Michael Towke’s takedown in 2007 Cook preselection an utter disgrace for Liberal Party

Michael Towke, pictured in 2007. Picture: Bob Finlayson

Michael Towke’s demolition of his preselection opponents for the seat of Cook back in 2007 ruffled blue blood Liberal Party feathers. So much so that the insiders club band together to take his preselection away.

Yes, Towke stacked the branches and blindsided his opponents when doing so, but guess what? That is how politics works. It is what Malcolm Turnbull did to defeat the one-term MP Peter King one electoral cycle earlier.

In fact, Towke helped Turnbull in that campaign, learning the fine art of internal party politics and applying it three years later in his local community. Towke had a seat at the table as Turnbull’s inner circle nutted out his strategy.

But Towke made one crucial mistake when he sought to apply what he’d learnt in Cook: he underestimated just how hard (and low) his opponents would go in the aftermath of his victory to bring him down and unwind the result.

The media backgrounding, the false claims about Towke’s personal and professional background. Scuttlebutt that his qualifications weren’t legitimate. It was brutal and calculated, not to mention utterly vexatious. In the end then Prime Minister John Howard also turned on Towke, because the last thing he needed was another distraction ahead of a difficult election campaign.

Towke became cannon fodder.

Was Towke racially targeted? Absolutely. Will he or anyone else ever be able to prove Scott Morrison was directly involved in such targeting? Probably not. Journalists backgrounded at the time aren’t going to give up their sources and political allies today aren’t going to give up their mates. That’s how tribal internal politicking often works, in both major parties.

It is important to note that when Towke was removed as the valid preselected candidate he subsequently contested the claims against him, both aired in the media and used internally to discredit him. He extracted apologies, compensation and retractions, because the slurs had no basis in fact. But what was done was done. Morrison was already on the front bench. An egg can’t be unscrambled.

What was so wrong with Towke anyway? Nothing, nothing at all, he just wasn’t your usual Liberal MP, especially not back then. He is Christian Lebanese, didn’t grow up thriving on internal politics, didn’t conform to the stereotype of a Young Liberal who moves through the ranks. He was also part of the conservative right in the party, and moderates and centrists were opposed to his traditional views on various issues.

At the heart of opposition to Towke was the fact he “wasn’t one of us”, even though Liberals claim to be the party of hard work and entrepreneurialism. Consider who Towke beat and you’ll better understand why the blue-blood set of Liberals couldn’t handle their bruised egos in the wake of Towke getting the better of them.

He didn’t just demolish Morrison 82 votes to eight in the preselection, in the remaining rounds he similarly knocked out a host of others who would go on to become ministers at state and federal levels. Taking their insiders pitch to other local battlegrounds to work their way into parliament – the righteous destiny of the white male who runs for Liberal preselection.

Scott Morrison. Picture: NCA NewsWire / Christian Gilles

In that infamous 2007 Cook preselection Towke also beat the now federal communications minister Paul Fletcher, the current NSW Attorney-General Mark Speakman, and the former immigration minister now assistant minister to the PM himself, David Coleman.

Along with Morrison, a former state director of the Liberal Party no less, this lot were regarded as “star candidates” of the future. Surely one of them would win?

Actually no. Towke outwitted and outplayed them all, and when you read his CV it is easy to see how. He wasn’t born with a silver spoon in his mouth. A schoolboy star of rugby league, not an adopted fan of the game once in parliament, he rose through the representative ranks, also setting up a small security business all on his own. He did this while also gaining a host of university qualifications.

Towke holds a first class honours degree in engineering from one of Australia’s best universities, an MBA with the highest Australian University international ranking, and he even went back and completed a BA in political science, philosophy and sociology because without family and friendship connections in politics he made the mistake of thinking that’s what you should arm yourself with to enter politics.

Subject matter academic expertise, how naive he was.

There was one thing Towke couldn’t do to upskill himself however: ditch his ethnicity and become another stale white male drone seeking his way into parliament for the Liberal Party. People like Towke are supposed to run for marginal seats with large ethnic communities, not safe seats like Cook.

While things are not as bad as that now, they haven’t changed enough for this issue to be swept under the carpet. What was done to Towke, with or without Morrison’s direct knowledge, was an utter disgrace.

Peter van Onselen is a professor of politics and public policy at the University of Western Australia and Griffith University