Look, we had our problems with Simon Holmes à Court’s new book The Big Teal, but it did raise at least one tantalising question: which major party candidate was offered a personal donation by Holmes à Court in 2019, but turned it down? He describes the candidate as “whip smart, ethical, personable and hardworking” — a minor point, maybe, but are men ever described as “whip smart”?
According to the book, she was running against “a particularly bad MP, an MP whose name was associated with numerous scandals and who had a reputation for fighting against climate action, not using good arguments but by wielding mistruths and through maladministration”.
Holmes à Court wrote: “The candidate was from a major party and for various reasons didn’t fit the criteria for Climate 200 support, but I thought her campaign was deserving of a personal donation.”
Look, it’s the kind of passage that invites a bit of speculation. We’ve got two frontrunners for the politician too ethical to take Holmes à Court’s lucre.
In 2019 Labor ran Yvonne Langenberg — who describes herself as a “Small Businesswoman | Political Commentator | Renewables Advocate” in her Twitter bio — against Barnaby Joyce, who, whatever else you may say about him, has fought against climate change action and at the time was associated with “numerous scandals“. Further, we note that up against “minister for getting energy bills down” Angus Taylor in Hume that year — and it’s easy to forget what a profoundly scandal prone 2019 that guy had — was Camden lawyer Aoife Champion, who said she was particularly keen to go up against Taylor on environmental issues.
Any other candidates come to mind, dear reader?
