Guardian Australia’s political editor Katharine Murphy quits website to work for Prime Minister Anthony Albanese

The Guardian’s political editor has quit the left-wing online website to take up a new job working for Anthony Albanese, prompting a dig by Peter Dutton.

The Guardian Australia’s political editor Katharine Murphy has quit the left-wing online website to take up a new job working for Anthony Albanese, prompting a dig by Peter Dutton about her and Nine’s chief political correspondent David Crowe.

The appointment of The Guardian Australia’s political editor ­Katharine Murphy to work in Prime Minister Anthony Albanese’s office was met with sarcasm by Peter Dutton, who said she will now be “officially running lines for Labor”.

The announcement on Monday that Murphy had quit the left-wing online publication to work for the Labor government was mocked by the Opposition Leader and he also attacked The Sydney Morning Herald and The Age’s chief political correspondent David Crowe, accusing the pair of political bias.

“I am genuinely shocked to see Murpharoo take up a spot to now be officially running lines for Labor,” Mr Dutton posted on X.

“The real outrage is David Crowe missed out. What more must he do to prove his credentials to formally be employed by the Labor Party?”

Nine Entertainment, which own the Herald and The Age, was contacted but would not comment, nor would Crowe.

Shortly after Mr Dutton’s ­attack, the Minister for Climate Change and Energy Chris Bowen chimed in to praise the Crowe.

“For the record, @CroweDM is a journalist of the utmost professionalism who keeps all sides to account,” he wrote on X.

“He does not deserve this level of childish abuse from you.”

Murphy has been prolific in her attacks on the Coalition while heading up The Guardian’s political coverage and has described Mr Dutton in her columns as a “a polariser”, a “stop-the-boats, hard borders isolationist” and an ­“exploding fire hydrant.”

I am genuinely shocked to see Murpharoo take up a spot to now be officially running lines for Labor. The real outrage is David Crowe missed out. What more must he do to prove his credentials to formally be employed by the Labor Party? #givecroweago

— Peter Dutton (@PeterDutton_MP) January 29, 2024

 She also accused Mr Dutton of harming the chances of the voice referendum succeeding, writing in her column on the day of the resounding No vote by 60 per cent of the population: “Dutton didn’t have to stage the voice ­referendum as a political death match. He didn’t have to be the figurehead of fear and fake news. But he did it anyway.”

She also accused him of helping “flood the zone with shit, was certainly part of the reason public support for the voice tanked”.

“I want to be very clear about this,” she wrote. “We see you Peter Dutton. We know what you did.”

Murphy’s political appointment comes after Mr Albanese’s most senior media official, Liz Fitch, quit late last year amid the Labor leader coming under political pressure and declining polls.  Murphy will finish at The Guardian on Friday before moving to Mr Albanese’s office where she will take up a role as a senior press secretary.

She will work alongside Fiona Sugden, a former Labor staffer who worked for Kevin Rudd and Bill Shorten, who quit her role at Fortescue this month.

The pair will report to the Prime Minister’s media director, Brett Mason.

Murphy also defended Mr Albanese for his extensive travel, which has been criticised by large sections of the media and resulted in him being dubbed “Airbus Albo”.

“Albanese travelled a lot in 2023 for one reason – the ­relationships he is tending, and the coalitions he is building, serve Australia’s national interest,” she wrote on December 27, her last column for The Guardian.

I thought this must be a parody, not the account of the alternative Prime Minister.

For the record, @CroweDM is a journalist of the utmost professionalism who keeps all sides to account. He does not deserve this level of childish abuse from you. https://t.co/T5QiiXbkbY

— Chris Bowen (@Bowenchris) January 29, 2024

 Murphy was also a supporter of winding back the stage three tax cuts and wrote in October 2022: “This package was legislated in a different economic and budgetary context. When circumstances change, smart people change their minds.”

Murphy is one of the most ­senior reporters working in Canberra’s press gallery. In 2013 while working as The Age’s national ­affairs correspondent, she was poached to join The Guardian when it was established in ­Australia.

In a series of posts on X she thanked the site’s editor, Lenore Taylor, and said helping to establish the website in Australia “has been the greatest privilege of my professional life”.

A Guardian spokesman confirmed that Murphy would finish on Friday and she would no longer write anything for the online publication.