David Flint The Spectator Australia 18 May 2024
I was asked recently to introduce Tony Abbott at a function. Along with national leaders of the standing of John Howard and Margaret Thatcher, Ronald Reagan, or Donald Trump, Tony would not have shamed the nation by slapping a foreign dictator with a wet lettuce for his clear acts of aggression, as Anthony Albanese did recently. And this is not the first time.
(On this, cartoonist Johannes Leak has cleverly drawn an enthroned Dictator Xi, with a newspaper at his feet bearing the headline, ‘Chinese jet’s aggressive action’. Beside him a sweating and nervous PM, holding a wet lettuce leaf, says, ‘You had to know there would be consequences.’)
Tony Abbott was to launch a magnificent book by Chris Reynolds, Australia, A Capital Idea.
If parents are looking for a gift for children about our history beyond the usual propaganda, this is it.
The indefatigable Sophie York organised the function at Sydney‘s Royal Automobile Club near Circular Quay, which also houses active pioneering organisations and societies.
This is in a beautiful old building with magnificently decorated rooms. The meal was the best I’ve had in Sydney for some considerable time.
I told the audience I had known Tony Abbott for over three decades.
While he has not changed much in that time, more importantly, he has not changed any one of the several intellectual and moral allegiances for which he is celebrated.
Among these are ones most relevant to Chris Reynolds’ wonderful book.
I first met Tony in the lead-up to the republic referendum when he had just been made Australians for a Constitutional Monarchy’s first executive director.
On the way to lunch, I was struck by two things. First, the number of people who knew him and greeted him and his universal reply, including to some distinguished-looking citizens, of ‘G’day mate’.
The other thing was that to maintain the same speed, I found myself unthinkingly falling into, indeed shadowing his walk.
This, no doubt, looked ridiculous.
As you have probably noticed, Tony’s walk is distinctive. It got him into trouble one day in parliament.
When an opposition member was noisily demanding Tony table some paper, Tony got up and crossed the floor with it.
The member rushed out of the chamber.
My recollection is that Tony was the first minister to be suspended, albeit briefly, from the house.
He was not threatening. This is his normal walk.
I then mentioned four things to explain to the audience what he’s like and what others think of him.
In 2018, when we invited the nation’s leading broadcaster, Alan Jones, to deliver the Neville Bonner Oration on the crucial issue of watering the continent, I asked Tony to introduce Alan.
When he began the Oration, Alan Jones said, ‘I regard Tony Abbott as a remarkable person, one of the finest people I have ever known….’
I could not read his tribute in full because it would have exceeded the allotted time.
(Alan’s eulogy ended with something along the lines of, ‘David Flint’s not a bad bloke either.’)
Second, I asked Tony as prime minister to deliver a keynote speech on the constitution at the Four Seasons Hotel.
Knowing how busy he was, I offered to write a draft.
‘No Dave,’ he replied, ‘I like to write my own speeches.’
Now, apart from Menzies and Howard, how many politicians write their own speeches?
With an ability to write and speak, invariably based on strongly held principles, Tony is now being noticed around the world.
Third, I recalled that when he was health minister, he designed a pandemic policy that would apply in the case of some plague reaching Australia. It was praised internationally. But when it came to Covid, it seemed to have been shredded. It wasn’t mentioned, nor was his advice sought. The policy lacked the bizarre measures taken most of which were unnecessarily burdensome, expensive and incompatible with a free society.
I concluded by pointing to a weakness spotted by Alan Jones.
But in any epitaph, it will be lauded as a strength.
It is something rarely seen in this world, especially in a strong man.
This is Tony’s Christian sense of forgiveness, of seeing the best in everybody. Alan recalled how he had warned Tony about those undermining him. As I have. Tony’s response has always been along these lines: ‘Dave, he’s not a bad bloke, you know.’
Now I believe in forgiveness, but not in the heat of politics or war.
Tony Abbott’s belief in forgiveness is precisely the reason ─ and it is the only reason ─ why his first term as prime minister ended.
That’s why the plotters and a delinquent media had to turn something thought of as entirely appropriate in over 40 other countries, the knighting of that admirable man, the late Prince Philip, into the equivalent of a mortal sin.
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