Malcolm Turnbull, Guardian of the Green Left Galaxy

Malcolm Turnbull’s admission that he helped start up an Australian edition of The Guardian has angered conservative Liberals.

Former prime minister Malcolm Turnbull. Picture: AAP

Malcolm Turnbull’s boasting that he was integral in creating an Australian edition of the Green-Left activist British website, The Guardian, has raised fundamental questions over his loyalty to the Liberal cause, according to Coalition ministers.

Federal Housing Minister and Assistant Treasurer ­Michael Sukkar said the revelation had raised questions about the former prime minister’s ­motives for ­wanting to start a progressive news outlet in Australia.

“Malcolm Turnbull freely admitting that he helped establish The Guardian confirms what many in the Liberal Party have thought for a long time … that he was the most left-wing prime ­minister Australia has had since Whitlam,” Mr Sukkar said. “It also partly confirms another belief that he simply used the ­Liberal Party as a vehicle to fulfil his own ambitions to become prime minister … and not because he subscribed to the values of the party.

“I will also be interested to read his recollections of the disastrous 2016 election campaign where the government lost (a net) 14 seats, losing many great Liberal MPs who Turnbull chose not to even acknowledge in his cringe-worthy election night speech.”

Liberal senator Eric Abetz said: “Nothing surprises me about revelations of Mr Turnbull helping left-wing causes like The Guardian. He then lacks the self-awareness to understand why those of us on the conservative side of politics questioned his judgement and motivation. It’s really quite sad.”

Graeme Wood, Wotif founder, at the Royal Yacht Club.

A senior cabinet minister told The Australian the admission by Mr Turnbull in his memoir, A Bigger Picture, was “unbelievable”.

“I have been wrong all along. I thought he should have joined the Labor Party,” he said.

“It turns out he should have joined the Greens.”

Mr Turnbull has credited himself in 2012 with introducing left-wing millionaire Graeme Wood to then Guardian UK editor Alan Rusbridger, as well as helping to recruit two senior Canberra press gallery journalists to establish an Australian digital version of the British publication.

Mr Turnbull was one of the key figures behind the establishment of The Guardian in Australia, ­according to his memoir, in which he boasts it was further ­evidence his deal-making skills “remained intact”. He also claims to have introduced The Guardian Australia’s first political writers, Lenore Taylor (now editor) and Katharine Murphy, to Rusbridger to help set up the publication.

Illustration: Johannes Leak

In The Guardian Australia on Thursday, Taylor said the website owed Mr Turnbull “thanks — but not favours” and claimed his recollection “skips” ­significant aspects of her recruitment and the establishment of the digital publication. Taylor wrote that Mr Turnbull did not influence the paper: “As Turnbull writes, in the seven years we have been operating, Guardian Australia only rarely endorsed his or his government’s policies. Since we are a progressive publication and he is a politician of the centre right, that should hardly come as a shock.”

The Guardian's Katherine Murphy, left, and Lenore Taylor, right.

Mr Turnbull wrote that he had begun to “despair” about the state of journalism in Australia, with shrinking newsrooms and editorial standards that “were dropping to loopy standards of the twittersphere”. “I wasn’t especially concerned about the political slant of one outlet or another, but more about the fact newsrooms were shrinking … Gina Rinehart was threatening to buy Fairfax — no doubt so its newspapers could emulate her ultra-right-wing views.”

The former prime minister, communications minister and journalist claimed it was he who convinced Rusbridger to set up The Guardian Australia during conversations in June 2012.

“I suggested to Alan Rusbridger, editor of the UK’s Guardian, that he should establish an Australian edition … we exchanged some rough numbers and he concluded he’d need $20m of underwriting for three years.”

Mr Turnbull wrote he brokered the $20m deal between Rusbridger and Mr Wood, the founder of travel firm Wotif who was on “the political left” and had been a generous donor to the Greens.

The cover of Malcolm Turnbull: A Bigger Picture.

He wrote that he was not able to fund the deal himself “given my political role”. He claimed he persuaded Mr Wood to drop left-wing digital start-up The Global Mail and fund The Guardian Australia instead. “It (The Global Mail) wasn’t going to make it. So, I suggested to Graeme he drop The Global Mail and instead use his fortune to bankroll an Australian edition of The Guardian.

“Once Graeme Wood was on board, I introduced Rusbridger to two seasoned Canberra political writers, Lenore Taylor and Katharine Murphy (aka Murpharoo). He sent his deputy, Kath Viner, to Australia to be the first editor.”

However, Taylor wrote on Thursday that Mr Turnbull’s account skipped over a long process of establishing The Guardian after the introductions to Rusbridger, claiming it took almost a year. “Turnbull’s recollection skips over a long and complicated process that followed those initial introductions, after which Turnbull had no further involvement as far as I know. I had some early conver­sations with Rusbridger … and then waited; first to hear from Rusbridger about whether his discussions with Wood had amounted to anything, then to meet Viner when she came to Australia.”