Malcolm Turnbull praises GoCatch, son holds shares

Peter Nicholson Margin Call cartoon for 06-10-2015. Version: (650x366) COPYRIGHT: The Australian's artists each have different copyright agreements in place regarding re-use of their work in other publications. Please seek advice from the artists themselves or the Managing Editor of The Australian regarding re-use.

The love our new PM, Malcolm Turnbull, holds in his heart for public transport is as famous as his love of “innovation” and Twitter — so isn’t it great to see him combine all three while keeping it in the family?

While toiling in obscurity as mere comms minister, Turnbull tweeted his crush on Aussie taxi-hailing app GoCatch, which is battling US giant Uber for a share of the local market.

“You should download it!” Mal said in the 2013 tweet.

Mal said a fellow Twit’s suggestion he was “getting paid by these different apps to advertise them” was “pretty offensive”, adding: “No. However the taxi apps like GoCatch are good examples of v disruptive new productivity technology”.

GoCatch thanked PM T for his support after he deposed Tony Abbott last month, Facebooking a snap of Mal and app boss Ned Moorfield at this year’s CEO Sleepout.

Turnbull’s app-fection for GoCatch comes from the heart, but he also has a personal interest: son Alex is a shareholder in the company, alongside the likes of David Paradice and Paul Bassat’s Square Peg fund. Alex owns a modest 1.57 per cent of GoCatch.

A bio with brio

Mal’s ascension has also disrupted the dusty world of books, where Louise Adler’s Melbourne University Press was yesterday putting final touches on Paddy Manning’s unauthorised bio of the PM.

It was commissioned in April-May this year but Adler moved the date forward to the end of this month to cash in on the “closure” provided by the coup.

While the halcyon days of newspapers paying huge fees for book extracts are long gone, Fairfax has agreed to stump up cash and plug the book in return for first run of the juicy bits.

Apparently Fairfax has forgotten the unfortunate episode in 2013 when its Maserati-loving boss, Greg Hywood, forced Manning out after the latter penned a Crikey item slamming “rubbishy” advertorial and “ soft coverage” in Michael Stuchbury’s AFR.

Meanwhile, Adler is keen to wring another book out of one of her authors who suddenly has a lot more time on his hands: newly minted backbencher Tony Abbott, whose manifesto Battlelines was first published by MUP in 2009. “I’m encouraging him to write more,” she said.

She’d also like to publish Peta Credlin’s memoirs — as would every other publisher in Oz — saying the former prime ministerial chief of staff had been “much maligned”.

Shifting the goalposts

Not content with just one football grand final being played in Melbourne, ambitious Victorian opposition leader Matthew Guy revealed that he would bid for the NRL’s top game to move south if his government wins the election.

But local team Melbourne Storm can’t count on his support if he takes the top gig.

“As a paid up member of South Sydney I think it would be good to see another South Sydney grand final but this time being played at Melbourne,” Guy told the Oz’s Greg Brown.

Not so his WA counterpart Colin Barnett, who said flatly: “I am not a fan of rugby.”

Fellow sandgroper Julie Bishop also didn’t feign interest in that other code. Asked if she would watch the NRL’s big game, the West Coast Eagles fan said: “I’ll probably be doing something else.”

Rails run for G1X

With football squared away for another year, thoughts turn to the corporate calendar’s next big date — no, not AGM season, the Melbourne Cup.

With the Cup less than a month away, new racing media contender G1X.com.au is running out of time to get trackside for the big day.

Sweeping up talent sidelined by the implosion of the industry’s broadcaster, TVN, early this year, G1X looks set to compete — to some extent — with the Victorian industry’s hook-up with Kerry Stokes, Racing.com.

On paper G1X is owned by Acquire Learning, the education broker where former AFL boss Andrew Demetriou is executive chairman and his nephew Tim is chief operating officer.

But Acquire’s horse-mad MD, John Wall, told Margin Call it’s actually his cash at stake. He said his team — Richie Callander, Mick Sharkie, Bruce Clark and Adrian Dunn — had applied for accreditation and he didn’t foresee any problems.

While Racing.com’s blinkers let it see only Victorian races, G1X aims to go national with three weekly video shows.

Wall reckons it can break even next year and should be turning a profit by spring 2017.

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