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Copyright David Marr 2013
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The National Library of Australia Cataloguing-in-Publication entry:
Marr, David.
Political animal : the making of Tony Abbott / David Marr.
ISBN for eBook edition: 9781921870941
ISBN for print edition: 9781863955980 (pbk.)
Abbott, Tony, 1957-
Policiticians Australia Biography.
342.22092
I am not asking the Australian people to take me on trust but on the record of a lifetime and an instinct to serve ingrained long before I became opposition leader: as a student president, trainee priest, Rhodes Scholar, surf life-saver and volunteer fire-fighter, as well as a member of parliament and as a minister in a government.
TONY ABBOTT, to the Federal Council of the Liberal Party, 30 June 2012
For what shall it profit a man, if he shall gain the whole world, and lose his own soul?
MARK 8:36.
Prince Hal
Australia has never shown much enthusiasm for the man. In the old days when pollsters asked us who should take over from John Howard or Brendan Nelson or Malcolm Turnbull, we put Tony Abbott way down the list, usually at the bottom. As the years passed and the number of Liberal contenders dwindled, we always picked someone else: Peter Costello even after he gave up the leadership without a fight; Malcolm Turnbull even after the climate sceptics brought him undone; or Joe Hockey the untried hulk from morning television. We never wanted the man the Liberals gave us in December 2009. Abbott was their choice, not ours. And the party was almost as stunned as the nation. God almighty, one of the Liberals cried in the party room that day. What have we done?
The Canberra press pack was held behind ropes waiting for the result. Bob Ellis was treated as comic relief as he buttonholed us with predictions of an Abbott victory. All alone in a nearby anteroom the Reverend Peter Rose sat reading the Bible in front of a blank television screen. There was no rancour in there, the priest told me. Thats what I was praying for. Hadnt the poor man noticed that parliament was a palace of rancour? It had been for weeks as Turnbull was torn to pieces by his party. Labor was gloating. Kevin Rudd was once more sailing along at the top of the polls. And the press had it wrong. The Liberal whip walked down the corridor, stood at the precise spot indicated on the carpet and announced Abbotts victory without a trace of pleasure.
Journalists swore, hit the phones and scattered. Out in the parliament gardens, pundits began talking to cameras. There was little evidence of jubilation in the corridors. Doors were closed. Abbott and the press faced each other in the party room about forty minutes later. It wasnt crowded. A little pack of supporters had come along to cry hear, hear from time to time. They had the shattered look of people given what theyd wished for. By her new leaders side stood the deputy perpetual, Julie Bishop, smiling and smiling. As the voltage of her smile dimmed, you could see her will it back to life. Once or twice she turned on Abbott a look of coquettish amusement but her eyes were dazed.
I accept at times I have stuffed up, he said. I suppose I should apologise now for all my errors of the past and make a clean breast of them. But he didnt go into detail. Long practice makes him good at confession. Its in his blood. The most Catholic thing about this profoundly Catholic man is his faith in absolution. The slate can always be wiped clean. Over the years he has said and done appalling things that might have sunk another politician. But charm and candour and promises to do better have seen him forgiven so much. The loudmouth bigot of his university days, the homophobe, the blinkered Vatican warrior, the rugger-bugger, the white Australian and the junkyard dog of parliament are all, he would have us believe, consigned to the past. Another self has walked out of the wings. The Australian public are very fair and are always prepared to give a leader of a major political party a fair go, he told his little audience. I believe that when you become leader, you make a fresh start.
We have not seen a contender like this before. Though he admires them and studies what they teach, Tony Abbott is not another Bob Menzies or John Howard. He is more conservative than both, more quixotic, a man of another faith that leaves him deeply troubled by the drift of the world. Heroes play a large part in his imagination. He dates the first stirrings of his interest in public life to the Ladybird books his mother read him as a child. These usually turned out to be about great figures in history: Julius Caesar, Francis Drake and Henry V, he wrote in his book Battlelines. The lesson, invariably, was that duty and honour carried the day. Spoonfeeding heroism to children of the Empire since World War I, Ladybird books were still going strong on Sydneys North Shore in the 1960s. In their world, power has magic. The handling of power is the greatest moral test a hero faces. Power transforms and challenges them. Abbotts favourite Ladybird book seems to be the one about wastrel Prince Hal who turns into heroic Henry V. Heroes excite Abbott. A few days after becoming leader of the Opposition, he was given a quick quiz by Josh Gordon of the Sunday Age . Favourite film? Gallipoli . Seen it many times. Film star? John Wayne. Book? Id have to say its probably Lord of the Rings . Its the book Ive read most. The best personal advice? Avoid the occasion of sin.
For a long time he saw himself as a man on a quest. So did old friends and political colleagues. Peter Costello called him a Don Quixote ready to take on lost causes and fight for great principles. Knights on horseback make odd figures in politics. They can be comic. They can be malevolent. They can be inspiring. They have a way of seeing the everyday world not quite as the rest of us do. Its unsettling. Sometimes they are right and we are in their debt. Often they find themselves, lance in hand, searching for windmills. A few of these types are always about in politics, attractive bit players on the left and right. But they rarely come so close to power as Abbott has. One of the many puzzles about this man is how much of the Don Quixote survives under the armour of caution he has begun to wear in the last few years.
We havent warmed to him. As he set about his job of wrecking Labor he saw off one of the most popular prime ministers in the history of the federation and weeks later nearly beat the mans successor at the ballot box. That 2010 campaign dashed Labors early hopes. Abbott didnt stuff up. He held his nerve and he very nearly got there. In those weeks, Australians extended a measure of respect, even admiration, to Abbott. But once that near-miss was passed, the polls have recorded deep dissatisfaction with the man. For most of the time he has been leading the Opposition, about 60 per cent of us have disapproved of his performance.
That figure is only a little less worse as 2013 begins. We think Abbott more arrogant and narrow-minded than ever. Few of us credit him with vision. Most have never thought him good in a crisis. Despite his unrelenting assault on the prime ministers integrity since the last election, Australia trusts neither leader much and him no more than her. An Essential poll in mid-January found 61 per cent of us think him arrogant, 56 per cent narrow-minded, 55 per cent aggressive and 54 per cent out of touch with ordinary people. Its a devastating verdict. The two qualities we have always acknowledged in Abbott are his intelligence and capacity for hard work but even our faith in his intelligence has faded since the Coalition handed him the job of ousting Labor.
