Jim Molan wins Senate ticket, Alliance Dinner heavy hitters, Virginia Bell’s run in with the law
At his word
So much for the word of Jim Molan – the retired major general who at the weekend bested Liberal senator Concetta Fierravanti-Wells to secure a winnable spot on the Coalition’s Senate ticket for the coming federal election.
“(This term) is Two-and-a-half years, that’s a long time,” Molan said in November 2019 when he was selected to replace Arthur Sinodinos.
“Should I want to serve this country and serve the state of NSW after that, I have given my word that I will not run for the Senate again.”
Guess we’ll chalk that one up as, er, misdirection.
Molan, for the record, in 2018 told the Senate in his maiden speech that he would work “tirelessly for the re-election for the Coalition at the federal level”.
One year later he campaigned against the Coalition at the federal level by running a below-the-line voting campaign – for an utterly unwinnable spot – after he was demoted down the Senate ticket ahead of the 2019 election.
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Ring my bell
Five stars was the general consensus from the pews of the NSW Bar Association’s annual knees-up – the Bench and Bar Dinner – when it came to former High Court judge Virginia Bell’s keynote speech.
By all accounts her honour was a barrel of laughs recounting the ignominy of retiring from the judiciary and finding that … nobody knows who you are.
Bell had a stellar career on the bench, first at the NSW Supreme Court and Court of Appeal before being elevated under Kevin Rudd to the High Court in 2009. She retired last year.
Despite her high-flying legal career, Bell has always been a Redfern local and keen supporter of the South Sydney Rabbitohs, and recounted to some 2000 barristers, judges and assorted others on Friday evening taking a friend and a few bottles of Seaview Brut sparkling down to Redfern Oval to take in the atmosphere and watch (by remote) the 2021 NRL Grand Final.
Despite more than two decades on various benches, police officers were none the wiser when approaching Bell to request they be more discreet with their drinking – the oval has much disregarded no-drinking policy.
It was in the midst of Sydney’s Covid-19 outbreak, and few others were brave enough to venture into public, Bell told those gathered.
That made it all the more amusing when a lone ABC reporter approached the former High Court judge and asked if she wouldn’t much mind waving a small Rabbitohs banner in the background of her piece to camera. “It was at that moment I thought of the Chief Justice,” Bell told the dinner.
Suffice to say, she did not grace the nation’s television screens that evening.
Bell did raise a number of more serious points, including taking aim at the ever-growing cottage industry that has emerged around defamation suits, a somewhat pointed reference considering another speaker at the Hyatt-Regency dinner, Nicholas Owens SC,
is a keen practitioner in the field (he is currently acting for Nine Entertainment against Ben Roberts-Smith).
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Heavy hitters
There was no lack of corporate and political muscle at Monday night’s big diplomatic knees-up – better known as The Alliance Dinner – in a sort of trial run for the budget bash come Tuesday.
Spotted on the guest list was a who’s who of corporate Australia and investment banking including ANZ chief executive Shayne Elliot, Bank of America Merrill Lynch boss Joe Fayyad, Citi boss Marc Luet, and KKR Australia head Scott Bookmyer.
The Great Hall event included remarks from Scott Morrison, Labor leader Anthony Albanese, US Charge d’Affaires Michael Goldman, former prime minister John Howard and The Australian’s editor-in-chief Christopher Dore. Looking on, a set of high powered News Corporation executives including the company’s chairman Lachlan Murdoch (with Sarah Murdoch), chief executive Robert Thomson, Australasian executive chairman Michael Miller, Herald & Weekly Times boss Penny Fowler, Foxtel chief executive Patrick Delaney and Sky News Australia boss Paul Whittaker.
Heloise Pratt was there to introduce the Prime Minister, and there were plenty of defence industry types to round it off: Lockheed Martin Australia chief Warren McDonald, Northrop Grumman Australia head Chris Deeble and BAE System’s executive Ben Hudson.
The dinner was hosted by the United States Studies Centre based at the University of Sydney.
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Hopes dashed
Could Matt Bekier’s abrupt exit from the Star Entertainment board save John O’Neill from a similar fate? Perhaps, but the harsh reality of sitting atop a company which apparently facilitated the laundering of $900m is unlikely to do the gaming outfit’s chairman much good when it comes to a coveted post on the Brisbane 2032 Organising Committee.
O’Neill has been a major supporter of the bid, as far back as 2018 telling this newspaper that the Australian Olympics Committee should give serious consideration to Brisbane as a host city.
Since the city secured the games, he has provided a stream of congratulatory commentary to everyone from Annastacia Palaszczuk to Morrison for their successes.
“There is a 10-year green and gold runway in front of us, then a 10-year legacy to follow,” he said in July.
Given this high praise, it’s no surprise O’Neill has been relentlessly mentioned in dispatches as a contender for the chairmanship of the organisation. But the 12-person organising committee, which was meant to have been in place by January 2, has yet to be finalised. It would be surprising to choose O’Neill now – given the revelations at the NSW inquiry into The Star.
The holdup appears to be the selection of five independent directors, from where the chairman will be drawn. The search is being conducted by Odgers Berndtson. The federal government’s four nominees – Tracy Stockwell, Rebecca Frizelle, Sport Minister Richard Colbeck and Olympics special envoy Ted O’Brien – are already in place, although the latter two will find themselves out of a job if Labor is successful come the May federal election.
O’Neill’s troubles, however, could be a boon for other likely candidates. The well-regarded former Queensland cabinet minister Kate Jones, now an NRL commissioner, remains a favourite in dispatches. No doubt recruiters are also looking at other successful Queensland businesswomen – three of five independent directors must be female – including, Margin Call is told, Cathie Reid (233rd on The List – Australia’s Richest 250) and Brisbane Lions deputy chair Sarah Jane Kelly.
Legal troubles also appear to have derailed a possible run for the position of Brisbane 2032 chief executive by Nev Power. The former Fortescue Metals boss, who once oversaw the nation’s post-pandemic taskforce, received a suspended eight-month jail sentence last week after admitting he flew a helicopter into Western Australia from the family cattle station near Mount Isa.
There are plenty of other heavyhitters mooted for the job, including former Virgin Australia CEO Paul Scurrah, a businessman known to be close to the Queensland government and currently running Pacific National, as well as ex-Wallaby Damian Frawley, who Margin Call reported as a key contender last year given his retirement from the Queensland Investment Corporation.
Two left-field candidates in correspondence: one-time Australia Post boss Christine Holgate and AFL chief Gill McLachlan, widely rumoured to have retirement in sight.
The Cat’s lair gets a visit from the corporate cop
The Byron Bay home of media entrepreneur Antony Catalano was raided by ASIC investigators last week, allegedly in relation to trading in asset manager Magellan.
The Price is right for Rinehart
Gina Rinehart praised the Coalition’s Jacinta Nampijinpa Price, urged the ADF to shift to Darwin and chastised unacclimatised city folk, in a recorded address to the Institute of Public Affairs.