By Kishor Napier-Raman and Liam Mannix
After the bright lights of Las Vegas, the NRL is headed to another glamorous desert-fringed rugby league wasteland this weekend, playing a double-header in Perth on Saturday.
CBD hears Prime Minister Anthony Albanese has been invited to watch his beloved South Sydney Rabbitohs take on the North Queensland Cowboys in the cavernous bowl of Optus Stadium, alongside Western Australian Premier Roger Cook. The PM’s campaign schedule is kept closely under wraps – even journalists travelling in the media circus have no idea where they’re headed any given day.
Anthony Albanese and Peter V’landys inside the NRL chairman’s suite at the first State of Origin game last year.
But we wouldn’t be surprised to see Albo in Perth this weekend. A big late swing in Western Australia three years ago effectively delivered Labor majority government, and Albanese has been sandbagging those seats in Perth ever since, making regular trips throughout this term and heading there on day two of the campaign.
If he takes time to watch the footy, it’d be quite a vote of confidence in Labor’s position as the race reaches its midpoint.
The NRL, on the other hand, can afford to snub the sandgropers. Saturday’s double header comes with relations between the league and the WA government particularly frosty, after recent revelations that it had put plans for an expansion team in Perth on ice.
A furious Cook, who has been lobbying Australian Rugby League Commission chair Peter “Showbags” V’landys to help get a team established, urged the NRL to treat WA with more respect. To misquote Don Draper, “that’s what the [GST] money is for!”
In return, it looks like the NRL’s top brass is set to disrespect the good people of Western Australia even further by skipping out on the weekend’s action. V’landys will don his Racing NSW hat and head to Royal Randwick for Championships Day on Saturday (sponsored by Star, but for how much longer?). That’s despite speculation that he’ll be dropping his racing role for an executive chair job in rugby league.
We hear the NRL’s chief executive Andrew Abdo also won’t be heading to Perth, and neither will be most of its senior people. We guess it’s a club game after all, and they’ll all be in Perth for State of Origin Game II in a couple of months.
Unlike Albo, some people can afford to avoid WA.
Daryl’s day
Former TV show host and current Boomer icon Daryl Somers seems to have had a win in his dispute with former IT contractor George Johnson.
Somers made his name hosting long-running variety show Hey Hey It’s Saturday but is now more likely to be seen on court roles than TV sets; he won a trademark battle over Hey Hey’s Celebrity Head game last week.
Somers’ lawyers last year asked Victoria’s Supreme Court to order Johnson to hand back admin access to Somers’ production company’s IT systems, after a dispute arose over an invoice.
The court has now ordered Johnson to pay some of Somers’ costs. CBD understands costs on both sides run into the tens of thousands.
“The proceeding to which you refer has been resolved, and my client was pleased to receive an order for costs in its favour made by the Supreme Court of Victoria on 18 February 2025,” Somers’ lawyer Christien Corns from K&L Gates told us.
For his part, Johnson only had this to say: “I hope this is the end of it”.
Very Pyne people
Christopher Pyne.Credit: Oscar Colman
Times in Washington, DC have been interesting this week to say the least.
As US president Donald Trump unveiled his master plan to wreck the global economy, then demonstrated his dealmaking genius by abruptly backflipping, former defence minister turned hyperactive lobbyist Christopher Pyne has been in DC to fight for the AUKUS pact.
Pyne & Partners held its fourth annual AUKUS Program in the capital this week, just as the British House of Commons announced a parliamentary inquiry into the multibillion-dollar defence agreement, and the volatile Trump administration sparks questions about the United States’ reliability as a security partner.
Festivities kicked off on Wednesday night US time with a dinner at DC’s ritzy Cosmos Club, featuring an address by former prime minister turned ambassador to the United States Kevin Rudd. Other speakers included Virginia senator Tim Kaine (better known as Hillary Clinton’s running mate in 2016), former US chief of naval operations Gary Roughead and ex-British secretary of state for defence Michael Fallon.
Also on the guest list – former South Australian Liberal premier Steven Marshall, who’s now president of the American Australian Association.
Burke claps back
CBD brought word this week that American extremist Candace Owens was lawyering up, asking the High Court to overturn a decision by Home Affairs Minister Tony Burke to deny her a visa to Australia.
Owens hopes that if the court rules in her favour, she can come spew her bile on these shores early next year. Burke, who is defending his western Sydney electorate of Watson from independent Ziad Basyouny, took time out of the campaign to hit back at Owens, telling CBD:
“It seems Ms Owens is willing to do anything to avoid refunding the people who paid to see her speak.”
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