Annika Smethurst: Don’t hate Malcolm Turnbull because he’s rich
OF all of Malcolm Turnbull’s faults, being rich shouldn’t have been one of them. His glorious fortune was far from the only reason he lost the top job, but it was used by those in the Liberal and Labor parties to bring him down, Annika Smethurst writes.
Opinion
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OF all of Malcolm Turnbull’s faults, being rich shouldn’t have been one of them.
Yet recent events have exposed our uncomfortable relationship with those, such as Malcolm Turnbull, who are a bit better off than ourselves.
Turnbull’s glorious fortune was far from the only reason he lost the top job, but it was used by those in the Liberal and Labor parties to bring him down. And it has exposed one uncomfortable truth; class is far from dead in Australian politics.
Australians have always struggled to accept people who have done a better than us.
Call it tall poppy syndrome or the politics of envy, we deride the wealthy and celebrate when they fall.
We appear slightly more accepting of wealth when it is amassed on the tennis court or in the recording studio. But wealth, such as Turnbull’s, which was accumulated through business or investment is met with suspicion.
Throughout his Prime Ministership, Turnbull never rid himself of the “Mr Harbourside Mansion” tag. Conservative colleagues from more working-class electorates — aka the rest of Australia — described him as out of touch. How could he ever appeal to those aspirational, middle Australians know as “Howard’s battlers?”, his critics would squawk,
It was again evident during the week when Turnbull and his wife Lucy left for New York. His abode was described as being a “luxurious multimillion-dollar” apartment on the “city’s exclusive Upper West Side”.
God forbid Malcolm and Lucy should take a holiday in an apartment, paid for with their own cash, and — unlike some of his colleagues — not purchased on a work trip. Did we really expect him to spend the next few weeks in a timeshare on the Gold Coast or at a caravan park in Yass?
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Could it be that his enormous wealth makes us jealous? Surely not.
For the most part, Labor tried to ignore his fortune knowing that he was far from the only MP to have a few bob in the bank.
But Labor research which asked punters to describe senior politicians constantly revealed that voters thought the PM was “elitist” and “wealthy”. And it wasn’t a positive.
Labor saw an opportunity to remind Australians he was friends with the big end of town. How could a man such as Malcolm Turnbull understand the needs of working Australians? The answer: easily.
Turnbull oft spoke of the profound impact his parents’ divorce had on his life. Yet his experience as a millionaire seemed to overshadow his childhood being raised by a single dad. Apparently being wealthy annihilated his ability to govern for all Australians and
Here are the facts.
Malcolm Turnbull is rich. He is conservatively estimated to be worth about $200 million. To put that in context he has more cash than our Olivia, Kylie or Hugh. But less money than Greg Norman or Nicole Kidman.
He is so wealthy he donated the equivalent of his full $528,000 annual salary to charity.
It would be nice to live in a world where Turnbull’s success away from Canberra was regarded as an asset, unlike the increasing number of career politicians who would struggle to find a six-figure gig in the real world. But in the end it contributed to his demise.
The idea that wealth diminished his ability to govern is absurd.
By the same logic, being female, or married or from a migrant background or from rural Australia could obstruct your ability to make decisions for the whole country.
Despise Turnbull his stance on the republic, or the environment. Hate him for knifing a sitting PM or for being too moderate. But using his wealth as a reason to tear down his prime ministership was no reason at all.