behave like the sleazy Fleet Street tabloids and run sex stories for their salaciousness — it’s our onerous defamation laws.
If taking on a High Court judge was risky, imagine the problem with the top lawyer of the land, as Attorney-General Christian Porter proved with his libel threats at the ready even as the program went to air.
And Turnbull on Q+A after the show doing his now regular “shoulda woulda coulda” act only highlighted the murkiness.
While Turnbull should be commended for swiftly bringing down the bonking ban over Joyce at great political cost, there have always been questions of what he knew, and when he knew it, about transgressions by senior ministers.
Only a few short weeks ago Turnbull was rushing to defend embattled NSW Premier Gladys Berejiklian over her secret affair with corrupt former MP Daryl Maguire.
At the time I mused in Crikey whether the premier would have failed his bonking ban. The usual Gladys defenders pointed out Maguire was not her staffer, even though technically he reported to her as evidenced by the fact she was the one who forced his sacking in the end.
Bonking ban or not, in the corporate world most CEOs would have been required to report such a longstanding relationship with a colleague.
The Gladys affair might not be the last one to damage the NSW government given the long-running threats of a newspaper exposé on another senior member that date back to the time of the Joyce scandal.
Not that the problem is confined to one side of politics. It was only two years ago that then NSW opposition leader Luke Foley quit over inappropriate conduct towards an ABC journalist. It was a story that was widely known among her media colleagues before it was revealed, but she didn’t want the incident made public.
And female Labor MPs must have been extremely lucky if they have never been hit on by some of the gentlemen of the ALP over the years.
Then there’s the collateral issue of journos having affairs with pollies. Years ago, a prominent ABC presenter would interview a senior minister very formally in the morning — “Minister, who do you think of this?” — a short time after the two of them had been sitting together at the breakfast table.
I learnt about the double standards very early in my career when, as a young journalist in 1986, I wrote about former prime minister Malcolm Fraser harassing me in New York. I was criticised at the time for breaking the rules on reporting pollies’ personal behaviour.
The Canberra bubble extends far and wide.
Let’s hope Porter turns out to be a text book example with a sound public flogging, metaphorically speaking….. Could not happen to a more deserving candidate, sickening case of rich privilege behaving abominably over a long period of time with no consequences.
His behaviour as AG has been corrupt and highly partisan as well. Part of Liberal royalty as he seems to see it, he thinks he can act with impunity
Sources to protect – by a political media?
And how “incurious(?)” was Turnbull – that a potential A-G of his choosing might be a compromised/corrupted candidate for that position – not least for the potential damage to the government he led, to the national interest and security?
We had a wall punching misogynist as PM so there is precedent.
When caught out Luke Foley quit. I wonder if Porter and Tudge will quit… not sure if I should put money on it or not…
I wouldn’t bet on it!
Did anyone note the sly self-satisfied smirk he gave as he dropped his “Hide any malfeasance bill” commonly know as the “Not an Integrity Commission bill?”.
The smirk probably was meant to indicate that if the cross bench refuse to support his “hide the malfeasance bill” that he will somehow be able to prove that no one really wanted an Integrity Commission at all.
Too clever by half.
I suppose the smug, rich and entitled offspring of the landed gentry or the First Fleeters have to have been found a job somewhere, don’t they?
I would bet a large amount that he won’t quit, and Scumbag won’t sack him – any takers?
Same money on Tudge…
Ministeral grace nowadays eh? Under EITHER Fraser OR Hawke they would not have lasted five more minutes; neither would have Cash for that matter that that is only the top of the list.
How true.
I’d be inclined, having just finished an excellent Japanese repast, to declare O tempura, O miso but will stick to the classic Tempora mutantur, nos et mutamur in illis – and not to our betterment.
In general, yes, but in the case of the USA I suggest : Non nos mutamur in illis (roughly – we are not changing [with the times]).
The place has become almost entirely polarised (witness the election : almost split down the centre). Ironically, the Trump brigade as closer to the “feelings are more important that facts” brigade – which, hence the irony, includes a fair percentage of Rundle’s
“progressives” (an idiotic term but there it is).
Not for a second am I inferring that Biden is in any way representative of Empiricism (indeed The Enlightenment) – just upon the basis of his political record to date) but, for the moment, he is the option to Trump.
The last Democrats were, arguably, Kennedy and LBJ if one can look above Vietnam (which was the beginning of the convergence towards Republicanism – and I include O-bomba) but we will leave that discussion for another time.
The culture clash, as I perceive it, will occur with the Trump (feelings – post truth – anti empiricist brigade) and the empiricist (the Ayer-Popper nexus) perspective; Jordan Peterson – to identity a representative now that Scruton has departed the scene.
But, (I forgot to add) hey : we have the recent example of Gladys!
“Hey Gladys – check out my huge property deal !” “Oh, Darryl, it enormous !”
I wouldn’t. Put money on it that is. He won’t quit. Nor will Tudge. They are morally and ethically bankrupt and probably cannot even fathom why they should quit. Only sustained public – and media – pressure will force Morrison’s hand on this one. And even then it’s a gamble.
On Q&A, one of the Panel asked why was Christian Porter’s early life of drunk and philandering type activities brought out during the 4 Corners episode. Simple answer was, it went to his character, as it appears he has not changed. Is this really the type of person Australia wants as the Top Legal Official in the Country?
History – ignore it if you will – repeats, and it looks like Porter’s is.
Call it “form”?
and it further shows, if it really needs to be anymore, the private school boy privilege of the “ruling class”, in that they (a) believe they are better then the rest of us, and (b) they can do whatever they like and get away with it.
That’s right. Just because the US appoints them to their Supreme Court doesn’t mean we have to copy-cat.
These politicians seem to forget that they owe their lifestyles to the money we pay them to represent us – their electors. How they behave is very much in the public interest, especially when they preach one thing (family values, etc.) and conduct themselves in a very different manner. There should not be one standard for M.P.s and another for the rest of us.
No there shouldn’t be – but there clearly is. No consequences for most of them these days.