Peter Goad has died aged 101.
The metallurgist, editor, yachtsman and skier became an unlikely activist when he joined and later assumed leadership of Save Albert Park, the group which has fought the increasing encroachment on public land of the Australian Grand Prix Corporation for the annual Formula 1 grand prix.
Peter Goad, pictured last year, has been remembered as “one of a kind”. Credit: Wayne Taylor
His death notice in The Age described him as a “man of many talents and fixer of everything. A man of principle. A fighter to the end. Died peacefully after a very full 101 years.”
Goad assumed leadership of the group when others suffered burn out.
Members of the Save Albert Park group in 2014, including Peter Goad, third from right.Credit: Wayne Taylor
“Though Peter Goad led an activist group that fought the Kennett, Bracks, Brumby, Baillieu, Napthine, Andrews and Allan governments, he was a most unlikely subversive,” the actor and playwright Kevin Summers told CBD.
“He was a plain-speaking, upright middle-class man whose sense of integrity was shaken by the imposition of the grand prix at Albert Park. While others moved on in despair, he maintained his ire and his energy. He never gave up. Despite the vitriol heaped upon him, he maintained his gentlemanly spirit and never resorted to cheap, personal attacks. One of a kind.”
Earlier this year, the group fell at the final hurdle when an administrative tribunal overturned an information commissioner decision to grant it access to the Australian Grand Prix Corporation books.
The Formula 1 race, which loses about $100 million of taxpayers’ money each year, is secure in Melbourne until 2037 after the state government agreed to a massive expansion of facilities at Albert Park.
A celebration for Goad will be held on December 6 with details to follow.
Richo’s dedication
So much written about former Labor powerbroker and CBD regular Graham Richardson, with the obituary in this masthead describing him variously as “artful dodger, kingmaker, spiv, front bar wit, grey eminence, raconteur” before detailing his high political achievements and knack for courting controversy.
It was in this third act as a commentator for The Australian that one of your columnists encountered him, and, like many, warming to his charm and dedication.
Famed Labor powerbroker, politician and commentator Graham Richardson.Credit: Ben Appleton
Ill health was already taking its toll on his body, and one week word came through that Richo was in hospital. Contingency plans for a replacement writer were made. How foolish we were. Well before deadline the (outdated even then) fax machine clattered to life with two pages of a column written out in cursive longhand. From his hospital bed, Richo had dictated his column to one of the nurses.
New Ten buzz
It’s been a tough time for the good folk at Network Ten, with massive financial losses, program axings and redundancies, and the uncertainty that inevitably comes from a change of ownership.
But at the network’s upfront presentation on the Gold Coast last Thursday, there was a noticeable spring in the step of many old stagers.
Gretel Killeen is returning to Ten.
It wasn’t just that they were excited to be at Dreamworld, with after-hours access to some of the rides (with their plummets from great heights a perfect metaphor for free-to-air television). It was that their new boss had flown in and let them know he cared. Well, that he isn’t about to sell them, anyway.
Though Ten’s s newly merged parent company, Paramount Skydance Corporation, wasted no time in selling off its Argentinian broadcasting arm, global content chief Kevin Maclellan has been on a mission to assure staff at UK subsidiary 5 and Australia’s Ten that they are key assets. They generate content that can be distributed around the world. And, crucially, they direct new subscribers to the Paramount+ streaming service, which is where the real action is.
Maclellan impressed the audience, largely consisting of media buyers and advertisers, by going off script (just as Tom Gleisner and Ed Kavalee did, to hilarious effect). Asked to talk about his career, Maclellan took a detour to his childhood in 1980s, pre-gentrification Brooklyn.
His mother would give him $2 for lunch. “And I would take that $2 and go to the store, buy a dozen bottles of water, head to the subway and sell them for $1 each.” And that, he told the crowd, is why they are his people. “Sales is in my blood.”
As a slide popped up behind him with the logos of the places he’d previously worked – HBO, Sony, Nickelodeon, NBC Universal – Maclellan said he wasn’t going to say anything about his experiences there except to share his key learning. “You stay between five and seven years, but then leave before everyone realises you’re full of shit.”
Unscripted, open, a little rough and ready – and very Dale Carnegie – it went down a treat.
So too did the promise that CEO David Ellison would bring the technological knowhow (and deep pockets) of his father, squillionaire Oracle founder Larry, to Paramount Australia, and thus usher in a new age of seamless digital magic. Or something.
There was lots of excitement when new Survivor host David Genat (aka the Golden God) took to the stage looking resplendent in double denim (a lot more than viewers have hitherto seen him wearing), and for Gretel Killeen, the original host of Big Brother, who is returning to Ten after a lengthy absence to host the next season of Traitors.
But the buzz peaked when guests were invited to take a tour of the Big Brother house.
To get a sneak peek of the massive multicoloured manse, guests had to register online, on their phones. The first tour was supposed to start at 7.15pm. By 7.30pm, the digital registration system had totally collapsed.
Yes, things may be looking up at Ten, but Ellison’s tech team clearly still has its work cut out.
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