35 Quotes by David Marr

What he’s about is destroying a government. Looking like a prime minister in waiting is a second-order consideration.

Though he went about the task with a will, he clearly did not share the ideological conviction that the jobless were better off without help from the public service. Abbott’s default position is that governments are there to act, to solve problems, not to withdraw and leave things to the cut and thrust of market forces. He was clearly not one of those conservatives who loved the market. His loyalty was to government and what government could achieve through intervention.

Misleading the ABC is not quite the same as misleading the parliament as a political crime.

He acknowledges that endorsing push-backs at the National Conference in July was only the latest in a long line of catch-ups with the Coalition’s refugee policies. But he is confident Labor won’t be forced to go any further: the worst has been reached. But isn’t that what Labor always says? “Time will tell but I know that if we want more humanity in our system, I’ll do a better job than the other fellow.

We all thought Tony would be a force to be reckoned with when he grew up and we’re still waiting.

This champion of self-reliance, the man who made the unemployed work for the dole, has no doubt that families like his deserve a great deal of help from the government.

Abbott was running a one-man campaign to wreck his own organisation.

The AWU had polled its own members and he knew the men and women of the union overwhelmingly supported Howard blocking the Tampa. That election proved a life lesson for Shorten: he saw the power of wedge politics. At the Press Club a few months later, he called on unions to act as a conservative check on the rank and file. Unions represent 2 million workers and who, he asked, do Labor’s branches represent?