Tony Armstrong takes his winning ways into September

We start the week with a feel-good footy story; desperately needed after the train-wreck first finals weekend for Melbourne sides, Richmond and the Bulldogs snuffed out and Melbourne and Collingwood bruised and beaten.

But for popular ABC sports presenter and former AFL player Tony Armstrong, the wins keep coming.

A few months after collecting his first his Logie – for outstanding new talent, sparking fevered speculation of a move to commercial TV – Armstrong is celebrating a Bellarine Football League premiership with his team Barwon Heads, after the Seagulls knocked over their rivals from down the coast, Torquay, in the regional comp’s grand final on Saturday.

Credit: Benke

Tony’s ABC news breakfast colleagues made quite a deal of him being out on the town and hard to find after his Logie win – he was on annual leave from his hosting duties, let the record show – and it was equally unclear on Sunday if he was going to make a weekend of it with his teammates after their big win.

CBD couldn’t get hold of Armstrong to check.

The presenter – who played 35 AFL games with the Adelaide Crows, Collingwood and Sydney – made a comeback to footy this year. He joined Barwon Heads this season to play alongside his friend and former Magpies teammate Nathan Brown.

DOCK OPERA

The City of Melbourne’s Docklands Summit at Marvel Stadium on Friday drew a decent crowd, with several hundred business types, residents and other interested parties gathering to discuss the future of the precinct, which has been hit hard by lockdowns, work-from-home restrictions and the departure of international students.

Lord Mayor Sally Capp opened proceedings in an effort to lift morale, with an upbeat outline of everything the council is planning for the precinct.

Could deputy lord mayor Nicholas Reece be the Placido Domingo of Docklands?Credit: Luis Ascui

Capp’s deputy, Nicholas Reece, then took to the stage to interview founding CEO of the Docklands Authority and later CEO of Barangaroo John Tabart, who went on to work as chief executive of Sydney’s behemoth Barangaroo development.

When the inevitable comparison arose between Docklands and Barangaroo, Tabart suggested the Sydney precinct had done a better job firing up its waterfront promenades, but then – Tabart added – Barangaroo also had the great advantage of having opera-loving former prime minister Paul Keating as head of its design advisory body.

Reece, who is head of design excellence for the City of Melbourne, took the feedback in good humour – he was no Keating – who famously once described himself as the Placido Domingo of Australian politics.

“You can’t underestimate our ambition and commitment to Docklands,” Reece told the audience. “Maybe one day I will be remembered as the Placido Domingo of Docklands?”

HAWKS TAKE FLIGHT

In 2020, as the freeze between China and the West deepened, an international consortium of parliamentarians came together to raise concerns about Beijing’s rising militarism toward neighbours and domestic human rights abusers.

Greens senator Janet Rice is joining the hawkish Inter-Parliamentary Alliance on China.Credit: Justin McManus

The Inter-Parliamentary Alliance on China takes a pretty hawkish stance on foreign policy, but is generally a broad church – late Labor senator Kimberley Kitching was a founding member, and it draws from both the Labor and Liberal sides of politics. Now it counts Greens among its ranks, with Victorian senator Janet Rice joining this year, which we’re told is consistent with her concern about China’s treatment of Uyghurs and Tibetan minorities.

Tasmanian Greens leader Cassy O’Connor is also a member, and given IPAC also counts one-time Republican presidential hopeful “little” Marco Rubio among its board members, and very conservative Liberal senator Alex Antic among its ranks, well, that’s some true bipartisanship.

More curious was the absence on IPAC’s website of shadow defence minister Andrew Hastie, a founding co-chair of the organisation who was barred from entering China back in the days when people could do that for his strong criticism of Beijing.

Apparently it’s all an error – Hastie is still a member and is headed to the organisation’s conference in Washington DC next week with an Australian delegation drawn from across the aisle: fellow Liberal James Paterson (an IPAC co-chair), along with Labor’s Deb O’Neill and Peter Khalil.

STRATEGIC MOVES

Speaking of China hawks, there have been a few movements at the Australian Strategic Policy Institute, the Lockheed Martin-funded think tank so influential in shaping the Morrison government’s thinking toward Beijing.

The organisation’s director of defence, strategy and national security, Michael Shoebridge – brother of Greens senator David Shoebridge – finished up last week after a four-and-a-half year stint.

Michael Shoebridge has left the Australian Strategic Policy Institute.Credit:

And since the election, David Wroe, a former communications director for then-foreign minister Marise Payne and one-time defence correspondent for this masthead, has joined as strategic communications director.

He’s the second Payne alum to jump over to the policy institute, following her old chief of staff Justin Bassi who was appointed executive director by the Morrison government earlier this year.

There is movement in the “Lobby Land” end of the Canberra bubble too. Liberal-aligned lobbying powerhouse Crosby Textor has added two refugees from the last government to its stable – Talitha Try, former senior adviser to Scott Morrison, and Bronwyn Bishop has joined as a senior manager.

Shadow health minister Anne Ruston’s policy adviser, Madeleine Church, has also joined up.

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