Greg Hunt; Political Walrus

ORIGINS AND EDUCATION

Gregory Andrew “Greg” Hunt was born 18 November 1965 in Frankston, Victoria.

He was the only child of Alan Hunt, a solicitor who had been born in South Australia. Alan Hunt was the West Gippsland and the Mornington Peninsula State Upper House member for South-Eastern Province from 1961 until 1992. He served under Bolte, Hamer and Thompson.

Young Greg was educated at the newly founded Anglican day and boarding facility, The Peninsula School. He was a student there at the same time as the Daddo Brothers.

After secondary school he enjoyed a gap year. In 1984, prior to entering university, he spent a year based on a kibbutz in Israel. This included a three-month period spent riding a bicycle around Europe.

He then followed in his father’s footsteps and graduated from Melbourne Law School with a Bachelor of Laws (First Class Honours), where he won a prize for a final year thesis he co-authored entitled A Tax to Make the Polluter Pay. More of that thesis later. He subsequently studied at Yale University, where he was a Fulbright Scholar and obtained a Master of Arts in International Relations.

While at university, Hunt captained the Australian Universities Debating Team, was runner-up at the World Universities Debating Championships and won the Edinburgh International Debating Tournament. He also worked casually as a steelworker, fruit picker, waiter and storeman and packer.

 

WORKING LIFE

• 1991 He began his professional life as an articled clerk with Mallesons Stephen Jaques
• 1992 He became Associate to the Chief Justice of the Australian Federal Court, Michael Black.
• 1994/95 Senior adviser to Alexander Downer, Leader of the Opposition.
• 1995/98 Senior adviser to Alexander Downer, Minister for Foreign Affairs
• 1999/2001 Worked for American global management consulting firm. McKinsey & Company. He left before the scandals struck.
• 2000/01 Director of Strategy at the World Economic Forum in Geneva. (Probably as the McKinsey representative.)

PRIVATE LIFE

Greg Hunt’s Electoral page reveals he is married to Paula Lindsey, a surgical nurse. They reside at Mt Martha on the Mornington Peninsula and have two young children: Poppy born in 2005 and James born in 2009.

In 2011 Greg Hunt said, in a speech to the Australian Davos Connection “For many years I did not understand my wife. This was not her fault! I do not like cooking. I am not good at it. I do not understand it. I do not get it. Indeed, as a bachelor my lavish late night repast was generally muesli or chilled oranges. Marriage, however, introduced me to Paula’s cooking. Paula is the daughter of Elsa, who is an ordained Cordon Bleu. Between the two of them they create meals of both complex and simple genius.”

He is a keen sportsman and has competed in seven marathons as well as numerous local events such as the Arthurs Seat Challenge fun run, the San Remo Channel Challenge run and swim and the Dromana Life Saving Club swim.

As the Member for Flinders, Greg has completed three 500km walks around his electorate – in 2004, 2007 and 2011 – to raise funds for Juvenile Diabetes and Autism Spectrum Disorder.

In March, 2012, News Ltd reported that, “THE wife of Victorian Liberal frontbencher Greg Hunt traded shares in major mining companies as her husband fought against the mining tax. Paula Hunt – whose husband is the Opposition’s climate change spokesman and MP for Flinders – bought and sold shares in Rio Tinto, Tiger Resources and Fortescue Metals Group. She also bought and sold gold exchanged traded funds.”

In March 2014 he tweeted,

Hmmm, about to Skydive for Good Friday Appeal at Tooradin ! Paula’s last qn as I left was something to do with insurance!

— Greg Hunt (@GregHuntMP) April 17, 2014

 

POLITICS

• November 2001 Hunt was elected as the Federal Member for Flinders in Howard’s third successful Election. He followed Sir Philip Lynch and Peter Reith in this seat. Bob Chynoweth took the seat from Reith in 1983 for the first term of the Hawke Government.
• October 2004 he became Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister for Environment and Heritage
• January 2007 appointed Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister for Foreign Affairs.
  

  He was NOT talking about tony abbott

• November 2007 After the Federal election, won by Rudd, Greg was appointed Shadow Minister for Climate Change, Environment and Urban Water, a role that brought together the great interests of his time in Parliament.
• September 2008 his role was expanded to include all water responsibilities.
• December 2009 Greg’s role was expanded once more when he was appointed Shadow Minister for Climate Action, Environment and Heritage.
• September 2013 After the Federal election Greg became Minister for the Environment, with responsibility for climate, environment, heritage and water.

With exactly the same responsibilities, after five years and under four leaders; Hunt could be seen as being typecast.

 

THAT THESIS

In 1990 Hunt co-authored a university thesis. His co-author was Rufus Black, the son of the Chief Justice of the Federal Court of Australia whose Associate Hunt became in 1992. Rufus Black also went on to work with American global management consulting firm, McKinsey & Company. Black is now the Master of Ormond College at the University of Melbourne and co-led the Independent Review of the Australian Intelligence Community at least until 2013.

Peter Martin, Economics Editor, The Age, found the thesis and published it on his blog.

The title was “A Tax to Make the Polluter Pay; The Application of Pollution Taxes within the Australian Legal System.”

It began,

The conclusion was,

Now, the pollution in question in the context of the thesis was that of dioxins and heavy metals. It would seem that Mr Hunt has chosen to see carbon dioxide as different from other pollutants. Of course, it is always possible that Hunt has become a climate denialist. Should he have done so then it obviously would have nothing whatsoever to do with wanting to keep his job. Would it?

*****Should anyone be able to send me a “.doc” or a “.txt” version of this PDF file, it would be appreciated.

THE GAFFES

TASMANIAN TIGER

In September 2012, Greg Hunt decided to save the last Tasmanian Tigers.

Mr Hunt, the Opposition’s environment spokesman sent a letter to Mr Burke’s office raising residents’ concern about mining in the Tarkine in Tasmania. Mr Hunt said he had received a deluge of letters from residents worried about the impact mining would have on the last Tasmanian tigers.

“All the letters refer to the health and wellbeing of the last healthy Tasmanian tigers in the region,” he wrote. “Can you advise the steps the government is taking to ensure a fair and reasonable balance is being struck between industry and the environment?”

WIKIPEDIA

Poppy Hunt explaing to her father that Wikipedia is not a great source for authorative information.

In October 2013, while being interviewed by the BBC, Hunt referred to research that he had conducted using Wikipedia to contradict Christiana Figueres, executive secretary of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, in regards to the relationship between climate change and bushfires. He said:

“Australia has since European settlement and obviously well before that, had a history of recurrent bushfires. I looked up what Wikipedia says, for example, just to see what the rest of the world thought, and it opens up with the fact that bushfires in Australia are frequently occurring events during the hotter months of the year. Large areas of land are ravaged every year by bushfires. That’s the Australian experience.”

The ENDANGERED ANTARCTICA WALRUS

On 11 Oct 2014, in a submission to the 20-year Antarctic Strategic Plan, the Environment Department raised the idea of the Antarctic Division broadening its funding base by looking at sources of revenue such as commercial, philanthropic and crowd-sourced funding.

Mr Hunt said that would be a supplement to government funding. “Whether it’s in relation to the walrus population, whether it’s in relation to penguins, you can have iconic species which can attract community interest,” he said.

At least he did not confuse Polar Bears with Leopard Seals.

 

MY CONCLUSIONS

From being a rising hopeful in the Coalition ranks Greg Hunt has stagnated into a bog-standard middle-of-the-road Cabinet Minister. His ambitions for higher office seem have died with the destruction of the Environment and the belittling of Climate Change by his Neanderthal leader. It is certain that his other abilities, those in the field of Foreign Affairs, have been forever squashed by the Member for Curtin.

He is very hard to take seriously now.

Could it be that he is as beached as one of those over-blubbered mammals who spend their time lounging on the shore and fighting with their fellows for prestige.

You know the ones I mean. Odobenus rosmarus. The Walrus.