Malcolm Turnbull slams ‘delusional’, ‘tragic’ former Liberal colleagues in TV tell-all as his new memoir is ‘discounted’
Former prime minister Malcolm Turnbull has rejected claims by Karl Stefanovic that his explosive new memoir is an act of payback.
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Former prime minister Malcolm Turnbull has rejected claims that his explosive new memoir is an act of “revenge”.
Speaking on Nine’s Today, Mr Turnbull defended his tell-all book after an analysis by Today host Karl Stefanovic, who said Mr Turnbull’s text was “revenge served piping hot”.
“Karl, that’s how you’re describing it,” Mr Turnbull said on Today.
“If they (viewers) buy my book in the hope it will be revenge on every page, they will be very disappointed.
“It is a much bigger book than that.”
Mr Turnbull said he missed politics but not the “backstabbing”. “I miss the government. The policy,” he said.
“I don’t miss all the back stabbing and politics. I don’t miss the politics of politics, put it that way. I never liked it very much. I never liked it at all,” Mr Turnbull added on Nine.
In a separate TV interview last night, Mr Turnbull unloaded on ex-colleague Home Affairs Minister Peter Dutton, saying he “over-estimated” the intelligence of the “delusional” Mr Dutton, who would be a “tragic” leader.
“I probably over-estimated his intelligence,” Mr Turnbull said of Mr Dutton, on The Project last night.
“It never occurred to me that he would be so delusional as to think that changing leader would advance our electoral prospects, let alone changing the leadership to him.
“You know, if Dutton, by some tragic circumstance, had become leader of the Liberal Party in that terrible coup week in August 2018, I think the government would have fallen within the following week, and not even Bill Shorten could have lost the following election.”
Mr Turbull’s comments came as he was promoting his new memoir, A Bigger Picture, amid reports that it has already been discounted at certain retailers.
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The book’s RRP of $55 has been lowered to $29-$35 at some stores – including Big W – just days after its release on Monday.
Meantime, Mr Turnbull said that once he realised his position as PM was about to end, he did everything in his power to ensure he was succeeded by Scott Morrison, and not Peter Dutton.
During The Project’s interview, Mr Turnbull also described as “bizarre” the relationship between former PM Tony Abbott and his chief of staff Peta Credlin.
“She knows – she and Abbott destroyed their own government and then spent nearly three years trying to destroy mine,” Mr Turnbull said.
“So they’re very good at destruction. It is a bizarre relationship. I’ve never seen a leader more dominated by another person than Abbott was by Credlin. It’s quite extraordinary … She was basically running the government.
“Everyone knew that at the time and that was why so many people were trying to persuade Abbott to move her out of that role.”
During the interview, when asked why Ms Credlin “dislikes him so much” in reference to her calling him a “reprehensible human being,” Mr Turnbull replied: “That is one of the nicest things she has ever said about me, actually!”
On Tuesday, Credlin told The Australian she found Mr Turnbull’s “highly personal attacks to be unedifying”.
“There is a lot I could say in relation to Mr Turnbull’s conduct in politics. However, while I find the man absolutely lacking in character and his highly personal attacks to be unedifying, I respect the office he once held, and the great party he once led, to add further to his commentary,” said Credlin, who is now a presenter with Sky News.
Mr Turnbull comments on The Project came as he was promoting his explosive memoir, A Bigger Picture.
ABBOTT RESPONDS TO TURNBULL
Former prime minister Tony Abbott has responded to Malcolm Turnbull’s sensational claims he was dominated by Chief of Staff Peta Credlin.
The former Warringah MP conceded Ms Credlin was a critical part of his government’s decision making.
“She was an important part of the Abbott Government, she was comparable to the role of someone like Arthur Sinodinos in the Howard Government,” he said.
“She was a fine thinker, great organiser and trusted colleague and I think she deserves a great deal of credit for what she did.”
The response comes after Mr Turnbull told ABC’s 7.30 Ms Credlin dominated Abbott’s office while he was leader.
“You were really dealing with Peta. Peta was running the country and dominating Abbott.”
During the interview, Mr Turnbull also opened up about his debilitating descent into the “black hole” of depression after losing the Liberal Party leadership in 2009.
“I started to sink into a very, very deep depression. It was very deep and very dangerous,” the former prime minister told 7.30.
“I’d never given much thought to mental health before. I’d always – I’d been aware that, you know, people have mental health issues, but I’d never really thought about it a lot.
“And I felt myself – I felt these thoughts of death, of self-destruction, coming into my mind unbidden and unwanted.
“And I couldn’t get them out of my mind and I got sicker and sicker and sicker. It was a terrible time. And I managed that by … I made an announcement I would retire from parliament.
“The moment I made that announcement, I knew it was a mistake. I then changed my mind, and ran again and I ran again in large part to survive, because I felt this was something I could do to claw my way out of this terrible hole, this black hole I’d found myself in.”
Mr Turnbull was particularly scathing when discussing Peter Dutton’s leadership aspirations during the Liberal infighting saga.
“It was such an absurd proposition,” he told host Leigh Sales.
“I didn’t imagine that he was so deluded as to imagine that our political prospects would be advanced by a change of leadership, and especially to him.”
He described Tony Abbott’s leadership as “erratic and flaky” and Prime Minister Scott Morrison, who he has accused of playing a “double game” as a “control freak”.
‘HOLDS TIGHT TO HIS OPINION’
Body language expert Dr Louise Mahler, however, said Mr Turnbull’s lack of critical analysis was “striking” and that was hiding “behind a mask”.
“Note to self: if the conclusion of your argument is that all others are ‘toxic’ folk who ‘bully and intimidate’ and you come out of that box and claim yourself to be ‘held to high standards’, it may leave the listener somewhat cold,” Dr Mahler told News Corp Australia.
Dr Mahler said the former prime minister “holds tight to his opinion and holds tight his jaw”.
“It is a shielded fight position with black and white outcomes, with little self-searching. This is at odds with a new style of leadership seen today in some female leaders epitomised by Jacinda Ardern whose raw openness is appealing and modern.”
The body language expert said Mr Turnbull had a “skill for masking”.
“Mr Turnbull hides behind a mask, a mask beautifully moulded, but still a mask. And his skill for masking is something he hinted at towards the end of his interview when he spoke of a depressed period and how he was faking it to make it to get by on a daily basis.”
Mr Turnbull sensationally likened the Liberal MPs who ousted him from power to “terrorists”, warning Prime Minister Scott Morrison he risks a similar fate.
The former prime minister unleashed on his parliamentary colleagues while promoting his new memoir in an ABC interview described by one party legend as “so sad”.
Long-serving former Liberal Victorian premier Jeff Kennett said Mr Turnbull had become a “bitter, shrivelled individual” who was the “natural” bedfellow of former Labor prime minister Kevin Rudd.
“This interview on the ABC is so sad,” Mr Kennet said on Twitter. “I will never regret, having been given the opportunity to lead Victoria, being defeated.
“Turnbull was PM of his country, the greatest honour … sadly (he) failed in loss to appreciate the opportunity he had been given.”
Mr Turnbull said the right faction members of the Liberal Party who conspired to install Home Affairs Minister Peter Dutton as leader would “operate like a terrorist” to destabilise Mr Morrison’s position.
“Now, they don’t use guns and bombs, I hasten to add, but it is the technique of terrorism, where you create enough mayhem, enough damage, that people in the middle say, “It has got to come to an end, how can I stop this terrible horror?”
Mr Turnbull said he believed the best way to stop the “horror” was to “flush it out” with a leadership ballot.
Former Liberal Party candidate Warren Mundine called Mr Turnbull a “delusional fool”.
“In Australia we have a term – get over it,” he tweeted.
Mr Turnbull earlier denied betraying former Liberal colleagues and defended the publication of private messages in his memoir, which could breach cabinet confidentiality.
The former prime minister told The Australian he was “writing history” and that he was merely telling his story in his new book, A Bigger Picture.
“The reality is I am writing history. My government is over. We are in a different government, different political era and of course with the COVID pandemic it is, you know, we are crossing what is going to be quite a watershed,” Mr Turnbull told The Australian.
“There is not much point in writing a memoir if you cannot write it truthfully. OK, sometimes you have got to use discretion and judgment but it’s important that people know what happened. And, you know, I’ve given a truthful account.”
Mr Turnbull insisted his new book provided “a balanced account” of his relationship with Scott Morrison, whom he regards as a friend.
In his book, Mr Turnbull writes that he hoped to “steer” the Liberal Party back to the “centre” ground of politics.
But he told The Australian the party remained in the grip of right-wing rump, which holds the party “hostage” through “terrorism” and is supported by sections of the media.
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