Nicolle Flint’s career sacrifice for the greater good of others

Liberal MP Nicolle Flint’s shock resignation over her treatment has seen her re-victimised by conservatives and the left. She doesn’t regret it.

South Australian Liberal MP Nicole Flint in her office in Parliament House, Canberra. Picture: NCA NewsWire / Gary Ramage

When Julia Gillard stared down Tony Abbott across the parliamentary chamber to deliver her landmark 2012 misogyny speech, her words were hailed both here and abroad as a clarion call for an end to sexism and gendered abuse.

But when Nicolle Flint made the shock announcement two weeks ago that she was quitting politics after enduring comparable abuse, the Liberal conservative’s detractors regarded her as an expendable irritant who was either exaggerating or distorting the nature of her suffering.

And when Flint dared speak again this week to suggest hypocrisy by the left over its studied ­silence towards the abuse of conservative women, she was effectively re-victimised — facing a fresh round of insults from her political enemies telling her to put the violin away.

Flint makes no secret of the toll the past two years has taken on her. It started with the brutal campaign in her marginal South Australian seat of Boothby which was targeted by Labor, GetUp and the unions as being the only winnable SA Liberal seat at the 2019 election.

The nature of what she sustained has been well-documented. There was a daily presence of protesters, several of whom formed a phalanx and shadowed her every time she left the electoral office door. The Weekend Australian spoke this week to one Boothby volunteer who said that “bovver boys” from the SA branch of the CFMEU arrived at his booth on polling day and ripped down all Flint’s posters, then stood there with their arms folded challenging anyone to dare put them up again.

Amid this free-for-all, let-it-rip atmosphere, where protesters were effectively camped outside her office for weeks, Flint also had graffiti painted on her windows calling her a slut and a skank. She was stalked, had eggs thrown at her corflutes, and sustained a level of social media abuse that was vile.

Flint admits that all this got to her. To use her words from when The Australian first broke the story of her treatment in 2019, it was a campaign to destroy her mentally and drive her out of politics. To that end, regrettably, it worked.

The Weekend Australian spoke this week to one Boothby volunteer who said that “bovver boys” from the SA branch of the CFMEU arrived at his booth on polling day and ripped down all Flint’s posters, then stood there with their arms folded challenging anyone to dare put them up again. Picture: Getty

“The general reaction to my announcement I would not recontest the next federal election was one of shock,” Flint told The Weekend Australian on Friday.

“After all, I was only in my second term (having held my seat despite the best attempts of GetUp, Labor and the unions); I had a strong record of achieving policy change; and this week the Prime Minister has said I was ministerial material. But there are limits to human endurance and I had reached mine.”

Flint says she thought that by speaking out two years ago, ­people would reflect on her bad treatment and it would prompt her Labor opponents to lead a call for a truce. Instead, not only did the attacks continue, but they worsened this week when she spoke out again.

She is candid about her ongoing anger at the comments by some in the media, specifically former Fairfax columnist Mike Carlton who wrote a tweet calling her a Liberal shill, and ABC Adelaide broadcaster and News Corp columnist Peter Goers, who wrote a derisory column about her appearance and clothing.

Having already been tipped over the edge in her decision to quit, she felt that this week presented a new tipping point as she broke down not once but twice in parliament discussing her experience and calling for change.

“The sexist and misogynistic abuse, intimidation and harassment I endured at the 2019 election did not stop after the campaign,” she says.

“I was subjected to more sexist attacks by Mike Carlton and Peter Goers. And Extinction ­Rebellion repeatedly vandalised my office.

“This week has revealed the extent of the problem for Liberal women in public life; after I spoke of the sexist abuse, harassment and intimidation I have suffered, the online trolling, the abusive sexist emails, the abusive phone calls to my office got worse.

“Senior journalists questioned my experience, suggesting I should not be believed, and sailed very close to victim blaming and shaming. I was deeply shocked, upset, and in a state of despair, as was evident in my speech to parliament on Thursday.

“As I said this week, I am tired of feeling unsafe. I am tired of pretending to be brave. I am tired of being attacked because I am a woman.”

Extinction Rebellion protesters outside the Boothby electoral office of Ms Flint on February 8, 2021. Source: Facebook

Flint is 42 and says she has no idea as yet what she will do when she bows out of politics at the next election. But she insists she has no desire to keep hounding the Labor Party over what happened to her in 2019 and is more interested in achieving consensus for change around the treatment of women in politics.

She says she was heartened by what she saw as a shift in the ­opposition’s attitude this week, after Labor had for the past two years insisted that what she suffered was no different to the experience of many other MPs, and that the stalking and sexist abuse could not be pinned on the left of politics but rogue elements in her electorate.

This week, senior Labor women including Penny Wong and Tanya Plibersek and also the Opposition Leader Anthony Albanese said clearly that what Flint had endured was unacceptable, and offered to sit down with her to discuss change.

“I was encouraged by the Leader of the Opposition’s statements,” she says.

“It was the ­moment I felt we might actually achieve change for all women in politics. I want to work with Labor, the Greens, independents to achieve the change we desperately need through the independent review commissioned by the Prime Minister and led by Sex Discrimination Commissioner Kate Jenkins. I genuinely hope we can put partisan politics aside.

“The fact women from all sides of politics now feel they can share their shocking experiences is a strong step towards change.”

Flint says she does not feel remorse over her decision to walk away, nor regard it as a surrender to the tactics that were aimed at knocking her confidence and driving her away. Rather, she ­likens her exit to a kind of personal sacrifice aimed at the ­greater good.

“If my decision to leave par­liament can help achieve the change we desperately need for all women in politics, for staff and MPs, then it was worth it,” she says.

“I said the need to change the culture of our parties, of this place, should be above politics. The safety of women in parliament, of female staff, of ­female MPs and senators, should be above politics. We all bear the ­responsi­bility for change.”