Venom by David Crowe

Author:David Crowe
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: HarperCollins
Published: 2019-07-10T00:00:00+00:00

9

KNIVES OUT

FRIDAY 17 TO MONDAY 20 AUGUST

IN POLITICS, AS IN horror movies, a silence can be more menacing than a scream. The government emerged from four thundering days in Parliament to an awful stillness on Friday, 17 August, when all sides waited for one man’s words to end a mystery over their fate. The words never came. Dutton kept his colleagues in suspense at a point when the lights dimmed, the sound died away and Liberal MPs listened for the creak of a door on a rusty hinge. They knew they had a potential challenger in their midst. They could not be certain if, or when, he might strike.

The spectre was impossible to ignore after the Daily Telegraph reported on Friday morning that MPs were urging Dutton to challenge Turnbull and remake the government with an energy policy that dropped the cut in carbon emissions and an immigration policy that scaled back the migrant intake. Abbott’s policy blueprint was now being named as the reason to make Dutton the Prime Minister. The report, by Sharri Markson, provoked instant conjecture about whether Dutton was encouraging the perception he was being drafted to the job. ‘There are only two good outcomes here — either the energy policy is dead and we can go to the election fighting Labor on it, or Malcolm goes,’ said an anonymous MP quoted in the story.1 The question to be asked that day was clear: if these unnamed Liberals wanted Dutton to lead, would he do so?

Turnbull knew the story was coming. Cray had messaged Dutton the previous night and he had told her he had not spoken to Markson, but this did not make it any easier to manage. There was no doubt some MPs had given up on Turnbull and were willing to vote for a new leader, although the size of the group was uncertain. The question was whether a candidate was available. Cormann stepped in on Friday to act as an intermediary in an attempt to bridge the gulf between leader and rival. The Finance Minister denied Dutton was sending a ‘shot across the bow’ to the Prime Minister or that MPs were urging him to challenge.

‘I am not aware of any such talk. Nobody has raised that with me,’ Cormann told Sky News. The closeness between Cormann and Dutton added weight to his words; many knew the two men met at dawn when Parliament was sitting to walk up Red Hill, a climb of about 120 metres from the street below. It was natural to expect the two friends to talk of their careers. Would Dutton consider a challenge? ‘We are both very committed to the success of the Turnbull government and to winning the next election,’ Cormann replied, with the discipline that made him such a reliable minister. ‘I did have four walks with Peter this week at 5.30 in the morning up Red Hill. It was very hard after a six-week break to get up that hill because the fitness levels had dropped off a bit.

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