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  John Cain

 Person: John Cain

Former Labor Premier of Victoria.
  Q1. Mr.Cain, could I ask you: why did you go into politics originally? What were you hoping to achieve?
 
JC. Well, I think I've had a life-long interest. I was born into a political family. When I was born my father had already been in politics for many, many years so it was part of our day-to-day life. I recall, as a youngster, people coming around - my father was the local Member. It was the late years of the Depression, people were knocking on our door trying to see him, trying to get a job. People were in desperate circumstances, as those Depression years evidenced. So the discussion around politics was just part of our everyday life. I think I hoped to achieve some amelioration of the social circumstances that I saw as I was growing up.

I believe in a fairer, more egalitarian and more decent society; one where people had a reasonable expectation if not a belief in their right to a job, a decent standard of living, to good health care and to a capacity to expend their talents to the maximum value and use. Education was a big issue in my years of growing up and I was one of the fortunate ones, I suppose, who was able to get a tertiary education. Albeit with the intervention in my university days of the Commonwealth scholarships, which became the accepted thing for everybody, it's all gone now. So I see what drove me as being circumstances that are perhaps foreign to young people today.
 
Q2. Do you see politicians as being motivated by a strong desire for social service? Is there an idealism that a lot of people go into politics with or do you think it varies greatly?
 
JC. I think perhaps more in the past. By the past, I mean the years when I was growing up and the early years of our federation. If you go back to the early days, what I'll call the middle class Liberals, the "Deakins" of that time, there was a belief in the middle class having an obligation to provide some social input, to try and bring society together. Thus the settlement of those years of the harvester wage and tariffs and protection - all those debates - and clearly the Labor men of that time who emerged from the industrial disputes of the 1890's, and more recently the Labor men who emerged from the days of the Depression, as I mentioned earlier.

They were young and middle-aged men then, when they got into the public life, and they were members of the Curtin and Chifley Governments, fiercely determined that they would never allow working men to be humiliated and lose their dignity when twenty, thirty, forty percent couldn't get work in the 1930's. So there was a fierce ideological commitment of those men, far less now. I mean, it's a job and it's well paid by community standards. To some, it's an exercise of naked power and patronage, power without much ideological base to it at all, and I think that's probably truer today than it was thirty or forty years ago.
 
Q3. So, do you think the two major parties are radically divided in terms of their vision for what Australia or Victoria may become or do you think they're just trying to attack the same thing by different means?
 
JC. I think they have grown closer together rather than further apart. From the post-war years, there was a common belief in a mixed economy, in full employment, in government assistance and intervention in the Keynesian style in almost everything Government had to deliver. Governments had to provide for people and look after them. They had a controlled economy, with interest rates controlled and exchange rates controlled and the Government was doing robust things like Qantas, TAA, Commonwealth Serum Laboratory, Snowy Mountain Scheme - all government initiatives. Government is seen as being the 'doer' and people expected Government to be the 'doer'.

Both parties said that from the post-war years through to the mid 70's or early 80's. Then market economy sort of took over and both now have to cling to the vagaries of the market economy and if they don't satisfy the markets, they get thrown out of the office. So to that extent there's a common ground. Yes, they have grown closer together and they have become less radical together, less robust and less concerned about government obligation or about small government. Our lower taxes; governments have to do less and less, I think that's all wrong but nevertheless that's the way it's headed.
 
Q4. Do you think there's something the public should be doing to try and change the political agenda? Or are we part of a great movement that it's not within the power of states now to resist?
 
JC. It will take me a long while now to answer that. I mean, I think you summed it up in that last phrase. Nation-states are no longer able to guide their own destinies. The thing we're doing right now, at this moment, nobody can control and edit them at any national borders. They can do what they like - gamble, they can transmit pornography, anything. No nation-state can do much about it, even if it wished to.

So far as the economy is concerned, we'll go to bed tonight and people will press buttons and send millions, hundreds of millions of dollars or money or credit. Flying around the world, we won't know anything about it but wake up in the morning and it's affected us. So all those things have meant that nation-states are no longer the architects of their own destinies and I think that's absolutely right.
 
Q5. So does that mean that the role of Premier now would be different to role of Premier in your day?
 
JC. The things I've been speaking about are more on a national perspective. Premiers are limited not just by those constraints, but by also the notion of a Federation. I think Premiers or State Governments are restricted in what they can do by the constraints of the Federal system and I think that we haven't made our Federation work terribly well.

But whatever constrictions apply to nation-states, so far as the incapacity to be your own master that I was talking about before, it applies even more so to Premiers. State Governments are even more restricted in some ways and have become more reliant upon the National Government providing a tax system heavily weighted to the Central Government. So the states have become more dependent upon Commonwealth Government, Federal Government and National Government so far as their revenue streams are concerned. Except they have burst out I suppose, definitely and aggressively in the gaming revenue, which is a good soft tax, and they made a wealth through that. With that exception, the sources of state revenue and thus financial independence are severely restrained.
 
Q6. What do you see as the most important part of the Premiers role?
 
JC. There's no part more important than the other I suppose. I mean, a Head of Government has to pull it all together and so far as I was concerned, over eight and a half years, the key to the role was making a good Cabinet system work. But nobody, I don't think, is silly enough to believe that they, as a Head of Government, can know everything about everything. Decision-making at a Cabinet level is the most important thing. So I concentrated on the process of getting a good Cabinet system and ensuring that good material came to the Cabinet, it was properly discussed and there was consultation. So you knew what the wide range of views available might be and then there was a good Cabinet structure.

The essential features of which, first of all, are assurances about confidentiality and a consensus on system or style. You can't have votes in Cabinet, we never did. I think some do but they're pretty silly if they do. You've got to get a consensus on a style of decision-making and people have to accept whatever the consensus is - they're the key features.
It all gets back to having good material before you, good quality material. That in turn means a good bureaucratic structure; government agencies and departments that give Ministers frank and fearless advice. Some would argue, and I think I'm one, that this requirement isn't consistent with having people employed for three years, or two years, looking over their shoulder to see that the advice they give is receiving approval and thus will ensure or won’t deny their job renewal or extension. The Premiers are getting private office administers that work well with the bureaucrats and they can distil the bureaucratic advice that the Ministers are getting.

The bureaucrats are self-interested, and in that I mean they're agencies like every other institution. They want to look after themselves so you've got to be prepared for that, and the private office has also got to be prepared to tell the Minister what is happening in the outside world with the lobby groups, with the interest groups and within your own parties.

It's an end meshing together of a whole set of streams of advice. Now I've wandered away from your question, but good process maximises your chances of making good decisions. Governance is hard I reckon, but you've got the best chance of doing it well if you use the wisdom of the 18 people in Cabinet on key decisions.
 
Q7. So on a day-to-day basis, what kinds of things does a Premier do to try and make that happen?
 
JC. Well, the Cabinet's part of it, but the rest of it... a big part of the role is handling the media. I used to see the media in my first terms - the first three years - everyday I'd meet them. Later, I made it three times a week and then as and when required. So yes, handling the media is pretty important because there is now an expectation that with anything that's occurring, the Premier or the Minister will be a constant source of advice. If you walk out of a meeting, they put a microphone up your nose and expect you to respond.

So the expectations of both radio and TV are for instant responses, the print a little less so. I think handling the media is very important and that, in part, is being well informed about what's happening in the community and about decisions or about issues that arrive from time to time. I mean, a lot of your role is reactive, I suppose, you're responding to bushfires that might emerge somewhere and you're expected to have an answer.
 
Q8. Do you think the nature of media has a distorting effect on the political process?
 
JC. Yes, yes. It's the demands of commercial, I use the qualifying adjective, the commercial TV and radio as such where people are expected to provide instant grabs. The ABC's not much better, the sound bytes are down now to about eight or nine seconds I think, so it makes for fairly slap-dash presentation of most issues, all issues. You can't provide a definitive, reasoned case about anything, I think, in those sort of circumstances.

So the news and the so-called public affairs programs on commercial radio and TV are pretty ordinary. The ABC, despite the Government currently offering it the axe or the sword - whatever is the most violent at the time - does a remarkably good job in remaining an independent source of advice and commentary. It's very important we retain it.
 
Q9. One of the issues that occurs to me, with all the media coverage that a Premier tends to attract, is that it must have an incredible impact on your personal life. Was it an incredible shock suddenly being so prominent?
 
JC. Oh no, I was the Leader of the Opposition for six months before I became Premier in '82. Then you go through a campaign, so I guess it's a ... well you're worked into it I guess. The toughest part of the life, I think, is the constancy of it. I practiced as a lawyer and worked pretty hard for eighteen or nineteen years before I went into politics but I got my weekends off if I wanted them. I might go down into the office on a Sunday and do some work for half an hour, but it's the constancy of it.

You're expected to be on tap and to attend functions, Saturday, Saturday night, Sunday, Sunday night. By the time you get to Monday morning you're not refreshed much from the weekend break, which you can be in most jobs. So it's the seven-day-a-week demands of politicians that is the most energy zapping aspect of it.
 
Q10. What sort hours would a Premier work?
 
JC. Well it's up to you. I think they would vary enormously. I suspect that public office holders generally have worked, or work, longer hours in the last fifteen to twenty years than in the case of my father's time, for instance. It was a much more leisurely approach then and I think fewer "govs" were involved in fewer aspects of the public life and it was a much slower pace. There was no radio from structured radio broadcasts. There was no talkback radio or that sort of stuff. In those years there was no TV so I think it was very different. The media attention was much more focused in particular channels and I think as well as that, there were fewer avenues for probing and inquiring.

The last 20 years have seen a whole new range of avenues of accountability thrust upon Government than was the case back in the 50's. I think one of the most significant issues people have regarded as important was FOI - Freedom of Information - which has, you know, sort of cast a whole new set of duty, properly so, upon the public sector to keep good records and to ensure that they prepare material in a correct way. Because the public can have access to them and I think they should. I think it makes better decision-making, I can't get any people to agree with me about that. But in the end you get better process material if it is prepared in the context of knowing that FOI is there.

Accountability through annual reports is tabled more often in Parliament and is more demanding now than it was, as is the scrutiny of Parliamentary Committees. So, I think all of those mechanisms probably are more acute in their pressures on the Minister than was the case before.
 
Q11. Are there any pressures that the Parliament brings to bear on the media or is the media pretty well unfettered in terms of what it does and how it reports?
 
JC. I don't think the Parliament brings any pressure on the media. The Parliament is subject to scrutiny of the media, they can control the access that the media gets the Parliamentary Chamber. But Canberra now broadcasts Parliament wall-to-wall, doesn't it? It's less so here in the State Parliaments - they do question time. Which in a sense is very distorting because that's the sort of "theatre of Parliament". And it is theatre, there's not much substance to it, so to that extent, I think probably televising question time, or grabbing from question time and weaving it into the news broadcast can be quite misleading. As well as that, the Parliamentary Chamber, the Lower House in particular, is a very robust place. I did, as a politician, get a bit strident at times but that doesn't look good on television. So I suspect the stridency that comes through in an exaggerated way, through the video camera, has meant that politicians have stepped back a peg or two in their delivery and the way they handle themselves.
 
Q12. Because certainly as a member of the public, one of the impressions you get out of these few second grabs you see on television is that there is a great big slanging match going on. Are there actually deep animosities between the parties and politicians or does everyone accept that that's the way the game is played and it's largely not like that?
 
JC. I think the latter, but it's an adversary system. It's a bit like barristers in court, I suppose, who will be fierce and robust in their presentation of their case because that's an adversary system too. So I think it's consistent with the Parliamentary process that there should be robustness and I think that's right. Everybody expects it. Some Parliaments are regarded as being more vigorous than others but certainly the Lower Houses of Parliament, where the Government's made or unmade, are traditionally seen as been more vigorous than other Houses. For obvious reasons I suppose. Well, it's the House where not only the Government is made but the real business takes place. The Second Chamber is a House of review.
So I think it's something some members believe they have to go through, but that doesn't mean there can't be good solid personal relationships between members of all sides. It was something that Winston Churchill said: "The most fierce conflicts in politics are not between the different sides of the chain, but within parties", where personal ambitions and juggling for places in the party hierarchy can engender conflict within the party. All political parties have factional alignments, so that's part of the process, that's part of the decision making, I think. Just like making public policy. Nobody gets their own way all the time, there's a reference in that paper there to whether the Premier gets his own way. He shouldn't get his own way - it's wrong if he does and there's something wrong with those around him if he does. It would be a foolish Premier to expect he got his own way all the time. What is done, the serious policy making, is the work of a whole range of people. They are conglomeratic special interest groups, and may take years to evolve, most times it does.

Take that GST for example, that was in the policy setting of discussion for twenty years before it became law - back in the 1970's. John Howard, when he was Treasurer of the Liberal Government, they really wanted him to promote it, which he did but didn't get far. Paul Keating, at the tax summit in 1983, didn't get anywhere. John Hewson ran an election campaign around it, got bowled out in the electorate. And John Howard said he's not going to do that, it's off the agenda - never, never. But every time it came out of Treasury. Treasury was a genesis, so it was swirling round in Treasury all that time and like every large policy issue, it needs a number of ingredients to make it tick. And what you need most times, is a champion within the governing party to get something up. So things that Premiers and Prime Ministers don't thrust forward come from a range of ideas. It would be a foolish Head of Government who said he got all his own way and it was his idea, it doesn't happen that way.
 
Q13. With the ambitions that must exist in any party, does that mean in the position of Premier to some extent you also have to watch your back a great deal, or does the party fundamentally support you?
 
JC. Well the party will support you as long as it believes you can win, that's what it's about.
Politics is about winning and as long as a Prime Minister or Premier appears to be capable of winning, then he'll get the support, unless there's some very good reason to the contrary. I think what affects that also, are the ambitions and you see it going on right at this moment around the Federal Liberal Party. As to whether John Howard should be replaced before the next election or after, the question is will he be successful if he goes the way he is and all that sort of stuff, so that qualifies it I guess. But the Westminster system is based on the Government of the day maintaining the support of the Lower House, and that in turn means that the Prime Minister or Premier has to maintain support within his own party. Now if the backbenchers in the party believe their marginal seat might fall by the wayside and a change of leader might give them a better chance, then what do they do? That's the political reality of it.
 
Q14. Do you think the selection of a leader nowadays is overly dependent on that person's capacity to perform to the media?
 
JC. Overly, I guess American politics is the great example of that. David Helbistan, who wrote The Powers That Be, talks about that in great detail in the USA in the 50's and 60's. Basically I think since television came into politics, the answer to your question is yes. John Kennedy was seen as more attractive than Richard Nixon in 1960 and so it's gone on ever since. Because of what you were saying before, most people get their dose of politics from the eight-second grab and they form their opinions from a very shallow, often poorly informed, if not ill-informed base. They will choose somebody who is seen to be able to convey a message in the glib shorthand that people want, so yes, I think that's right.
 
Q15. What do you think of the primary qualities that a person needs to make an excellent Premier? Not just to be seen to be good.
 
JC. Well they are two different concepts, I think. The excellent Head of Government, Premier or Prime Minister is the one who can proceed forward with the kinds of reforms and changes that his Government has said it will proceed with, at the same time maintaining that coalition of support, both within the interest groups and within the electorate - that's the trick. And the three are often mutually exclusive, you can't balance all those balls very often at the one time.
It depends, if you just see politics as being an exercise in power and patronage just to exercise power and put your mates in jobs then it doesn't matter much. You just grab it and do what you can, and move onto the next job. But I think it's about more than that and most leaders of the past have thought it's about more than that.

So, to answer your question, to do the best job, to be good or excellent, you've got to try and maintain that coalition of support, and it's getting increasingly difficult to do that, I think, because nobody's hitting a third term now. People get sick of them; television exposure, shop spoiled, used by date, all that sort of stuff. I think it had an effect in my years, in the 1980's, but I was lucky enough to get a third term and I don't think many have got third terms in recent times. People get tired of seeing the same old faces and hearing the same old voices.
 
Q16. Do you think there are any adjustments that could be made to improve things? Maybe adjustment to the length of term or anything like that?
 
JC. I think three-year Parliaments are too short, and the Federal Parliament still has those. I think what we introduced in the 1980's is about right - four years maximum, three years minimum and the last year you can choose to go when you see fit. And I think you can't go in the first three years unless you're bowled out for some good reason which I won't bother you with. Five years in Britain is probably a bit too long, you can argue, so your length of term - four years is about right.

That means that if a Government gets two four-year terms, maybe that's as much as it's going to get, because at eight years, people are saying, "Why not give the other lot a go?". A bit of that takes effect but maybe that's a good thing, two terms is enough. You see that some of the United States' states and certainly the Federal Constitution after Roosevelt provide no more than two consecutive terms. In fact you can't have more than two terms as President. Some of the states enable their Governors to have two terms then come back after a lapse, but the notion of two terms as a maximum limit is fairly firmly entrenched. It's more difficult to do that with a Westminster system, of course.

Maybe the answer to that is to have fixed terms as they do in NSW. Now they've got fixed four-year Parliaments and elections on the same day each four years as in the USA.
 
Q17. Do you see the State Parliament as having a strong role well into the future or do you see it as likely to dwindle in terms of importance?
 
JC. I think the present trend in politics is to move away from central power, so federations are more popular than they were in the immediate post-war years where strong central government was the salvation of most countries during the war or those who were able to survive the war. And the defence power in our constitution was very liberally interpreted by the High Court, to give the war-time Central Government powers it never had before and that's what you need. In other times of national emergency I think people want to see power diffuse. It's the checks and balances and "don't give politicians too much power" sort of stuff; those catch phrases ring pretty loud bell in most electors' ears. I'm not saying it's right but they do.
 
Q18. Are there any issues that you'd like to particularly explore?
 
JC. Well, you mentioned the party system. The party system gets bagged a bit but I think it's the solution ... wrong word ... it's the best way for the Westminister parliamentary system to work, where you have a Government made up of the majority of the party in the Lower House and an Opposition made up of a minority party, then say you've got a Government and an alternative Government. Anything else leads to instability most times and that's to be avoided. You want to watch the lobby groups, in fact I barred them here when we were in government. I said we didn't want them; if people wanted to speak to Government, they should be able to do it not rely upon professional lobbyists. I lost that one because they're everywhere. There were 130 registered lobbyists in Canberra, maybe for some organisations, and it's mostly commercial organisations who can pay for them. They provide a source of information. I'm not sure you need it now because people can get well informed many other ways.
 
Q19. Do lobby groups have an excessive influence on State Parliament?
 
JC. I think they can have, I mean they're around. The danger I see with lobby groups is that they become too closely involved, as in the case of the US, and political parties sell favours directly or indirectly for meeting the perceived requirements or demands of lobby groups. I think you have to watch that. The US has a huge problem and that's in part brought about because of the massive amounts of money required to conduct television campaigns.
It is claimed that George W Bush got the momentum for his campaign as Republican nominee for the next presidential election because he had a big war chest; he had forty eight million or something. Now why do you have forty eight million? Because he had political IOU's out there that individuals and corporations had funded and he required money. So what's happening in politics generally is that more and more money is able to buy access. It buys access, that's one thing, it's maybe no fault in that, but if it buys more than access that's got you worried.

The Financial Review, yesterday or the day before, said that if you want to have dinner with the Prime Minister at the Lodge then you've gotta pay ten thousand dollars to Ron Walker, the Treasurer of the Liberal Party and I think that thoroughly bad. If that's true and I haven't heard it denied. So where you get access to decisions makers in that way, then you’ve got problems. And they always say it makes no difference to access, they all say that, but never-the-less I think you leave yourself open. You're silly to do it.
 
Q20. Does that apply as much to State politics?
 
JC. Different ways I think. There's no doubt that disclosures are now required from some political relations. Most corporations work both sides of the street. They may differ in the amount, but they're both doing it and they will argue that this is part of their role as good corporate citizens.
 
Q21. If there was a particular aspect of political life that you could change to improve the system, what would it be?
 
JC. I think probably what we've just been talking about, I'd try and ensure that political parties weren't able to exploit political donations. I think that's what I'd try and do, it's pretty hard to do. We tried to do it in the State Parliament in the 80's by requiring disclosure of political donations. It's only been achieved in part I think. You can walk around it now by making substantial loans to political parties which they never pay back. Or you can use foundations or shelf companies and disguise where the money's come from. So I think the current system we have has made some attempts to address the problem but not as great as it should have been. It hasn't achieved what it should have achieved, so if I were God for a day I think I would try and ensure that the capacity to buy access and decisions was more limited than it is.
 
Q22. Is it your impression that marginal seats get a better deal than safe ones in the allocation of political funding?
 
JC. Well it's not just an impression, it's the reality of political life! You've gotta hang on to them. "Pork barrelling", which is what it is, buys votes, all sides of politics do it to some extent. I'm not sure that it does, actually it may be that some particular projects do have the effect of having changed their vote or solidified their choice in voting. Somebody should do some work on it. I'm not sure if any research has ever been done. I mean, Joh Bjelke Petersen in Queensland was a great believer, he believed he could buy seats and in fact I think Jeff Kennett said he was going to punish some electorate. That they wouldn't get things if he wasn't able to get things and if they didn't return his candidate. You're not going to run that on the Internet I know but I think it's worth saying. I mean if politicians start doing that, it highlights the thing that "pork barrelling" is alive and well.
 
Q23. The Tasmanian State Parliament has a system with multi-electorates which they believe makes them less prone to "pork barrelling". Do you believe it would be worth looking at the mechanics of our system? That there's some protection we can get there?
 
JC. Well the Tasmanians have a PR system in their Lower House. Which gives you what it's got now; it's a minority government isn't it, down there? I think you will get that most times or many times. They use the final seven seats I think, and elect seven from each seat, that's the way they work it. But their Upper House is a single member constituency. That won't stop the "pork barrelling" and it leads to instability. If you have a PR system in the House, it makes and breaks the Government, by that I mean the Lower House. So I don't think the Tasmanians can claim any particular wisdom in that regard.
 
Q24. Could I move us on to the issue of gender in politics. Is it your impression or, particularly during your time in Parliament, that women were treated very differently from male politicians?
 
JC. By other parliamentarians, by themselves or by other women? I don't think there was any difference. I mean, I suppose people can point to particular incidents where they saw gender conflict or gender ignorance as being an issue. I don't think it made a difference, we had four or five women Members in the Cabinet, maybe six at one stage. Their commitment and their status, their role in the Cabinet, was no different because of gender. Some women did say that women were less comfortable with the conflict and aggressive culture of the Parliament - that they didn't like it. That may be so but some men don't either.
 
Q25. Do you think that operates also at a party level? Because it's certainly been said that it's actually hard for women to get through the machinery of the various parties.
 
JC. Well I can only speak for the Labor Party but it doesn’t matter what gender you are in the Labor Party as long as you're in the right faction. It's about factions there and I think it is in the Liberal Party to a very large extent, so I think any gender bias that may have been seen in the past, and there probably was many years ago, has gone. Well, there's a positive discrimination policy still applying in the Labor Party, so perhaps I should qualify what I'm saying by noting that there's a requirement to build up numbers of women Members in safe seats, as they call it, over the next two or three years. So maybe there's a bias in favouring women. But having said that, I don't think that gender is as significant in the pre-selection process as choosing the right faction.
 
Q26. Excuse me for wandering around but that reminds me of an interesting issue. How does a person actually get to be Premier? Do you have to lobby people in your own party? How does that happen?
 
JC. Well I think to some extent, it's what we were talking about before, it's the "theatre of Parliament". It's the belief by your members that you will be able to win for them, because the leader cult is still alive and well, although we're not quite in the same category in that regard as the US. So they've got to believe that the media will be well handled by the leader. They've got to believe that the Parliament will be handled because whilst the public think Parliament is a bit of a joke and just theatre, it is important to the members. They like to see their leader or their Ministers or their front bench, if they're opposition, doing well and they’re making fool of the other side.

So it requires a Parliamentary performance capacity, a media capacity and then I suppose, a belief that, and I don't put them in any order, that policy development and implementation can be handled as well. They're the ingredients and the latter embraces a whole range of things like handling the party and handling the interest groups. I mean, policy development and implementation is I think the most important part of all that because unless you do that right, you make a git of yourself when you get on television if you haven't got the right things to say. They complement one another, but I suspect that's what the party looks for.

If you go into politics you give up a lot, in the sense that many would have given up a job for an uncertain future, where their family is not going to see much of them. So despite what people say about politicians they do make a lot of sacrifices and the result is that they feel pretty keenly about surviving. They don't want to be one-termers, so they want to win their next election. Never underestimate the drive the desire to win reveals the motives of politicians. It's all about getting re-elected.
 
Q27. It's looks like a pretty savage process from an outside view. When you're winning, you’re up, then when a Premier loses, or leads a party unsuccessfully for a re-election, they seem to get rather ruthlessly dumped.
 
JC. Well I think that's right, that's the process but that's never been any different.
 
Q28. I'd imagine at a personal level that must be a pretty hard thing to handle.
 
JC. Oh well, you know that's the game when you go in. It is a very different life being in it but you've been in the "before life" and you just go back to that "before life" in the "after life" I suppose. So it's almost a stellar rise up and down sometimes.
 
Q29. Is it very difficult making the adjustment back to a less-political existence?
 
JC. I guess it is in a way. After I finished, I was asked to go up to the University of Melbourne and be a Professorial Associate in Politics and Public Policy and so on. So I found a role in teaching students about politics and did a bit of writing and a lot of research, which I'm still doing. So you've got to find something to fill the void I think, it's like any other job. See, it depends on the person. I'm not one of those at any stage go and play bowls or join the Probus Club and feel fulfilled and satisfied, that wouldn't be me, so I like to be doing something else. It's up to everybody to find what they need to provide an alternative outlet. But the years in leading a political party are exciting, it's heady stuff. The thing about it, is no day's the same, you walk in, in the morning at 8 o'clock and a whole heap of new problems confronts you. That's always the case I think and it's the dynamics and the variety that you get that is the most interesting part of it all.
 
Q30. I'd imagine though that your family was grateful to get you back at the end of it?
 
JC. Oh well, my family was not that young. I suppose our youngest was, well one of them got married right after I was elected to the Premiership, so they weren't young in that sense. Their age range was twenty three or twenty four and twenty, and we had a younger one who was about twelve or thirteen, and he was at school. So I only had one at home the whole eight and a half years I was in. At that stage of your life, family is growing away anyway, so it's a bit different than if you have a very young family.
 
Q31. Do you think we need to work harder to take care of our politicians, or is it fair enough the way the system is?
 
JC. Better care? In what particular way?
 
Q32. Just more as people. Does the public need to have more of a sense that actually just because you're a politician you haven't ceased to be a member of the human race?
 
JC. I don't think it's a disillusion that they regard politicians as being fair game and the level of support and admiration for politicians is very low. Now, I'm not sure, maybe some haven't behaved as well as they might have and that's built up over the years a degree of public anger. Maybe it's the tall poppy syndrome. I'm not sure. But it is clear that politicians are not highly regarded which I think is to be regretted because it does require a commitment and a determination that few other jobs do. You see, that's the most significant thing about politics when you compare politicians with people from other disciplines. We in government invited a few from the business community and other areas to come and work for the Government either on an exchange basis and some of them were offered permanent places, five or six years.

It never ceased to amaze me how narrow and single minded the people from the private sector were; they had no understanding of the broader issues. They were good in their own discipline or industry, understood it and were very good on that, but when something else came from left field ... no idea how to handle it, it was just too much for them.
That's what business does to you, gives you a very narrow focus. The most important thing in the business industry is making a success, the bottom line. You're accountable to the board of directors, accountable to your shareholders and nothing else much matters. That's why I think business has made an awful mess of its public relations in recent times. How could you contemplate that banks collectively, the four big banks: Qantas, Optus, all this prestige, Telstra! Companies could believe they could give secret commissions to John Laws and Allan Jones and that was alright! They find nothing wrong with it! What's wrong with these so-called giants of the business world is the fact they don't realise they've done something wrong. That is even more alarming I think.

Now I think the politician would immediately say, "That's not right! You can't do that." But they seem to regard it as being okay, not to mention the guys who did it, the Alan Jones' and the Laws'. What I was trying to say was that those people are very narrowly focused in life and politicians get a very broad one where you become conversant with and get a smattering of almost everything. You may not master everything but you get to understand what the issues are and what issues are flying through society and you find it's the same with other parts of the world as well. Whilst you don't get across every detail, you get a broad understanding of what's going on at large.
 
Q33. What do you think is the thing you most enjoyed about as being Premier?
 
JC. I think what we've been talking about, the sheer diversity and some belief and satisfaction we were making things better. The buzz that you get from a new challenge, twenty to thirty new challenges a day almost, I suppose to test you out all the while as to how you handle it.

So it's the variety and the constancy of it that's the most agreeable thing. But you can at times become like a sponge; you can't absorb anything more and you become almost limp where you've taken almost too much in so you need to get away and have a break at times. You'll be in meeting after meeting and paper after paper, you can become very ragged if you're not careful, you've got to pace yourself a bit both on a daily as well as a weekly and monthly basis.