From Schwartz Media. I'm Ruby Jones. This is seven am. No matter your politics, there's never been a politician who can wield an insult quite like former Labor Prime Minister Paul Keating.
I asked the Prime Minister, if you are so confident about your view a fight back, why won't you call.
An early election?
Might because I want to do more slowly, I want to do your.
Keating set the standard for eviscerating his opponents. He once called the coalition front bench scumbags, said John Howard was getting so wound up he needed a valium, and described Peter Costello as having all the attributes of a dog except loyalty.
You all sat there last night while I roomed you out, point by point, dreamed you out. You were setting up there, both ties, the steam coming out.
But lately Keating and a growing band of old time labor men are directing their barbs at their own privately
and publicly criticizing the Albanese government on their policies and priorities. Today, special correspondent for the Saturday Paper Jason Cottsircus on the party elders problems with Labor and how their critiques are landing it's Friday, October eighteen, so Jason, I thought we could begin by talking about this group of Labor Party elders who seem to be loosely banding together with some shared grapes about the current Labor Party. Tell me who are they?
So these are all veterans ruby from the Hook Keating guments from the nineteen eighties and the nineteen nineties, and the core of this group is the former Prime Minister Paul Keating, John Faulkner, who was the Leader of the Senate for the Labor Party, and Barry Jones, who was of course a very prominent minister in the Hawk government. And Bob Carr, the former New South Wales premier. He grew up in the Labor movement with Paul Keating and John Faulkner, so he's very much a part of that
old guard as well. And what I've been told is that that core group getting together for lunch in Sydney once a month, and it seems that a regular topic for discussion is how disappointed they are in the Albanese government and the lack of progress the government is making on issues that are dear to them environmental policy. This proposed reform to gambling advertising. They also have in common
the fact that they don't like the orchest policy. Seems to have been a feature of discussion among these kind of these labor wise men who feel that, you know, Australia shouldn't be tying itself so closely to the United States. And I think in poor Keating's case, he's particularly concerned that Australia seems to be giving up its sovereignty.
Okay, so we've got these quote wise men of Labor Party elders critiquing Australia's relationship with the US, critiquing the orchard steel Can you tell me a bit more about the tenor and tone of those critiques and where they're being made.
Well, I think they're being made in private and in public. If we start with poor Keating, you know, he's not afraid to do a lot of media.
You know, the idea that we need American submarine to protect us, you know three, if we buy three or at three, three are going to protect us from the might of China. Really, I mean the rubbish of it, the rubbish. So for another word, let me say this, China has not threatened us in despite five years of.
This in private, he's been really getting quite personal with some of his criticisms of the Prime Minister at the Albanzi, the Deputy Prime Minister and Minister for Defense Richard Miles, and Foreign Minister Penny Wong, who Paul Keating collectively has referred to in private as this kind of lix bittle kind of trio.
You know.
Lix Biddle is a favorite Keating put down for anyone who shows the slightest hint of deference towards the US or the United Kingdom.
I referred elsewhere to Richard Miles Defense mister Richard Miles's love of the United States as being so dewey iders to defy parody.
And then there's Gareth Evans, the former foreign Minister he also got stuck into the Albanesi government has been too cautious, defensive and where's avoiding?
And the Prime Minister himself, Albert not only has never given much attention to the complexities of defense and foreign policy, very unusual for the labor left, but he does remain politically deeply risk averse, occupied more than anything else, with not being portrayed domestically as weak, facilating.
Another great labor figure from the nineteen eighties. Bill Kealty he was never in federal politics, but he was of course running the ACTU right throughout the eighties and the nineties. And he's been saying a similar thing in a speech I think he gave last month to a business for him. He said, there's a lot of good talkers in the government, but they don't do anything. You know, You've also got people like Stephen conrayd Allen Griffin, who are both ministers
in the rud and Gillard governments. They're also on the sidelines trying to exert influence around preselections and policy decisions where they can. So it's quite a busy of offstage collection of important labor figures there who are all chipping in with their own interpretations of what the government's doing, and that they haven't been afraid to express their disappointment.
Okay, So how is this criticism or I suppose it could also be construed as meddling. How is it landing? I can't really imagine that alban Ezy and his senior ministers would appreciate the feedback.
Well, I think they're really starting to get pretty annoyed about it. Labor insiders, you know, both in Canberra and around the country quite frankly hate this, this constant carping from the sidelines. It's an annoying distraction for them and
I think they just wish it would go away. And you know, one Labor veteran told me, and this was a person who was very close to the Hawk and Kenny governments, said to me, you know what really struck me about the Hook and getting governments in particularly the Hawk period, was that there were no Whitland government ministers wandering around shitbagging the Prime Minister, his ministers or their priorities.
And he also felt that it's one thing to say the government is on the wrong track, but to descend into the highly personal attacks that we are seeing is not at all helpful. Another member of Labour's front bench expressed, you know, the concern to me that it was nostalgia that was making them forget the pressures of leadership and
just how hard it is to govern. And another Labor veteran, Flatter rejected this complaint that the Albanese government has shirked any and all major reform and he said that that was just a kind of willful blindness. Of course, some members of the current government. You know, they are also to some of the criticisms that Paul Caating has been making. You know, one current minister in particular told me that the problem is that Labor is becoming a top down,
invitation only society. And as this person said to me, we're timid and we're woke and that's a pretty facked position to be. And according to that minister.
After the break our, one Labor minister says, the entire party structure is broken. So, Jason, you've got a current Labor minister on record saying that the Labor Party is essentially becoming more elite, more tightly controlled, both timid and woke as they put it. So tell me more about what this person says about what Labour's problem is and how it got to this situation.
Well, I think what's happened here If we look at the last fifty years of labor history, we had the very undisciplined Whitlam government and in reaction to that, the
Hawk and Keating governments became much more disciplined. You know, ever since then that the Labor Party has become more centralized and the National executive has acquired more power, the power to overrule the branches the power to overrule the rank and file, and they did that for reasons of political expediency, because they think, well, the more professional we are, the less chance there is that will pre select candidates
that do something stupid. But I guess the downside of that is that, as this minister said to me last week, the truth is that the party doesn't really exist at the moment. It's either old people or ministerial staffers or the odd union secretary. No one young and fresh is actually joining the party anymore. There isn't that same diversity of background that other labor governments have had. The party
really is sick at the moment. And according to this person, you know, these gray beards of the party are voicing their criticisms because they have a view of where the party should be. But the other point is if they don't say anything, no one will. And as this person said to me, they're the last freedom fighters in the Labor Party today.
Okay, So, Jason, if we are to focus on today, on this current moment and the criticisms that are being leveled at the Labor Party, that it's too timid, that it's scared of big reforms, is there any acknowledgment of that instinct from within? Did anyone who spoke to any current labor figures defend a kind of softly softly approached to reform.
I think many inside the government believe that governing today is a lot different to governing in the nineteen eighties and nineties. One former advisor to Anthony Albernezi that I spoke to Dean Sure He said to me, well, look, the truth is that the government has been busy and that there are a lot of reforms on the table. Performs to the way the NDAs is funded, changes to the way Medicare is operating, cost of living relief measures that have really made quite a difference to people who
have been struggling through this cost of living crissis. But you know, as Dean Sho said to me, the government does have to keep an eye on re election. It is prudent politics to do so. And one of the biggest lessons of the rut and Gillard years was that, according to Dean that progress is fleeting if you lose power before you get the chance to cement any changes.
And he used the example of the Guillard government. They lost government after two terms and bold moves that they had made, like the carbon tax, were quickly scrapped by Tony Abbott.
This is a Labour green carbon tax and it's going to drive up prices, threaten jobs, and do nothing at all for the environment.
The lesson that Dean shir took from that was that reforms have to be bettered down and future proofed so that a future government can't just come in and quickly repeal something like a carbon tax. And according to Dean, there is a case to be made that a softly,
softly approach actually works in the long term. And another labor veteran told me that when it comes to gambling reform, it's only by waiting and carefully considering the options that it will end up with a policy that strikes a balance and actually has a hope of getting through the Senate and also lasting for years and decades to come.
You know.
This person said to me that if the government had come out of the gate quickly when the report was released by the late Labor MP Peter Murphy eighteen months ago and moved to totally ban all online gambling as that report suggested, then they would have been attacked by every conservative politician in the country and probably wouldn't be in a position to really implement any meaningful reform.
Sure, I can't help but think it is a strange situation though, and you have the people who seem to be speaking with real passionate about change and reform are the ones who actually left the party a long time ago in some cases and are approaching old age. I mean, we're talking about a group of former politicians who are in their sixties, their seventies, their eighties. So if these are the quote freedom fighters, what does that say to you about a problem at the heart of the Labor Party.
So I think one of the big problems here with the Labor Party today is it doesn't have that sense of energy and youth that reforming, energetic political movements have. If you look at the Australian Greens and you go to any event that Adam Bant is holding in public, the first thing you notice is there's a lot of passionate young people at those events, you know, volunteering, putting their hands up, wanting to be part of that movement that Adam Bant leads. And that's something you never see
at Labor Party events these days. It's mostly older people whose only real interest is to be closer to power. But you don't get the feeling that it's a vital, energetic political movement that wants to go out there and change the world in the way that the Labor Party used to be. But I think, you know, the good thing about having people like Paul Keating, Gareth Heavens, bobcar and Bill Kelty speaking out like this is they are likely to keep speaking out on issues that matter to them.
And then an effect of what they've been saying is that this has got Labor actually thinking harder about okus and how to keep the Labor Party vital. So indirectly they are having a net positive effect by generating debate, and I think ultimately that's what's been missing I'm the Labor Party in recent years, but we've now got a debate, and I think, well, that's what politics is for, isn't it.
So maybe there's a silver lining there, and having these Labor Party holders speak out in this way isn't necessarily a bad thing for the Labor Party.
Jason, thank you so much for your time.
Thanks Reby, always great to talk with you.
Also in the news today, an Israeli airstrike in one of South Lebanon's biggest cities has killed sixteen people in the largest attack on an official Lebanese state building since
the Israeli air campaign began. The mayor of Nabatier was among those killed in the strike that destroyed the city's municipal headquarters, wounding more than fifty The Israeli military says the target was a Hezbola underground tunnel network that Lebanese officials say the attack is proof Israel's campaign is now shifting to target the Lebanese state and The Therapeutic Goods Administration has approved a new COVID nineteen vaccine for Australians
aged over six months, set to be available in the coming months. The new fiz of vaccine is expected to provide more protection against the latest omicron variants. Seven Am is a daily show from Schwartz Media and The Saturday Paper. It's produced by Shane Anderson, Zoltenfetcho and Zaia Artungral. Our technical producer is Atakis Pasto. We're edited by Chris Dngate and Sarah mcveae. Eric Jensen is our editor in chief. Our mixer is Travis Evans. Our theme music is by
Ned Beckley and Josh Hogan of Envelope Audio. Seven Am is hosted by James and myself, Ruby Jones. We'll be back on Monday.