Tim Wilson (Goldstein, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Small Business) Share this | Hansard source

I'd like to, of course, follow on from the remarks of the previous speaker in paying respects to the life of Graham Richardson. On the Tuesday before his passing, my phone lit up. I got an SMS and it started with, 'Mate, you looked good on ABC News tonight. Hope you are well.' And I replied—and I hope he doesn't mind me breaching confidences—'Thanks, Richo. I still owe you lunch.' 'Ha-ha. Yes, you keep promising that.' 'Well, I do. I'm just pointing out I haven't forgotten,' was my response. And then I went on to say, 'Outside of a'—expletive—'show, how do you see our internal games at the moment?' I won't repeat what happened thereafter, except I finished my SMS exchange by saying, 'Hence I asked.' That certainly reflects the engagement I had with Graham Richardson: forthright, honest, private—apart from of course what's now read into the parliamentary Hansard.

He was somewhat of a political—it's odd to say 'mentor' about somebody from the other side of politics. But he was somebody who actually sought me out and started to engage during his media career. I didn't know him at the time he was in this place. I only read about his political career well after it was gone. I have a dog eared copy of Whatever It Takes, not through a component of scholarship but simply because somebody gave me a second-hand copy when I was an adult. It's a reflection very much on the use and wielding of political power.

But he was clearly a larger-than-life figure when he was in this place and down the road. You hear this from the speakers who have honoured his life and his legacy and his achievements as a minister but, more clearly, as a significant contributor to the labour movement. There's a certain fondness that I think we all must have when condolence motions are made from whatever side of politics, when you have a partisan who's held in such—I don't know whether it's rancour or esteem, or perhaps it's a mixture of both. There's nonetheless an affection and warmth because at least they were in the fight together. So I honour very much his legacy as a member of the Labor Party and his contribution to it, though, obviously, sometimes I probably disagreed vehemently with what he was fighting for.

He used to regularly taunt me when he was doing his television shows on Sky News, sometimes when I was on his program and sometimes when I was not. He'd say, 'I don't know about that Tim Wilson. He could have potentially been a member of the Labor Party,' until he heard my views, and then he suddenly would adjust. But it showed that he was always prepared to have a laugh, have a go and, with a smile, engage on the important issues at the time. And so I always enjoyed his counsel and always enjoyed his friendship.

So the question is: why did I owe him lunch? The reason I owed him lunch was that, in the lead-up to the 2022 election, we took a bet live on air about the result of that election. I lost the bet in more ways than one. But, as a consequence—

A division having been called in the House of Representatives

Sitting suspended from 10:49 to 11:02

I feel it's appropriate that this section of the speech begins almost in the spirit of Richo. I can imagine him saying 'since I was rudely interrupted by democracy, in continuation'.

The question is: why did I owe him lunch? The short answer is that in the lead-up to the 2022 election, live on air, we took a $100 bet about the outcome. As I was saying, I lost that bet in more ways than one—let's just say that. When I went to ask for his bank account details on the eve of the election—because I was not oblivious to the realities of the situation—he said, 'Next time you're in town, buy me lunch.' Then, a few days later, I said, 'When am I going to honour the bet?' When it came down to it, I never really got to Sydney to be able to honour the bet. He SMS'd me more recently and said, 'Actually, I'll buy you lunch,' which was very kind and generous of him but, of course, I couldn't possibly do that—I'm a man who honours my debts. In that spirit, when his widow, Amanda, and D'Arcy came to parliament the other day for this motion, I extended that I still owed them lunch. I want to make sure that that is honoured. I extend my warmest condolences to both Amanda and D'Arcy.

I understand how many members have regarded or made comment about the fact that Richo lived to make sure that he could see D'Arcy finish his secondary education, and that now he is going onto university. I'm sure he would have been enormously proud of that achievement. But whatever it is, and whatever contributions Richo made to this world, it was clearly a colourful life filled with rancour, contests, contribution and, of course, warmth and friendship. He was, nonetheless, a figure who I always found to be incredibly generous and supportive, who offered counsel and was incredibly warm, so I'll miss him. I pay tribute to him but also acknowledge that, one day, if I make it to heaven and he happens to be there as well—I promise you, Richo, that I will buy you lunch.

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