jay weatherill penny wong
Delivering once in a generation reforms for LGBTIQ South Australians taking South Australia from a laggard to once again leading Australia in respect to LGBTIQ rights; Championing gender equality achieving 50% female representation on Government boards, helping women become more financially and economically secure, and supporting womens sport; and. A member of the Australian Labor Party (ALP), she has been a Senator for South Australia since 2002. [70], In 2022, Reuters described her as a "high profile" figure with "a reputation for plain language and maintaining composure during heated debates. Last modified on Tue 13 Mar 2018 13.51 EDT. Tobys story is a tragic part of Wongs life. August 2012, in the aftermath of the GFC, BHP announced that the $20 billion Olympic Dam mine expansion would not go ahead, citing 'subdued commodity prices and higher capital costs'. In the six and a half years he led the Government, Jay was one of the most . Nick Xenophon. The Commission was headed by former Governor Kevin Scarce and delivered its final report and recommendation to the Government of South Australia in May 2016. Theres another simple solution, retorted Mr Weatherill. Between 1987 and 1990, he worked for the Australian Workers' Union. But in private she has a warmth and humour which belies her reputation; there is a touch of goofiness, if you can imagine that. PRIME Minister Malcolm Turnbull has exploited divisions between Premier Jay Weatherill and Federal Opposition Leader Bill Shorten to fend off Labor attacks on tax reform and education funding. [2], Following the 2010 election, Weatherill as a cabinet minister in the Rann government, unsuccessfully challenged Kevin Foley for the position of Deputy Premier. I deliver factual information from all over the world and ensure that my readers get only the best of the best. [62][63][64][65], On 16 June, Wong visited New Zealand Foreign Minister Nanaia Mahuta to reaffirm bilateral relations and cooperation in the areas of climate change, indigenous, and Indo-Pacific issues. She is fiercely intellectual, yet also emotional. Kevin Rudd AC @AmboRudd. The reporter is also a University of Adelaide alumnus. The biography covers Wongs personal life, albeit very briefly compared to the politics, by far its main focus. Arriving at the University of Adelaide in 1987 as a first-year arts student, the politically conscious Wong dabbled with a couple of environmental groups and the left-wing group CISCAC - the Committee in Solidarity with Central America and the Caribbean. Ms Wong came out as a lesbian a month after she assumed office on 1 July 2002. Over the first two Simplify Days (2016 and 2017), the government amended 101 acts and regulations and removed 22 acts altogether. Certainly, Wong is known widely within the party for her driving ambition, and her lack of squeamishness about the hard and unattractive side of factional business, of which she saw plenty through the Crean/Latham era. In December 2007, in the wake of the Labor Party victory in the 2007 election, Wong was appointed to the Cabinet of Australia in the first Rudd government as the Minister for Climate Change, the first person to hold this role in an Australian Cabinet. ", "Brown "horrified" at Wong's anti-gay marriage stance", "Since March 2019 government trust & distrust have fluctuated but 2021 ended with soaring levels of distrust", "Passion and principle: Penny Wong is far from done", "Labor voice inspired by the fight for ideas", "lumen Australian experience builds global perspective", "First Day: Penny Wong's journey from shy student to Senator", "Freakish powers of a formidable operator", "Can Wong avert carbon-fuelled train wreck? [64], In 2017, Weatherill announced a plan to reform South Australia's electricity supply,[65][66] as a response to a number of blackouts that affected large numbers of South Australian residents and businesses in 2016. Plebiscite is stupid and wasteful policy. The stability of the arrangement is one of the questions surrounding Labors immediate political future. Butler says she has a forensic brain and a gift for cross-examination; he describes her appointment as a "brilliant" move on Rudd's part. [78] In December 2011, Allouache gave birth to their first child,[79] after announcing the IVF-assisted pregnancy using donor sperm in August 2011. Rollo Armstrong children: Does Rollo Armstrong have kids? They are allies, she says, and Keneally has earned her place. It provides a fascinating account of Wong's long campaign inside the Labor tent for marriage equality while still observing the party's collective strictures. Theres a lot of hate in the world. Meant to be here: Projects sad Jock reveal. Largely, this was about gender balance, with Albanese and Richard Marles as leader and deputy leader in the lower house. [25][27][28], Through her friendship with David Penberthy, who had also been on exchange in Latin America,[29] Wong joined the Socialist Workers Party-sponsored Committee in Solidarity with Central America and the Caribbean (CISCAC) while at university in 1987, but was not an active member. In 1989 Wong was elected general secretary of the university Labor Club; others viewed her as the one in charge. [51], In 2015, the Weatherill Government pledged significant funds towards a second building, to be known as the John Chalmers Centre for Transforming Healthcare or 'SAHMRI II', which would house Australia's first proton therapy unit. Jay Wilson Weatherill (born 3 April 1964) is an Australian politician who is the 45th and current Premier of South Australia, serving since 21 October 2011. . Life improved greatly when Penny won a scholarship to the lite Scotch College. In her second year, she became active in student politics and was elected to the students association and the board of the university union. [58] The Federal Government refused, however in 2017 British consortium GFG Alliance settled on terms of a purchase of the steelworks with administrators Korda Menthe. When Wong won preselection for the Senate before the 2001 election (she replaced the retiring Keating government veteran Rosemary Crowley), the joke went around that she would never have been able to contest a lower house seat, being not only a woman, but Asian and gay to boot. A boyhood dream was to be a professional tennis player. Despite all their differences over same-sex marriage, Penny Wong never had to fear that Farrell aspired to her job as Senate leader. [48] Weatherill stated early that a nuclear waste facility would need both public and bipartisan support, with the former withdrawn by Liberal leader Steven Marshall. [77], Wong's partner, Sophie Allouache, is a public servant and former University of Adelaide Students' Association president. I mean - really. [35] She was admitted to the South Australian Bar in 1993. She batted off comments from Education Minister Simon Birmingham, who was accused on social media of mansplaining when he told her: Penny, youve got the opportunity now to see this issue resolved. After Weatherill, her relationships were with women. Weatherill told Frydenberg the Federal Liberal government was the "most anti-SA government in living memory" and claimed the Federal Government's plan for Snowy Hydro 2.0 was a sign of a government in a "white-knuckled panic about national energy policy". I have to concede, I backed the wrong horse. It gave Wong a strong sense of a divine force to which there were many paths. This is a good book with the right balance of personal journey and labour history to show how contemporary politics works and how it doesn't work. In late 1996, Wong, at the invitation of the SA ALPs left, returned to Adelaide to seek preselection for the Senate. There seems to be an enormous focus given to Pauline Hansons right to speak. Her political judgment has usually been acute. We will review your comment and, subject to approval, we will post it under your name. The Congress in Adelaide hosted 3500 delegates from around the world, including Elon Musk of SpaceX and NASA. Chris Wallace is a political historian at ANU and the biographer of Germaine Greer. [9] Weatherill is from the Labor Left faction. Wong previously served as Minister for Climate Change and Minister for Finance and Deregulation during the governments of Prime Ministers Kevin Rudd and Julia Gillard from 2007 until 2013. Senator Farrell told the ABC he was not interested in the leadership of the SA ALP, but believed he had something to offer the people of Napier. "The rest of us would be running around, putting up posters, but she would be talking about serious number-crunching deals, preference flows, stuff that made you think - this is really serious business," she says. And she won! "She learned to control her emotions and fiercely protect her thoughts, not to let those outside her family see what was going on inside." She took a job in industrial law with a firm that represented unions on the left, then moved to the Miscellaneous Workers Union to work with Mark Butler, president of the SA Labor party. [19][20] Wong grew up speaking dialects of Malay (Bahasa Melayu), Chinese, and English. She is an introvert, in this media-saturated age an insuperable liability in pursuit of the top job. I think it was important for the Labor party to have another woman in the leadership. Others, perhaps falling into the misogynistic trope that senior women must necessarily be adversaries, suggest that for the next three years Wong may have to look over her shoulder. A member of the Australian Labor Party (ALP), she has been a Senator for South Australia since 2002. South Australian Senator Penny Wong, a close friend with whom he had a five-year relationship during their Young Labor years, said he was adept at reading people's emotions. Mainly of other people," says one party to that upheaval. LNP won't give free vote #qanda, #qanda is the major contributor to my premier envy, first Daniel Andrews and now Jay Weatherill. Keneally replaced Don Farrell in that position. Penny Wong. Penelope Ying-Yen Wong (Chinese: , born 5 November 1968) is an Australian politician who is currently serving as the minister for Foreign Affairs and leader of the Government in the Senate in the Albanese Government since 2022. She has been entirely consistent, rejecting the idea in private as in public. Qanda effect or actually more likeable, Ms Wong backed her fellow Labor politician and university boyfriend, adding: I think Jay made the right point.. [60], In 2016, Weatherill supported calls for increasing the GST to 15%. Don Farrell. A close friend of late chef Jock Zonfrillo has revealed how devastating his death is to The Project panel. Toby turned 30 on the day his sister was elected to the Senate in 2001, in the middle of the bitterest race election this country had seen in the course of the siblings' lives. [9] In December 2022, Wong was deemed the most effective minister in the Albanese government in a survey of Australian Financial Review readers. [49], In 2015 Jay Weatherill announced that the state government would hold an annual 'Simplify Day' to initiate the reduction and removal of unnecessary regulation and legislation. It drains her. Her natural strength is policy and strategy. Who is Penny Wong's first boyfriend Jay Weatherill? Penny Wong. [59] Since the purchase, GFG Alliance has invested in Whyalla in a number of ways including a $1.37 billion renewable energy project. And we see, over and over, how racism was so pervasive in her life that inevitably it became the paramount issue for her. If you are an ABR subscriber, you will need to sign in to post a comment. One of the Indonesian ministers said to me, if you take the sugar off the table the ants will stop coming.. "It's a very private matter. Wong describes herself as a social democrat. [69] In March 2022, Wong was named Australia's most trusted politician in a study by Roy Morgan Research. Related Authors. As leader of the party, he said his responsibilities were to lead and, when asked his opinion, to give his judgment. Whether as prime minister or foreign minister, there is a good chance that she will yet be one of our top leaders, which is a compelling reason for us to know more about the making of Penny Wong. Were sorry, this feature is currently unavailable. You can have all these plans, and then life does something different and you have spent all this mental energy on complex plans that are entirely in your head That sounds a bit fatalistic, but its also a sort of weariness, I think, that comes with being 50.. On 21 January 2013, Weatherill became Treasurer of South Australia and took other various portfolios following a cabinet reshuffle triggered by the resignation of two members of his ministry. Wong rejects any view of herself and Keneally as rivals. She and fellow campaigners Anthony Albanese and Tanya Plibersek positively contrast with the cynical and self-interested calculus of Kevin Rudd and Julia Gillard on the issue. With the Kevin 07 ALP victory, she became minister for climate change and water, a frontbench heavyweight. [3] She was also the first female openly-LGBTI Australian federal parliamentarian, and was an instrumental figure in the legalisation of same-sex marriage in Australia in 2017, reversing her previous endorsement of Labor Party policy that had opposed it. Viewers almost went nuclear at another point in the debate, when former immigration minister Amanda Vanstone explained the refugee situation with an eyebrow-raising analogy. Penelope Ying-Yen Wong (born 5 November 1968) is an Australian politician who is currently serving as the minister for Foreign Affairs and leader of the Government in the Senate in the Albanese Government since 2022. Some of this was through suspension of major works programs such as the electrification of the Gawler and Outer Harbor rail lines, and redevelopments of Modbury Hospital and Queen Elizabeth Hospital. [72], In 2017, after revelations that upstream states had not been complying with the Murray-Darling Basin Plan, Weatherill requested that the Federal Government undertake a judicial enquiry or Royal Commission to determine who was to blame for water theft and whether upstream states had been complicit. Were sorry, this feature is currently unavailable. ", On her brother: "The only thing I'd want to say is how much I missed him the day I was sworn in.". Though a major electoral redistribution in 2016 had seen four Labor seats become notionally Liberal, Labor retained a total of 19 seats at the election. It portrays the kind of person both sides of politics need more of: intelligent, focused, hard-working, with a consistent set of values and, crucially, aware of and able to work within the realities of politics, including the ability to play a long game. "They had ambition, vitality, energy - they were a generation that really wanted to make a difference," Bolkus recalls. [61] He argued that the GST rate should be increased but he would only support an increase if a compensation package was developed for those earning under $100,000[62], In the 201617 Budget, Weatherill introduced Job Accelerator Grants, providing between $4,000 and $10,000 to businesses for creating new jobs, increasing in the 201718 budget. In all of Labors troubles since she entered the Australian parliament, Penny Wong has emerged from each stage with her reputation enhanced and her influence increased. The question everyone asks when they know you are writing a book about Penny Wong is whether she will ever be prime minister, and if not, why not. [55] In March 2019, Wong was named the 2018 McKinnon Political Leader of the Year.[56]. [57] At this point she was named part of Albanese's four-person ALP leadership team, along with Richard Marles and Kristina Keneally. [2][6], Between 1987 and 1990, he worked for the Australian Workers' Union. As well, she credits him with holding the government together during the years of minority government under Gillard. However, Wong has two children with her current domestic partner, Sophie Allouache named Alexandra and Hannah. A plebiscite is all about the internal politics of the Liberal Party, not about delivering marriage equality, she went on. There are several surprises in Margaret Simons' biography of Penny Wong.Credit: Alex Ellinghausen. The White Australia policy still existed and in any case Francis faced family obligations requiring his presence back home. Were working to restore it. In July, Jay Weatherill (seen next to SA irrigator Sam Dodd) and Ian Hunter were joined by South Australian senators Labor's Penny Wong, the Greens' Sarah Hanson-Young, Australian . [26] She has said that, "I do not ever remember having the sense that I denied the existence of God. Mar 31. In a reshuffle of the South Australian Cabinet that week, Weatherill also announced the expanded the portfolio to become 'Defence and Space Industries'. All rights reserved. [7] In the early 1990s, he worked at the law firm Duncan Hannon with Patrick Conlon and Isobel Redmond. Bill Shorten. We are all in the debt of those like Wong who do so. We should all be grateful that Simons has given us this clear, well-researched, and comprehensive biography, and that Wong eventually contributed the personal memories and views that round it out. Add articles to your saved list and come back to them any time. Australians already struggling to find a doctor have been warned that things are about to get frighteningly worse. Anna Bligh. Her initial plan was to be a doctor, and to work for Medecins Sans Frontieres; she won a spot in medical school in 1986, deferred it, and then left for an exchange year in Brazil, where she volunteered at a hospital - and quickly changed her career plans. [24] She was accepted into the Bachelor of Medicine, Bachelor of Surgery at the University of Adelaide,[25] but after spending a year on exchange in Brazil,[26] found she had an aversion to blood. The Wongs were part of a Christian minority in a largely Muslim nation. People in Borneo suffered severely under Japanese occupation in World War II, including Penny Wongs paternal grandmother, father, and his siblings. Labor Senator for South Australia. [14][15][16][17][18] Penny Wong's parents had met in the early 1960s, when Francis Wong was studying architecture at the University of Adelaide under the Colombo Plan. South Australian premier says senator is threat to him the 'very last impression' the Labor party wants to give electorate. In 2000 Wong applied to have her Malaysian citizenship revoked, which it was in 2001. [63], Jay Weatherill, along with then Health Minister Jack Snelling, opened the new Royal Adelaide Hospital in early September 2017. The relationship thawed and Simons was able to conduct six interviews.