Demons and Destiny: ‘We’ve lost sight of the real Bob Hawke’

A ‘high-functioning alcoholic’ who had sex with possibly thousands, of women, the former PM’s money making in China has also come under scrutiny.

Former prine minister Kevin Rudd says he felt uncomfortable with Bob Hawke asking for assistance with his business deals in China. Hawke, before his death, said he disliked Rudd.

Troy Bramston remembers the last interview he did with Bob Hawke, the one that turned out to be the last ever.

“Hawke was always open with me, and happy to answer any questions I had, but on this occasion, he was increasingly brief,” Bramston says in an interview. “He looked a little dishevelled. He was still sharp in the mind, but irritable and uncomfortable.

“And when I turned off the recording, I said: ‘How are you feeling?’. And he said: ‘To be honest, mate, I’d be happy if I don’t wake up tomorrow.’ He was not frightened. Although according to (Hawke’s widow) Blanche, who I interviewed about his final hours, right at the end, he fought it.”

But maybe we all fight it?

“Maybe. Because I did get the sense he was ready to go.”

Bob and Hazel Hawke. “He cheated on Hazel. He cheated on Blanche. He was a womaniser. People know that. But there was much more to it.”

Bramston’s final interview with Hawke informs part – but only a small part – of his mammoth new biography, Bob Hawke: Demons and Destiny. And my first question about the book is maybe also your first question: why?

Why write a new biography of Robert J Hawke?

“Because we haven’t had a single-volume, full-life biography of Hawke published in 30 years,” says Bramston.

“And no previous book has had this kind of access to Hawke’s personal papers. Hundreds and hundreds of boxes. Things like, his father Clem wrote a memoir, that I’ve been able to read. Letters Bob wrote to Hazel and to his parents in the 1950s. Diaries from when he went to Oxford and to India for a student Christian conference. Pages and pages from the ACTU years.

“Drawings that his three children sent him in the 1960s when he was travelling. And that is before you get to the extensive range of material that has become available under the 20-year and 30-year archival rules.

“When you read it all, you get the sense that in the last few decades, we’ve lost sight of the real Hawke. For personal legacy reasons, and for political reasons, he returned to what he was in the 1970s: a larrikin superstar celebrity. But the real Hawke is a very complex person, whose personal behaviour is difficult for people to accept today.”

Which brings us to some of the headlines already being generated by this book: Bob Hawke was a sex addict?

“I believe he was. He cheated on Hazel. He cheated on Blanche. He was a womaniser. People know that. But there was much more to it.”

Hawke alongside his wife Blanche d'Alpuget at a book signing.

In a chapter titled “In Bed With Bob”, Bramston says that when Hawke “rolled into a capital or regional city, some women would ring his office to let him know they were available … he had a steady group of women who satisfied his sexual needs”.

Bramston says it is now clear that Hawke had sex with hundreds, possibly thousands, of women over the course of his life. He cheated on Hazel, he cheated on Blanche. Some of his mistresses, among them Gil Appleton, have spoken for the first time, and these accounts are key to Bramston’s project.

“Some of the relationships were short, casual things. Some were longer-term, a few months, a few years. Even Blanche recognised when he was having an affair with her, he was having affairs with three or four other women at the same time. He was having affairs while in was in the Lodge. So this is a big part of Bob’s life. And it can’t be ignored, so I tracked down some people … there have always been rumours, and people gave me tips, and I approached the women, and I said: will you talk to me?

“Gil Appleton gives her first account of having an affair with Hawke in the 1970s. I wanted her to talk to me, and I told her: this is a serious book. It’s trying to unravel and explain the real Hawke. It’s a service to history for an important and consequential Australian. And she agreed.”

Bob Hawke with Glenda Bowden at the ALP conference in Terrigal in 1975.

Bramston says Hawke was also a “high-functioning alcoholic” but when he became prime minister, he managed to come off the booze.

“A lot of people thought it would not be possible,” he says. “He knew that he had to demonstrate that he could do it, that he would not embarrass his country. But he wasn’t able to tame that other part of his personality, and Parliament House, politics, it was all very different.

“There was no impact on his public duties. But with his family … they do love him. But they have been appalled by his behaviour over the years. I interviewed (daughter) Sue and (son) Steve, and family friends, people who have known Hawke since he was at school, who had a good insight into the relationship with Hazel, and they were appalled by it.

“And he never denied any of it to me. He acknowledged to me: ‘I wasn’t a good father.’ He said that. And that’s part of the trick to understanding him. He never lied about anything. He was always relaxed with his life and his legacy. He thought there were things he could have done better. But he was very comfortable, overall. He would respond angrily to things if people impugned his integrity or misrepresented him but he knew he was not a perfect person.”

The book tackles another tricky topic: the money Hawke made doing business in China after he left The Lodge.

Hawke, surrounded by advisers and media, lights up a cigar on a VIP flight during the 1983 federal election campaign, which saw Labor swept to a landslide victory.

“A few colleagues have said he asked for too many favours,” Bramston says. “Kevin Rudd told me on the record, he felt uncomfortable with Hawke asking for assistance with his business deals in China, and (Peter) Beattie said the same.

“But a lot of what he did wasn’t bringing China to Australia, it was the other way, opening doors for Australian businesses. And it’s a different China today. He was meeting with Chinese leaders in the 1990s, when it wasn’t so narrow-minded and oppressive. But I do think he was a little naive about things.”

Bramston believes Hawke is the most important, consequential and successful prime minister since World War II.

“We recognise the achievements in domestic policy but a big part of his prime ministership was foreign policy. He was the last Cold War prime minister, and he developed close and respectful relationships with historically significant figures: Thatcher, Reagan, Bush Sr. They had enormous respect for Hawke. Reagan writes to him and says relations have never been stronger. A Republican administration, and a Labor prime minister.

“He took that alliance to a new level, he strengthened it, and made us more independent as well. I was told that Hawke was the leading figure in helping get Nelson Mandela out of prison, too, by working through the Commonwealth.

“It is extraordinary to think he would have such a close relationship with such iconic figures, be trusted and respected, having tough arguments with Thatcher, but (she) liked him very much, because he was upfront, and always knew what he was talking about.

“Add to that his skill at running a cabinet, and the fact that we’ve never had a Labor prime minister as popular.”

Hawke and then-PM Tony Abbott attend the Boao Forum for Asia Annual Conference in China in 2014. Hawke had a high regard for Abbott personally, but called him a “bloody hopeless” prime minister.

The book is serious, but also filled with lovely little titbits such as this one: “Hazel ran a busy household with children of school age … in the early 1970s, she had the help of Bridgette Warne, who would help clean the house for a few hours each week. Bridgette and her two sons, Shane and Jason, were regular visitors to the Hawke house … Shane would later become one of Australia’s greatest cricketers.”

Bramston says the aim of the book, with its 676 pages, a solid selection of photographs, and the impressive index, is to describe for history the “real Hawke. He was a much better prime minister than we’ve appreciated, and a much worse person. That light and shade is crucial to understanding him”.

Bob Hawke: Demons and Destiny by Troy Bramston is published by Penguin/Viking this week, $45 (HB).