The son of a billionaire who shaped the election

The wealthy climate crusader has succeeded in his mission to influence Australian politics

The wealthy climate crusader has succeeded in his mission to influence Australian politics

He's a one-time dabbler in AI who worked in Silicon Valley in the 1990s before it was cool, then Simon Holmes à Court pivoted to renewable energy about a decade ago when he helped build Australia's first community-owned wind farm, with the help of state and federal subsidies (according to the Australian Financial Review).

He now works with a bunch of climate and energy groups.

It wasn't until 2019, though, that he burst onto the political scene spearheading a fundraising group backing more than a dozen independent candidates in marginal seats with the object of ousting the government.

It didn't work then, but it did in 2022.

The policies of these candidates - backed and sponsored by Holmes à Court's Climate 200 organisation - are almost entirely:

• Climate change
• Integrity
• Gender equality

Among the higher profile and successful candidates at the weekend were Allegra Spender, who fought Dave Sharma in Wentworth (Sydney's eastern suburbs), Monique Ryan was up against Josh Frydenberg (the former Treasurer) in the Melbourne seat of Kooyong and ex-journalist Zoe Daniel took the fight to the Libs Tim Wilson in Goldstein in Melbourne.

His father was Robert Holmes à Court senior, a South African-born Australian lawyer-turned-businessman, who wasn't just any billionaire, he was Australia's first.

Robert was a corporate raider - think Succession-style corporate deals - who died in 1990 at aged 53 with an estimated $800 million in assets. His son was a beneficiary of a lot of that estate.

Businessmen John Elliott, Brian Loton, Sir James Balderstone and Robert Holmes a Court. Elliott and Holmes a Court attempted to take over gaining the power BHP back in the day.

Junior, who lives in the Kooyong electorate, has sought assistance far and wide for his political endeavours over the years.

His Perth-based mum, Janet Holmes à Court, one of Australia’s wealthiest women, is one of the many donors to her son’s climate charity vehicle, Climate 200 (C200). 

Simon's mum, Janet, was a vocal supporter for the push for Australia to become a Republic in the late 1990s. Here she is with other supporters of the movement Malcolm Turnbull, Steve Vizard and Eddie McGuire.

It's also backed by tech billionaire Mike Cannon-Brookes, businessman Nick Fairfax and his wife Sandra, and tech entrepreneur Simon Hackett, and raised a reported $7m election war chest.

As a kid growing up in Perth, he said he saw his parents entertaining politicians, although apparently they didn't stick to one party.

At the University of Western Australia, Holmes à Court, a law student, also opted for the non-partisan Model-UN version of student politics.

The Holmes à Court family descends from British baronage and Simon's brother Peter used to co-own the South Sydney Rabbitohs with Russell Crowe.

The Climate 200 organisation dates back to the May 2019 federal election, when Holmes à Court and his mates raised $500,000 to support 12 Independent candidates. But recently Holmes à Court's C200 has been criticised for its choice of political battles.

Climate 200 isn't a party. Holmes à Court has consistently insisted the candidates his group sponsors are "strictly independent". The funding comes with "no strings attached" and they can make their own decisions in parliament, he said.

“Cross my heart and hope to die that all the campaigns we are supporting started from inside their own electorates...Every single one is grassroots,” he said.

At the National Press Club in February, Holmes à Court said he wanted to fix a “broken” political system. “Striking at the root means getting people into parliament who are strong, independent and ready to hold governments accountable," he said.

Climate 200 founder Simon Holmes a Court addresses the National Press Club.

This infuriated ex-chairman of the Liberal's Indigenous Advisory Council, Nyunggai Warren Mundine who tweeted Holmes à Court was a “filthy rich man trying to influence the election via the All White … Climate 200 party”.

Things really hit a low when Holmes à Court called Mundine him a “grub and a flog” back and Mundine shot back (via The Australian) that C200 were certainly a political party, calling him “Clive Palmer … on the left”.

“He’s just one of those filthy-rich spoiled brats who think they … influence elections by spending millions and millions of dollars,” Mundine said.

FYI : Clive Palmer is the billionaire businessman behind the right-wing nationalist United Australia Party.

Ousted Liberal MP Dave Sharma - who Holmes à Court trolled as #DoNothingDave on Twitter - rode the blowback too.

“Climate 200 is the party of white privilege – just look at the candidates they are running, and their leader, Simon Holmes a Court … a movement which claims to be ‘grassroots’. It is run by elites and for elites,” Sharma said before the election.

C200-backed candidates running in seats with large Jewish populations have also come under scrutiny. 

Spender and Daniel faced accusations that people close to their campaign - not necessarily C200 but similar climate advocacy organisations - publicly shared anti-Israel sentiments.

To really turn up the heat, C200 have been in talks with left-wing political activists Get Up to push out moderate Liberals in Melbourne and Sydney, including in the seats of Goldstein and Kooyong. Get Up campaign against government policies in the areas of environment, health and housing equity and generate petitions for the protection of Indigenous heritage sites and the Great Barrier Reef.

Holmes à Court was previously aligned with Liberal politicians, even joining a group known as the Kooyong 200 Club fundraising group in early 2017 - started by Frydenberg. “I originally went to see him as a constituent, because I decided he would be around for a long time. He’s ambitious. He’s talented," Holmes à Court told the Good Weekend in October 2021.

"Kooyong under [Frydenberg’s predecessor] Petro Georgiou had been a progressive, positive force within the party. And you read the Liberal Party’s core tenets and think, ‘Yeah, I believe in freedom, and I believe that individuals should be allowed to excel, and I believe in well-regulated markets. I should be a member of that party, shouldn’t I?’ ”

But according to the profile article things changed when Holmes à Court wrote a column for The Guardian in 2018, which included a line criticising Frydenberg for trying to keep NSW’s Liddell power station open.

“Less than 24 hours later I got an email from Kooyong 200 saying my membership had been rejected and two years of membership fees and a donation had been returned to my credit card,” Holmes à Court told the publication, which observed that "in title and substance, C200 was Holmes à Court’s reply, even the font and colour of its initial logo is a riff on Kooyong 200’s."

In the dying days of the campaign he was filmed by Frydenberg amid a heated confrontation with Liberal Senator for Victoria Jane Hume.

They clashed again on Saturday during a televised panel interview when Hume refused to apologise to Holmes à Court, instead telling him to  "stick it up your jumper".

"I'm a convener of Climate 200, which has supported a lot of the teal candidates but each of the campaigns has grown up within the community," he said from Ryan's party.