Background and passions of Scott Morrison, Australia’s 30th Prime Minister
THE 30th Prime Minister of Australia is a pie-eating footy-loving conservative Christian who wields serious political clout, having “stopped the boats” and bolstered Australia’s economy.
NSW
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THE 30th Prime Minister of Australia is a pie-eating footy-loving conservative Christian who wields serious political clout, having “stopped the boats” and bolstered Australia’s economy.
Scott Morrison, 50, swept to power yesterday vowing to unite not only the fractured Liberal Party but the entire nation. He addressed voters directly at his first press conference as PM-elect to assure them: “We’re on your side.”
Mr Morrison then ran through a snapshot of typical family pressures and key moments in an average voter’s day to emphasise that, in sync with his “everyman” image, he gets it.
The son of a policeman, the man affectionately known as “ScoMo” has been a key warrior in the Turnbull and Abbott governments as controller of the purse strings as treasurer and as a tough immigration minister.
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Outside of politics, he is a down-to-earth “netball dad” to two girls and the number one ticket holder of his beloved NRL team, the Cronulla Sharks.
In fact, as he walked into the party room yesterday where his future as Prime Minister was sealed, Mr Morrison told assembled media “the only tip I’ve got — Sharks to beat Newcastle this weekend”.
Mr Morrison, of the centre right faction, was born in Waverley and raised in Bronte before studying economic geography at university.
He moved up the ranks of the corporate tourism world at the New Zealand Office of Tourism and Sport before moving to Tourism Australia.
It was here he oversaw the controversial “So where the bloody hell are you?” advertising campaign featuring Lara Bingle. He was state director of the Liberal Party of NSW from 2000 to 2004.
Morrison lives in the Sutherland Shire in Sydney’s south with his wife Jenny, who he met at church aged 12 and married at the age of 22, and their two young daughters.
The couple are both members of the Horizon evangelical church in the Shire.
It took 18 years and multiple rounds of IVF before the first of two children was born, and Mr Morrison dedicated his maiden parliamentary speech to his daughter Abbey Rose.
Mr Morrison is a huge backer of the National Disability Insurance Scheme and revealed last year his brother-in-law Gary’s long battle with multiple sclerosis as he worked to sell a tax hike that funded the scheme.
During his first speech as PM yesterday, Mr Morrison flagged his ongoing commitment to the NDIS because it gives people choices “regardless of your level of ability”.
Mr Morrison was elected to Parliament in 2007 in the southern Sydney seat of Cook after a tumultuous preselection battle against a candidate from the party’s right.
Soon after arriving in Canberra, then opposition leader Malcolm Turnbull appointed Mr Morrison to the Coalition’s shadow minister for housing and local government.
He was drafted into the shadow cabinet with the immigration portfolio under Tony Abbott, who described him as a “bright new star”.
In the Abbott government in 2013, Mr Morrison spearheaded the Coalition’s fight to “stop the boats” and wind back the staggering numbers of asylum seekers who, under Labor’s softer refugee policy, had been arriving in Australia via deadly sea trips.
In a Cabinet reshuffle in late 2014 he was moved to Social Services minister, where he led a crackdown on welfare cheats that made him popular with conservative voters.
But Mr Morrison’s relationship with Mr Abbott fractured over the successful leadership challenge that installed Malcolm Turnbull as PM.
Conservatives accused ScoMo of being among the plotters — something he always denied.
But he was duly installed as Treasurer and delivered two Budgets that providing plenty of sweeteners without implementing deep spending cuts.
Mr Morrison is regarded as one of the Coalition’s strongest debaters and for years had a regular spot on 2GB broadcaster Ray Hadley’s show until the two men fell out after Hadley asked him to swear on the Bible he had not toppled Tony Abbott.
One of his more colourful appearances in Parliament was in February 2017 when he brandished a lump of coal in the chamber and said “This is coal. Don’t be afraid. Don’t be scared. It won’t hurt you,” and accused people who worried about the impact of coal industry on the environment as having “an ideological, pathological fear of coal”.
Yesterday he nominated the drought as the “most pressing need right now”. He vowed to consult widely and to take major policy shifts to his new Cabinet, to be chosen this weekend. Fairness would be a hallmark.
“A fair go for those who have a go, that’s what fairness in Australia means,” he said.
“We have a lot of challenges as a country and we will get through them as we always have — together.”