Politics

Bill Shorten Just Nailed His Appearance On ‘Q&A’, And Yeah, We’re Surprised Too

Meanwhile, Scott Morrison won't even go on the show.

by Tom Clift  7 May 2019
Bill Shorten on Q&A

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Opposition leader Bill Shorten has offered a glimpse of what he would be like as Prime Minister during a lengthy solo appearance on Q&A. And honestly, he kind of nailed it. Yeah, we’re surprised too.

Hosted at Monash University in Melbourne, the episode saw Shorten answer questions on everything from climate change to Indigenous suicide rates to his own unpopularity. In was a strong performance from the man who polls suggest will be in the top job in just two short weeks, and was capped off by a particularly memorable response to a question about his approach to leadership.

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“Repeatedly, our royal commissions find there is a failure in leadership culture,” the question began. “In human decency and human kindness. Especially in caring for the vulnerable.”

“What will your leadership culture be? How will your government guide all of us as a community in relation to our culture in being a decent and caring country to live in?”

“I’m not a lone ranger,” Shorten responded. “I’m not going to be a Messiah. I don’t believe in the authoritarian strong man.”

Instead, the Labor leader liked himself to a coach, saying he wanted to “get the best out of the team”.

“I understand that if you can get the smartest people in the room, even if they don’t all agree with each other, you’re more likely to get a better outcome than if you don’t talk to people,” he said. “I understand that if you want to go and find out what’s happening, they don’t all come to you. So if I’m elected Prime Minister, we’re going to do public meetings and go out and listen to people.”

“My other leadership style is I don’t believe in majorities picking on minorities,” Shorten continued. “This is not political correctness. But in my experience good ideas come in all packages. They can come from the left. They can come from the right. They can come from people who worship Jesus or people who worship Allah or people who don’t worship anyone at all. Good advice and good ideas doesn’t come from what school you went to, not how many generations your family has been in this country, not how rich you are. Good advice and good people are everywhere.”

Shorten finished his answer by talking about the experiences of his mother, who taught at Monash for more than 30 years.

“My mum came from a working class family,” he said. “She was the first in our family, in the early 50s, to ever go to university … She became a teacher, but she wanted to be a lawyer. But she was the eldest in the family and needed to take the teacher scholarship to look after the rest of the kids. My mum was a brilliant woman. She wasn’t bitter. She worked here for 35 years. But I also know if she had other opportunities she could have done anything.”

“I can’t make it right for my mum. And she wouldn’t want me to. But my point is this: what motivates me, if you really want to know who Bill Shorten is, I can’t make it right for my mum but I can make it right for everyone else.”