Anthony Albanese loves a trophy, especially a human one. He prides himself on his various “captain’s pick” candidates – good campaigners he has steered into seats.
Way back in the Gillard days, he was key in persuading discontented Liberal Peter Slipper to defect. Slipper became an independent and Labor’s speaker.
The exercise helped the government’s numbers, but the bold play didn’t end well for Labor or for Slipper. The government was tarnished, and Slipper, relentlessly pursued by the Coalition and mired in controversy, eventually had to quit the speakership. The affair did produce Julia Gillard’s famous misogyny speech, however.
