They may be “Senator” or “spokesperson” to you, but to their inner coterie (or childhood pals, or colleagues behind their back) they’re known as …
The Coalition
Andrew Robb — Mr Bojangles (for his preference for singing mainly this song, verse after verse after verse after verse whenever he managed to find the guitar that everyone else thought was well hidden), Little Red Riding Hood, Andy
Malcolm Turnbull — when at Goldman Sachs, known as Turbo when being “powerful and dynamic”, and Turdball “when high-handed” (according to former colleague)
Tony Abbott — Abbo
Joe Hockey — The Bodyguard (when he was moving from High School to Uni as he got all the girls home safely), Pizza Boy (from those who claim managing a pizza bar is about the height of his expertise), Sloppy Joe (nickname given by opponent Wayne Swan)
Barnaby Joyce — Shouting Mouth, Barnynard Voice
Amanda Vandstone — Verandah Sandstone
Bruce Billson — Bunter (because of his affable nature and similarity as a youngster to the fictional Billy Bunter character from the Greyfriars School stories in the early 1900s), or Billy
Kelly O’Dwyer — Wytha (as in “why the long face?”, nickname given by Labor)
Mathias Cormann — The Cormmantator (has a Belgian accent and sounds at times like Arnold Schwarzenegger, nickname given by media), also The Muscles from Brussels (he has used this to sign off on emails)
Nationals Senator John Williams — Whacka, Wacker
Stuart Robert — The Merkin (name given by some colleagues “who think his hair resembles a thinning wig”)
Dr Andrew Southcott — Dr Who, Dr Dolittle (gets a play on posters around Flinders Uni in Southcott’s electorate of Boothby)
Barnaby Joyce the Bush Turkey — a turkey who resides in Whale Beach who has been named after Senator Joyce
Cross-party alliances
Liberal Jamie Briggs and Labor’s Richard Marles — The Twins (check them out on Sky AM Agenda sometime)
Labor
Bob Carr — Wottha (as in “what’s he saying this time?”)
Ex-NSW state politician Eddie Obeid — He who must be obeyed
Laurie “the Log” Ferguson
Kevin Rudd — Dr Death, KRudd, Kevin24/7
Greg Combet staffer Mark Davis — Rowdy
Craig Emerson — Emmo
Tanya Plibersek — Plibbers
Anthony Albanese — Albo
Warren Snowdon — Wazza, Wakka
* All pollies are federal unless otherwise noted. Got one to add to the list? Drop us a line.
Um, who calls Tony Abbott that and why on earth would anyone think it’s appropriate to give someone so high profile a nickname that’s also a racial slur?!
Ha! These nicknames reveal absolutely the lack of wit and intelligence of most parliamentarians. Even the medya could do better than this.
And whilst compiling this riveting list of “whatever” the great “Tips & Rumours” operators at Crikeh missed the PM slotting Nova Peris into the #1 position on the NT Senate Ticket.
Another late comment as I’ve been off line but what the hell I’m enjoying talking to myself tonight. I like Comrade Swansteen, have always referred to Julia as Dame Julia (from before the whole lady Macbeth thing), enjoy the sinophile flavour of Chairman Rudd and have a longstanding habit of referring to the entire Liberal National Coalition as “the B team”.