Tiberius with a Telephone: the life and stories of William McMahon
Winner of the 2020 Australian National Biography Award and the 2020 NSW Premier’s Non-Fiction Award.
The oddly compelling story of a man regarded as Australia’s worst prime minister.
William McMahon was a significant, if widely derided and disliked, figure in Australian politics in the second half of the twentieth century. This biography tells the story of his life, his career, and his doomed attempts to recast views of his much-maligned time as Australia’s prime minister.
After a long ministerial career under Menzies, McMahon became treasurer under Harold Holt, and fought a fierce, bitter war over protectionism with John McEwen. Following Holt’s death in 1967, McEwen had his revenge by vetoing McMahon’s candidature for the Liberal Party’s leadership, and thus paved the way for John Gorton to become prime minister. But almost three years later, amid acrimony and division, McMahon would topple Gorton and fulfill his life’s ambition to become Australia’s prime minister.
In office, McMahon worked furiously to enact an agenda that grappled with the profound changes reshaping Australia. He withdrew combat forces from Vietnam, legislated for Commonwealth government involvement in childcare, established the National Urban and Regional Development Authority and the first Department of the Environment, began phasing out the means test on pensions, sought to control foreign investments, and accelerated the timetable for the independence of Papua New Guinea. But his failures would overshadow his successes, and by the time of the 1972 election McMahon would lead a divided, tired, and rancorous party to defeat.
A man whose life was coloured by tragedy, comedy, persistence, courage, farce, and failure, McMahon’s story has never been told at length. Tiberius with a Telephone fills that gap, using deep archival research and extensive interviews with McMahon’s contemporaries and colleagues. It is a tour de force — an authoritative and colourful account of a unique politician and a vital period in Australia’s history.
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Tiberius with a Telephone: the life and stories of William McMahon
Winner of the 2020 Australian National Biography Award and the 2020 NSW Premier’s Non-Fiction Award.
The oddly compelling story of a man regarded as Australia’s worst prime minister.
William McMahon was a significant, if widely derided and disliked, figure in Australian politics in the second half of the twentieth century. This biography tells the story of his life, his career, and his doomed attempts to recast views of his much-maligned time as Australia’s prime minister.
After a long ministerial career under Menzies, McMahon became treasurer under Harold Holt, and fought a fierce, bitter war over protectionism with John McEwen. Following Holt’s death in 1967, McEwen had his revenge by vetoing McMahon’s candidature for the Liberal Party’s leadership, and thus paved the way for John Gorton to become prime minister. But almost three years later, amid acrimony and division, McMahon would topple Gorton and fulfill his life’s ambition to become Australia’s prime minister.
In office, McMahon worked furiously to enact an agenda that grappled with the profound changes reshaping Australia. He withdrew combat forces from Vietnam, legislated for Commonwealth government involvement in childcare, established the National Urban and Regional Development Authority and the first Department of the Environment, began phasing out the means test on pensions, sought to control foreign investments, and accelerated the timetable for the independence of Papua New Guinea. But his failures would overshadow his successes, and by the time of the 1972 election McMahon would lead a divided, tired, and rancorous party to defeat.
A man whose life was coloured by tragedy, comedy, persistence, courage, farce, and failure, McMahon’s story has never been told at length. Tiberius with a Telephone fills that gap, using deep archival research and extensive interviews with McMahon’s contemporaries and colleagues. It is a tour de force — an authoritative and colourful account of a unique politician and a vital period in Australia’s history.
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Tiberius with a Telephone: the life and stories of William McMahon
Winner of the 2020 Australian National Biography Award and the 2020 NSW Premier’s Non-Fiction Award.
The oddly compelling story of a man regarded as Australia’s worst prime minister.
William McMahon was a significant, if widely derided and disliked, figure in Australian politics in the second half of the twentieth century. This biography tells the story of his life, his career, and his doomed attempts to recast views of his much-maligned time as Australia’s prime minister.
After a long ministerial career under Menzies, McMahon became treasurer under Harold Holt, and fought a fierce, bitter war over protectionism with John McEwen. Following Holt’s death in 1967, McEwen had his revenge by vetoing McMahon’s candidature for the Liberal Party’s leadership, and thus paved the way for John Gorton to become prime minister. But almost three years later, amid acrimony and division, McMahon would topple Gorton and fulfill his life’s ambition to become Australia’s prime minister.
In office, McMahon worked furiously to enact an agenda that grappled with the profound changes reshaping Australia. He withdrew combat forces from Vietnam, legislated for Commonwealth government involvement in childcare, established the National Urban and Regional Development Authority and the first Department of the Environment, began phasing out the means test on pensions, sought to control foreign investments, and accelerated the timetable for the independence of Papua New Guinea. But his failures would overshadow his successes, and by the time of the 1972 election McMahon would lead a divided, tired, and rancorous party to defeat.
A man whose life was coloured by tragedy, comedy, persistence, courage, farce, and failure, McMahon’s story has never been told at length. Tiberius with a Telephone fills that gap, using deep archival research and extensive interviews with McMahon’s contemporaries and colleagues. It is a tour de force — an authoritative and colourful account of a unique politician and a vital period in Australia’s history.
Patrick Mullins is a Canberra-based writer and academic who has a PhD from the University of Canberra. Tiberius with a Telephone, his first book, won the 2020 NSW Premier’s Non-Fiction Award and the 2020 National Biography Award. He is also the author of The Trials of Portnoy: how Penguin brought down Australia’s censorship system.
Table of Contents
1 End to End 1
2 Building Character 5
3 The Ghostwriter 17
4 Shelter and the Law 22
5 The Central Figure 37
6 A Time of Transformation 40
7 Rumours 61
8 Lowe 63
9 Gaps 74
10 Red 75
11 Disgust 88
12 The Colours of Ambition 89
13 The Undoctored Incident 110
14 Control 114
15 Perception 133
16 War and Strife 136
17 Exposure 159
18 Preparing the Way 161
19 Lauding the Headmaster 183
20 Protection (I) 187
21 Protection (II) 201
22 The Story and the Fact 229
23 Cold Water 235
24 Privilege 253
25 The New Man 257
26 Fragments and Credit 289
27 Subsequent Plots 293
28 Loyalty 304
29 A New Stage 308
30 Le Noir 327
31 Battles 329
32 A Transient Phantom? 362
33 A Natural Development 366
34 Activity and Responsibility 394
35 The Crumbling Pillars (I) 400
36 The Crumbling Pillars (II) 422
37 The Crumbling Pillars (III) 441
38 The Crumbling Pillars (IV) 459
39 The Stories Told 470
40 Survival Mode 474
41 On Edge 496
42 Constant Threats 498
43 The Unequal Struggle 513
44 Dither and Irresolution 515
45 Tributes 534
46 'Where We Are Heading' 536
47 Finishing 561
48 In Calm and in Crisis 566
49 As Matters Stand 591
50 In the wilderness 593
51 Never 611
52 Persistence 614
53 A Liberal View 629
Acknowledgements 637
Appendix: McMahon government cabinet and ministry 639
