Tony Abbott

The Hon Tony Abbott
File:Tony Abbott.png
Minister for Health and Ageing
In office 2003–2007
Preceded by	Kay Patterson
Succeeded by	Nicola Roxon
Constituency	Warringah
Personal details
Born	(1957-11-04) 4 November 1957 London, United Kingdom
Political party	Liberal Party of Australia
Spouse	Margaret

For other people called Tony Abbott, see Tony Abbott (disambiguation).

Anthony John "Tony" Abbott (born 4 November 1957), Australian politician, was Minister for Health and Ageing in the Australian federal government and Leader of the House in the Federal Parliament. Since 1994, he has been the Member for Warringah, in New South Wales in the House of Representatives for the Liberal Party.

Early life and family

Abbott was born in London to Australian parents. In 1960, his family returned to Australia, living first in the Sydney suburbs of Bronte then moving to Chatswood. Abbott was schooled at St Aloysius' College before completing his secondary school education at St Ignatius' College, Riverview in Sydney. He graduated from the University of Sydney, residing at St John's College, with a Bachelor of Economics (BEc) and a Bachelor of Laws (LLB). At university he was active in student politics, gaining media attention for his political stance opposing the then dominant left-wing student leadership. He was also a prominent student boxer. He then went on to attend the University of Oxford as a Rhodes Scholar and graduated with a Master of Arts (MA). Rhodes scholarships are granted to better than average students who show "vitality" in sport and are under twenty-five years of age: A good all rounder rather than a top scholar. Said to be [only Abbott knows for sure] a devout Catholic, he then considered the Catholic priesthood, and entered St Patrick's diocesan seminary in Sydney, but subsequently decided to leave and chose another career path.

Despite his right-wing leanings, Abbott has acknowledged he voted Labor in the 1988 NSW State Election as he thought "Barrie Unsworth was the best deal Premier that New South Wales had ever had."

After leaving the seminary, Abbott worked as a journalist for The Bulletin, an influential news magazine, and The Australian. He became well known for his strongly worded criticism of trade unions, feminism and left-wing politics. For a period, Abbott was a Plant Manager for Pioneer Concrete before becoming press secretary to the Leader of the Opposition, Dr John Hewson in 1990-93, and between 1993 and 1994 was the Executive Director of Australians for Constitutional Monarchy.

Abbott is married to Margaret with whom he has three daughters.

Political life

Abbott was elected to the Australian House of Representatives at a by-election in March 1994 following the resignation of Michael MacKellar. He served as the Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister for Employment, Education, Training and Youth Affairs (1996-98), Minister for Employment Services (1998-2001), Minister for Employment and Workplace Relations and Small Business (2001), Minister for Employment and Workplace Relations (2001-03), and Minister for Health and Ageing from 2003 to November 2007. From late 2001 to November 2007, he was also Manager of Government Business in the House . He acquired a reputation in these roles as a robust parliamentary debater and political tactician.

As Minister for Health and Ageing, Abbott reduced government funding to the Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme and Medicare. In 2004, he introduced the Medicare Safety Net to cap the annual out-of-pocket costs of Medicare cardholders to a maximum amount. In 2007, he attracted criticism over long delays in funding for cancer diagnostic equipment (PET scanners).

Abbott is widely known as an outspoken socially conservative Catholic. Abbott sees reducing the number of abortions performed each year as a national priority. In March 2004 he asked "Why isn't the fact that 100,000 women choose to end their pregnancies regarded as a national tragedy approaching the scale, say, of Aboriginal life expectancy being 20 years less than that of the general community?" Abbott promised to launch an investigation into a product called Pink or Blue, which is made by UK-based DNA Worldwide, a division of US-based Consumer Genetics. This test is one of several pre-natal blood tests designed to detect the sex of a foetus as early as six weeks into pregnancy. Ethicists have raised concerns that knowing the sex of a foetus so early into pregancy would facilitate Sex-selective abortion and infanticide.

A conscience vote took place in February 2006, approving a measure that deprived the Health Minister of regulatory control of the abortion drug RU486. Abbott and previous Health Ministers had decided not to allow it to be made available. Abbott responded to the vote by calling for funding of alternative counselling to pregnant women through church-affiliated groups. During this time, Abbott criticised the acceptance of abortion, saying "... we have a bizarre double standard, a bizarre double standard in this country where someone who kills a pregnant woman's baby is guilty of murder but a woman who aborts an unborn baby is simply exercising choice."

Abbott opposed allowing the introduction of Embryonic stem cell research or therapeutic cloning in another conscience vote, preferring continued use of Adult stem cells for research into cures for debilitating diseases. He argued that: "there are very important ethical questions here and even the very best end does not justify every possible means."

Abbott is also a supporter of the constutional monarchy in Australia. He has previously accused some sections of the Australia public of "suffering self-imposed historical and cultural amnesia" in relation to Australia's British heritage and acting like "teenagers blowing raspberries at their parents".

After losing Government[2007] and his Health portfolio, in Opposition, Abbott was re-elected to the seat of Warringah with a 1.79% swing toward the Labor Party. Following Peter Costello's rejection of the leadership of the Parliamentary Liberal Party, Mr Abbott nominated for the position of party leader, along with Malcolm Turnbull and Brendan Nelson. After canvassing the support of his colleagues, Abbott decided to withdraw his nomination. He seemly didn't have the numbers, noting that he was "obviously very closely identified with the outgoing prime minister." He also he would not rule out contesting the leadership at some time in the future.

In December 2007, Abbott was assigned the Shadow Ministry of Families, Community Services and Indigenous Affairs.

Controversies

• In May 2006, Abbott, as Manager of Government Business, called the Opposition MP, Kelvin Thompson, a "snivelling grub" in the Parliament for speaking about Nationals MP John Anderson's shares in the disgraced Australian Wheat Board. Abbott then said "If I've offended grubs, I withdraw unconditionally." The comments were not widely reported until a week later when Labor Deputy Leader Julia Gillard (then Shadow Minister for Health and Ageing) used the exact same phrase about Abbott, refused to withdraw it, and was ejected from Parliament for 24 hours. Abbott later told the Parliament "It would have been better if I had not moved the motion in the terms that I originally did."

• Before losing Government, Abbott was widely critised for not releasing details on the findings of the use of PET scanners to detect cancer. He promised he would on the ABC's 7.30 Report, but he did not keep his word.

• In July 2007 Abbott gained attention after swearing once on a national TV interview and repeating the phrase when asked about the incident by journalists the next day. After renewed controversy over John Howard's alleged broken promise to hand over the Liberal leadership position to Peter Costello, Abbott said to an interviewer: "Not to put too fine a point on it, shit happens, Tony". When asked if he regretted it he cackled and repeated "shit happens", garnering some laughs from the journalists.

• In the 2007 federal election campaign, Abbott was again drawn into controversy over comments he made about asbestos campaigner Bernie Banton. Banton, who was suffering, and later died, from terminal mesothelioma, attempted to deliver a petition to Abbott's electorate office in Manly. As Abbot was not there, he was accused of being "gutless". Abbott said the event was a stunt and said: "I know Bernie is very sick, but just because a person is sick doesn't mean that he is necessarily pure of heart in all things." Abbott later apologised for the comments, owing to a wave of condemnation and an upcoming election.

• The next day, 30 October 2007, Abbott arrived more than 30 minutes late for a nationally televised debate with his Labor counterpart in the health portfolio (Nicola Roxon) after being held up by masses of journalists in relation to the incident the day before. Roxon answered questions and joked with the media about "debating herself" while waiting. After the debate, Abbott was heard saying to Roxon that her suggestion that he could have made the debate on time was "bullshit". Abbot was a recipient of The Chaser Decides' 'Mal Award' for this and later bungles in the campaign.

Action against One Nation Party

In 1998, Abbott established a trust fund called "Australians for Honest Politics Trust" to help bankroll civil court cases against the One Nation Party and its leader Pauline Hanson. Prime Minister John Howard denied any knowledge of existence of such a fund. Abbott was also accused of offering funds to One Nation dissident Terry Sharples to support his court battle against the party. However, Prime Minister Howard defended the honesty of Abbott in this matter.

It was Sharples' legal action that laid the basis for the successful prosecution of the One Nation founders Pauline Hanson and David Ettridge.

Opposition MP Craig Emerson demanded to know where the money for the Trust, reportedly $100,000, had come from, saying that taxpayers had a right to know. Treasurer Peter Costello said of Abbott's actions, "I don't think that the way to resolve political disputes is through the courts. I think the way to resolve it is at the ballot box."

Abbott conceded that the political threat One Nation posed to the Howard Government was "a very big factor" in his decision to pursue the legal attack, but he also claimed to be acting "in Australia's national interest". Prime Minister Howard also defended Abbott's actions saying "It's the job of the Liberal Party to politically attack other parties - there's nothing wrong with that."

Alleged son

When Abbott was 19, his then girlfriend Kathy Donnelly gave birth to a son whom she adopted out. Abbott believed the son was his and described this as an intense personal experience. The identity of this son was not known until late 2004, and it was soon publicly revealed that this child was Daniel O'Connor, an Australian Broadcasting Corporation sound recordist who worked in Parliament House, Canberra and who had often been involved in making television programs in which Abbott appeared. DNA testing later revealed, however, that Abbott was not O'Connor's biological father.

Community Service

Abbott is a volunteer member of the NSW Rural Fire Service as a member of the Davidson Rural Fire Brigade.

Abbott has participated in many events for charity. He has run in a 100 km ultramarathon for charity. . In April 2007, Abbott launched the tenth annual Pollie Pedal, a charitable event which aimed to raise money for breast cancer. Federal Territories Minister Jim Lloyd said that the event was Abbott's "brainchild".

External links

• Personal website

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