As he incessantly reminded us in characteristically bombastic fashion, diseased hordes would have overrun the state had he not bravely stood up to the federales and told them what to do with their steenking badges.
But the pandemic has passed, and the electorate is fickle. Unfortunately, the great man no longer receives the adulation nor the respect he believes he deserves. As a People’s Voice Survey revealed last month, voter satisfaction with McGowan is at its lowest level since the start of the pandemic. Typical of plebian vulgarity, WA folk are instead preoccupied with mundane concerns such as burgeoning juvenile crime, lengthy ambulance waiting times, and a crisis in the housing construction industry.
No doubt feeling nostalgic for the days when entry to the state was at the Premier’s pleasure, the McGowan government – ostensibly to combat drug-trafficking – introduced legislation last month for police to stop and search people and vehicles at 22 border points across WA, including the state’s road and rail border crossings, along with major ports and airports.
It would, declared WA Police Commissioner Col Blanch, enable officers “to manage the searches of vehicles without reasonable suspicion”. You know, just like what happens when you enter a foreign country. And as McGowan added, “having some enhanced restriction on your borders will reduce drug-related crime”.
Only two years ago he announced he was for the same reason considering extending the state’s controversial G2G entry pass post-pandemic, only to back down reluctantly when the former naval lawyer was informed this would be unconstitutional.
But as the prickly and combative McGowan would be the first to tell you, even he knows when to defer to a higher authority. That much was obvious when the sycophant – sorry, the Sinophile – Premier left Australia this month to pay homage to Beijing. “This mission is a great opportunity to reconnect with Chinese leaders,” he declared before his departure.
That statement did not surprise anyone. All those familiar with McGowan’s history knows his approach is one of opportunism and obsequiousness.
In 2005, when parliamentary secretary to WA premier Geoff Gallop, McGowan infuriated his boss when he went AWOL on the eve of the state election to go to Canberra. His reason? Opposition frontbencher Kim Beazley was vying to return as federal Labor leader, and for McGowan, it was a carpe diem moment.
“He was willing to pay his own way over to Sydney to give us a hand, which was a gesture of unparalleled friendship,” a tactful Beazley told the West Australian in 2012. A furious Gallop ordered him to return to Perth. So much for McGowan’s credentials as a diehard sandgroper. Yet in 2016, when former federal Labor minister Stephen Smith challenged McGowan for the party leadership, the latter had the chutzpah to say his rival had “brought the Canberra disease to Western Australia”.
It is well-known this provincial loudmouth fancies himself as statesman, and no-one doubted this overseas trip would be cringeworthy. But McGowan’s comments on the second day of his China visit turned this into the ultimate toady tour.
“The Prime Minister, hopefully, will come to China sometime in the next six months and meet with President Xi Jinping,” he told The West Australian. “One of the things he could do is invite all the Premiers and Chief Ministers to come with him.” It would, he said, be “a strong demonstration that the relationship is back to a harmonious and productive one.”
A fantastic idea, Premier. I can just imagine the spectacle of every one of our current political leaders lining up in the Great Hall of the People to pay their respects to Xi. After all, China has been a great friend to Australia, aside from unleashing a killer virus, covering up its outbreak, crippling our trade market with punitive tariffs, pointing lasers at our defence aircraft, falsely portraying our soldiers as murderers, and infiltrating our domestic front to exert political influence. For good measure and to demonstrate their good will, perhaps our leaders could practise Maoist self-criticisms before the Chinese president?
For McGowan, it is yet again a case of being unfairly maligned. “I never said there should be a meeting of the national cabinet in China,” he said, insisting the West Australian had made a mistake in its reporting. “I’ve never said anything of the sort.”
But whether or not he used the term ‘national cabinet’ in this context, his conduct and on-record comments were rich material for propaganda purposes. During the China-Australia Chamber of Commerce lunch in Beijing, he was captured on microphone telling chamber chair Vaughn Barber that shadow defence minister Andrew Hastie had “swallowed some sort of Cold War pills back … when he was born, and he couldn’t get his mindset out of that.”
As CCP propagandists know, it is not necessarily a bad thing to have a bull, or more accurately a buffoon, in the China shop. Having interviewed McGowan last week, China’s state-owned Global Times praised his “pragmatic” stance.
“When Washington is attempting to hold its allies and partners hostage so they continue to act as pawns in the US anti-China and containment strategies, local governments and enterprises in Australia have a clearer understanding than some Australian politicians,” it declared.
Small wonder McGowan and his Victorian counterpart Daniel Andrews are feted, given both have publicly criticised the Morrison and Turnbull governments for holding China to account.
Defending his actions last weekend, McGowan pointed out he had raised the cases of detained Australians Cheng Lei and Yang Jun during a one-hour meeting with China’s vice foreign affairs minister. For two reasons, he deserves no credit for this.
First, this was a belated decision that McGowan was shamed into, given his office had earlier said he would not do so, claiming ridiculously he did not want to intrude into what was a federal government responsibility.
And secondly, his doing so was totally ineffective. Put simply, if you behave like a China lackey and undermine your own government, you earn not just gratitude from your Beijing friends but also their contempt. The Premier went into that meeting with as much bargaining power as a baby panda.
But at least in one respect he is unsurpassed. No-one can kowtow like McGowan.
More Coverage
Trade war woes: Feeling bad about buying American-made at the checkout
Cornflakes are made only a few kilometres away from my pantry but the ownership resides in America. Do I punish the company and diss the local factory?
Why preferences matter when it comes down to the count
Look carefully at the detail before you choose No. 2 – it can have unexpected consequences.
To his adoring fellow citizens, Premier Mark McGowan was the strongman who saved Western Australia from the Great Eastern States Plague.