Barry O’Farrell is not a bad man. But the politics of New South Wales are squalid. Not for the first time, a capable Liberal leader has been brought undone by the Independent Commission Against Corruption. The last was Nick Greiner a decade ago. What distinguishes the O’Farrell disaster from any other before Icac is the oddly upmarket cause of his doom: a bottle of Grange.
O’Farrell waited a long time before making his bid for the leadership of the party. He was accused of being too timid to claw his way to the top. But he came with no taint of the dishonesty that’s the cologne of choice for so many politicians working in Macquarie Street.
The Liberal party is his life. Apart from a few unhappy months with the old Department of Business and Consumer Affairs, O’Farrell has worked around politicians ever since he graduated from university. Bruce Baird brought him to work in NSW. Baird’s son Mike may be his successor.
O’Farrell was a natural backroom boy. He didn’t exude ambition. His beat was transport. But he won one of the safest seats in NSW on the north shore and sat through the slaughter of Liberal leaders that followed for a decade.
He never put up his hand. He became leader only in 2007 after one last Liberal debacle at the polls. He proved to be tougher than his supporters thought. He broke the premier Morris Iemma. He defeated Kristina Keneally.
He came to office in 2011 after a huge victory with a well-developed reputation for despising the filth of NSW politics.
He was a big fan of Icac. He told me during the 2011 campaign that he worried politicians didn’t fear the commission enough: “We should be worried as we sign something or make a phone call – even when we are being ethical – that if I don’t do this right I can be pinged.”
As premier he moved slowly and was mocked for it. He did nothing fast and nothing particularly radical. He didn’t revenge himself on his opponents. He didn’t have to: Labor could be left to tear itself apart.
But under O’Farrell Icac showed the deeply ingrained corruption of NSW didn’t begin and end with Labor. His own side was punished. Now the Liberals have taken the biggest hit of all.
A lobbyist on the make, a bottle of wine and very north shore thank you note have brought a premier undone. He might have tried to hang on, blaming memory loss, that politician’s affliction that has been explored year in and year out by Icac.
But he didn’t. O’Farrell had always made a virtue of being thoroughly dull – decent but dull. His departure isn’t dull. But it is decent.
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