Palmer’s wrecking ball won’t fly forever

FORGIVE the comparison to Miley Cyrus, but Clive Palmer is swinging on a wrecking ball aimed squarely at Canberra.

You probably need to be under 25 — or have teenage kids — to fully appreciate the ghastly imagery of Palmer as the political version of the young American singer who, naked, straddled a giant wrecking ball in her 2013 music video. Suffice it to say, it’s not a pretty picture.

But the emerging picture of Palmer as a revenge politician is not attractive, either. Driven by vengeance, old feuds and new, Palmer seems hell-bent on causing instability in Canberra knowing this will turn many against the Abbott government after six chaotic years under Labor.

Palmer’s crusade on Canberra, using his Palmer United Party senators as foot soldiers, relies on a cocktail of portraying himself as a political outsider and using populist fluff and silly stunts to grab the attention of disenfranchised voters. He knows that, for every person who is very interested in politics, at least two people are not.

He understands that, while 24-hour news channels cater for the political junkies, on commercial news the sound bite is getting shorter and shorter, leaving no room for scrutiny of Palmer’s moti­vations, his fickle policy positions and his cunning tactics to wreak revenge in Canberra.

Far from the spin, Palmer was the ultimate insider. As a huge donor to the LNP in Queensland, Palmer seems to have expected the red carpet treatment from the Newman government. As former Queensland premier Peter Beattie told the ABC’s Australian Story last year, “I’ve got no doubt that Clive expected to have total entree to the LNP government … he expected to be given the red-carpet treatment.”

Consider the emerging claims against Palmer. In this newspaper yesterday, Hedley Thomas reported that a document handed to Deputy Queensland Premier Jeff Seeney’s chief-of-staff by Palmer, and headed Settlement Terms, set out an offer by Palmer’s private company, Waratah Coal, to drop all litigation and claims against the Queensland government if his $8.4 billion coal project received exclusive rights to own and operate the rail corridor through the Galilee Basin in the north of Queensland.

That document will be examined by Queensland’s Crime and Misconduct Commission.

In documents lodged in the Queensland Supreme Court last week by the Premier, who is defending a defamation action launched by Palmer, Campbell Newman states that Palmer met with Seeney on April 13, 2012.

Palmer requested that all staff leave the room, and then told Seeney that he — Palmer — had prepared his own draft legislation for development of the Galilee Basin, giving exclusive rights to develop “Port Palmer” at Abbot Point. Newman’s document states that when Seeney said there were proper processes to follow, Palmer replied “words to the effect that he had supported individual candidates in the past and liked to support candidates that understood how business works”. Palmer will have a chance to reply in court documents to these allegations.

Last November, Newman made similar claims on ABC Brisbane Radio 612 about Palmer seeking special treatment for his business projects — including a high-rise that would cover ­public land at Coolum — at a meeting between the two men on July 1, 2012.

Palmer didn’t get what he wanted from the Newman government. He left the LNP, started the PUP and seems to have used last year’s federal election to wage war against conservatives.

Whenever scrutiny of him gets serious, Palmer unleashes outlandish tirades, not simply to turn the media cycle his way, but to ­divert the attention from any substantive analysis of him.

In response to Newman’s claims, Palmer called the Queensland Premier a “fella with a bipolar condition that sometimes doesn’t take his medication”. When The Australian’s Thomas started scrutinising him, Palmer shut-out our reporters from his news conference, tried to link this newspaper to a break-in at his office and later dreamt up a doozy about Wendy Deng being a Chinese spy. Sure enough, the media fed on Palmer’s ridiculous claims instead of looking at Palmer’s business world.

A fortnight ago, I wrote a piece suggesting the media look closely at him and his senators, who will hold the balance of power come July 1. Palmer responded by tweeting sexist nonsense about me, kicking off a vile stream of tweets from his supporters.

Palmer’s success at last year’s federal election depended on his senators, and enough voters and members of the media largely ­ignoring his motivations and tactics. His continued success relies on the same lack of attention. For too long now, some in the media have been co-opted as Palmer’s free advertising platforms.

While criticism has grown in some quarters, many have still missed Palmer’s motivations. There is a growing narrative, ­echoed by Tony Wright in The Sydney Morning Herald last week, that Palmer through his buffoonery has “blown himself to smithereens”.

Alas, that has not happened and won’t happen for so long as the media allows Palmer to use his buffoonery to divert attention away from his motivations.

As Beattie told Australian Story, no one should underestimate Palmer’s cunning. “This is about Clive getting what Clive wants and he’ll use any means of expression, outrageous claims to get what he wants.”

That said, Palmer is not clever enough. He tends to fall out with the wrong people. Embroiled in litigation with his Chinese partner Citic Pacific, the Chinese state-owned company claims that Palmer’s company, Mineralogy, transferred two cheques worth $12,167,065 from a Citic account just before last year’s federal election. It is alleged Palmer used some of the Citic funds to ­finance his party’s federal election campaign.

Palmer has also over fallen out with West Australian Premier Colin Barnett — again, over the former’s business interests — with Barnett recently saying that Palmer’s litigation with Citic has damaged Australia’s economic interests and the nation’s reputation in China, our largest trading partner.

Likewise, Palmer’s attack on Tony Abbott’s chief of staff, Peta Credlin, over Abbott’s paid parental scheme wasn’t clever. Palmer’s claim Credlin influenced the policy so that she “can receive a massive benefit when she gets pregnant” was riddled with bile and factual errors.

A cursory Google search would have revealed Abbott crafted his PPL policy years before Credlin began working for him. A moment’s thought would have told Palmer that, as a public servant, Credlin would be entitled to the public service leave rules. And a quick perusal of Hansard would have saved Palmer misleading Sarah Ferguson on the ABCs 7.30 program last week when he said he didn’t mention pregnancy in his attack on Credlin. He did.

Palmer seems to assume the normal rules don’t apply to him. Ignore facts. Change your position from one day to the next. Bat away scrutiny using ridiculous claims.

While many voters see Palmer as their protest politician, sooner or later there will be a fallout with them, too, if they realise that one of Palmer’s key motivations is ­revenge and that Chris Uhlmann was right to ask last week on ABC radio whether the balance of power is just the latest toy in the billionaire’s playpen.

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