The man Bob Hawke turned to on his deathbed

When Bob Hawke knew death was imminent, he called good mate John Brown, his minister for sport, recreation and tourism from 1983 to 1987, revealing he was considering an each-way bet.

“I’m an atheist but I grew up as the son of a Congregational minister in a manse,” the former prime minister said.

Bob Hawke and tourism minister John Brown with Paul Hogan during the era of the “throw another shrimp on the barbie” campaign in 1984.Credit: Fairfax Media

“I’m thinking of getting a religion. You’re a Catholic. So is [Paul] Keating. All my mates are Catholic. What do you think?”

Brown indicated it was a personal decision but shortly afterwards, Hawke called again. “I’ve given up on that idea. I’ve heard [Bill] Hayden is in a nursing home and the nuns have converted him to Catholicism, so I won’t be going there.”

If Hawke held disdain for Bill Hayden, whom he defeated for the leadership of the Labor Party in 1983, Brown’s attitude to the man who later became governor-general is venomous.

Bob Hawke and John Brown.Credit: Alex Trowle

It’s a surprising emotion from a jovial and convivial man nicknamed “Pollyanna” by his five children; “The Minister for Good Times” while serving as the member for Parramatta and JJ by his mates.

The photo on the front cover of his recently published book, Brownie, has Hawke and himself laughing heartily but if you want to find why he has so much antipathy for Hayden, turn to pages 302-304.

“I didn’t miss him,” says Brown of Hayden and nor does he ignore “that Desk Business” - sex with his then wife Jan Murray, revealed on Nine’s 60 Minutes in 1987 and addressed in the book’s opening pages.

But the bulk of Brown’s autobiography is an anecdote-laced account of his significant achievements in sport and tourism.

Hawke and Brown were responsible for the establishment of the Australian Sports Commission, the federal government’s funding and policy arm. Brown initiated Aussie Sports, a program for primary school children where the rules of sports, as well as its equipment, were modified, such as Kanga cricket and Mini League.

Minister of Sport John Brown opens a race carnival in 1987.Credit: David Trood

He advocated tax averaging for sportspeople and a Sports Aid Foundation which granted tax deductibility for donations, re-routing the money to the sporting organisation; promoted sport for the disabled and introduced the Olympic Insignia Bill to federal parliament, granting the Australian Olympic Committee protection from any unauthorised commercial use. This was a factor in Sydney winning the bid for the 2000 Olympics. Brown was also a pioneer of the removal of tobacco sponsorship from sporting promotion.

Like Hawke, Brown loved the races, revealing he won the money for his first house when he backed his horse La Das at Gosford at odds of 33/1.

The two politicians helped transform the Australian racing industry, as Hansard cites on August 20, 1985, quoting Brown: “The government did three simple things. It took away from racing clubs the necessity to pay income tax, which put them on the same basis as every other sporting club in Australia. We took away the sales tax that was payable on the import of thoroughbreds to race in Australia and allowed breeders to write off their sires and mares in exactly the same way as breeders have been able to do in New Zealand for the last 10 years.”

Jan Murray and John Brown on radio .Credit: Barry Gilmour

Hawke took all the credit in his book The Hawke Memoirs, writing that all these achievements took place after Brown had left the ministry in 1987. The Herald reported this example of historical revisionism, with an accompanying caricature of Hawke’s photo masquerading as a brand on the rump of a horse.

But, as Brown writes in his own autobiography, “Bob contacted me with a very gentle apology” and “laughed at the imputation that he had made a horse’s arse of himself.”

Hawke’s language on the phone to Brown was very different to when he once spoke to British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher.

Brown had earlier received a phone call from his UK equivalent, Neil McFarlane, who was alarmed the 1986 Commonwealth Games in Edinburgh would be boycotted by African nations if a British and Irish Lions tour of South Africa proceeded. The opening game of the tour coincided with the Opening Ceremony of the Games.

Brown, who was present at the phone call, quotes a frustrated Hawke telling a defiant Thatcher, “Listen, you f---ing bitch, get that f---ing team to withdraw from South Africa or otherwise the Commonwealth Games will implode and possibly the British Commonwealth of Nations.”

Bob Hawke and Margaret Thatcher were all smiles here but a new book says it wasn’t always that way.Credit: Getty

Thatcher finally agreed and Hawke apologised for his language.

Brown writes, “I remember their conversation vividly”. He will be 92 in December and his memory remains sharp. A year older than Hayden, he is determined to outlive him.

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