The Liberal body count keeps rising. But I see a twist in this Scorsese script

3 months ago 6

If Martin Scorsese was to direct a film about the Victorian Liberal Party, it would be titled The Deposed and document in Wolf of Spring Street-style the men whose political ambitions rose and fell with the leadership of Australia’s most combustive parliamentary outfit.

With some creative license, we can imagine roles for a young Ray Liotta (Brad Battin), Al Pacino (Michael O’Brien), Harvey Keitel (Matthew Guy) and Joe Pesci (John Pesutto). The film would need to carry a warning for graphic party room violence but in its quieter moments, explore the torment and despair that accompanies the rooster-to-feather duster career arc of yesterday’s opposition leader.

Former Victorian Liberal opposition leaders Brad Battin, John Pesutto, Michael O’Brien and Matthew Guy.

With this in mind, it is worth noting that Brad Battin, whatever his failings during the brief, 11 months he sat at the big desk, has set a new standard for how to get dumped with dignity. His decision to promptly join new leader Jess Wilson’s frontbench as spokesman for police and corrections – instead of retreating into customary backbench lament – speaks to him being one of parliament’s goodfellas.

It has also given Wilson the kind of running start that Battin didn’t have when taking over from Pesutto, nor Pesutto when picking up the party room pieces after Labor’s thumping election win in November 2022.

A little less than a year ago, when Battin first walked into the vacant leader’s office after replacing Pesutto in the Christmas coup, he didn’t find much holiday cheer. The filing cabinet was empty and incoming staff had no access to shared files on the office computer. The bookshelf was similarly barren save for two volumes: a copy of Machiavelli’s The Prince and Dante’s Inferno.

Battin says that in his first week in the job, two separate debt collectors came to the office inquiring about unpaid invoices.

A pause here to record the protestations of one of Pesutto’s supporting actors who swears emphatically the leader’s office was tidied and dusted to pristine condition but not stripped bare.

They profess no knowledge of Machiavelli’s 16th century guide on the dark arts of power or Dante’s journey through hell being left as parting gifts, although they confirmed an unhappy staffer did sabotage the shared computer file.

Nonetheless, the shift to Wilson’s leadership has seen a very different quality of transition.

Within days of losing the leadership, Battin was publicly admitting his own faults and praising the work ethic and leadership qualities of the woman who’d usurped him. The pair met and completed a thorough handover of all policies in development, polling and planning.

Wilson’s announcement of the frontbench team she plans to take into next year’s election reflects Machiavelli’s adherence to realpolitik. She bestowed new lands and titles on her party room backers – Bev McArthur, Brad Rowswell, Renee Heath and James Newbury chief among then – demoted Battin’s consigliere Richard Riordan and kept the conservative wing happy by extending Pesutto’s backbench purgatory.

The sum-total of this is a shadow ministry less talented for the absence of Riordan and Pesutto – two of the better policy brains in the party – but potentially more stable due to the pragmatism shown by Wilson.

Neither Riordan nor Pesutto is happy about being left out but so far, they have copped their lot without public complaint or demur. On Wednesday, when Riordan was button-holed by journalists outside parliament, he deadpanned that his demotion would give him “lots of time to work for the people of Polwarth”.

Battin’s new role as shadow minister responsible for reminding us that Melbourne is in the grips of a crime crisis surely makes him the first person to lose the Liberal leadership and keep his day job. In another way, Battin has changed the script Scorsese has to work from.

The most difficult thing about being yesterday’s leader, as any cast members from The Deposed can tell you, is the crushing, stupefying boredom that comes from suddenly having nothing much to do in public life.

Battin, on reflection, knew his leadership was in deep trouble in the lead up to last month’s party room spill when colleagues stopped ringing him. Nor do they ring in your first days and weeks as a former leader, when nothing screams louder than the silence of your phone.

From there, where previously your calendar was chock full of meetings, functions and public appearances, an empty calendar stretches out like a desert. You console yourself that you have more time to spend with your family but families of political leaders grow used to spending time without them.

Battin says that in his first weekend out of the leadership, he spent too many hours lost in doomscroll funk.

As Liotta’s character Henry Hill reflected from the suburban confines of witness protection in the closing scene of Goodfellas, the hardest thing about shifting out of the fast lane is realising how slow a life more ordinary moves.

“Everything is different,” Hill says. “There’s no action. I have to wait around like everyone else. I can’t even get decent food. Right after I got here, I ordered some spaghetti with marinara sauce and I got egg noodles and ketchup. I’m an average nobody. I get to live the rest of my life like a schnook.”

Instead of being a schnook, Battin has decided to keep busy. And Wilson, having recognised Battin as her party’s best spokesman on law and order issues, felt secure enough to give him meaningful work to do.

It is a small step towards repairing a party culture that has produced its share of plot twists but desperately few Hollywood endings.

Chip Le Grand is state political editor.

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