The Chaser Report - ARVO: Tom Ballard Being a Filthy Greenie

Episode Date: February 1, 2022

Joining us for our first Afternoon Edition of 2022 is legendary comedian Tom Ballard! Tom Ballard is joined by Charles and Gabbi as they harass him about his filthy Green podcast promoting biased Greenie agenda like wanting to not cause climate change. Plus they take a look other political parties, for balance. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Striving for mediocrity in a world of excellence, this is The Chaser Report. Hello and welcome to The Chaser Report. We're back, Gabby. Woo, woo, woo, woo, we sure are. Not at all depressing. No. We did it. We did it. It was great. So today we're going to talk to Tom Ballard. You may know him from such projects as Tonightly, which was on ABC.

And Triple J, he used to host breakfast on Triple J. didn't he? Yeah, he sure did. And he's also like a world-renowned stand-up comedian that also happens to be a good. Very, very good at his job.

Hello, Tom. Hey, mates. Fuck, fuck, fuck. Sorry. That was like an extra $3 for me. Thank you so much, Tom. Just to contextualize for the listeners, Gabby told Tom

that this podcast is sponsored by the word fuck. And every time he says it, she gets a dollar. Yeah. Yeah. This was after she asked me what blood type I was. We don't have to explain. Yeah, we don't have to explain more than that.

I mean, it's a blind trust. It's fine. Like, we don't have to tell them who sponsors it. It's all good. So, yeah, it works for the government. It works for us. Shut up. We're going to go to an air break, and we'll be back after these.

Thank you for your patience. Your call is important. Can't take being on hold anymore. Fizz is 100% online, so you can make the switch. in minutes. Mobile plans at $15 a month. Certain conditions apply.

Details at fizz.ca. The Chaser Report. News you know you can't trust. So Tom, how you got? How's your life been over the last two and a half years? Oh, hasn't been ideal, Charles. I will say. It's been fun, exciting, thrilling, a wonderful challenge.

and a chance to grow creatively and just have great mental health the whole time, I'd say, yeah. So you've obviously taken up lying. It's so fucking boring. I'm not doing the Comedy Festival this year, and I am very grateful for that because I feel like I honestly

we have no idea what to say. I did a show last year that was all about 2020 and how insane 2020 was from the bushfires to COVID to Black Lives Matter. But honestly, I have no idea whether any audience is interested in anyone saying anything about fucking anything at this point.

So I just, I got nothing for you. I went to what was left of the Melbourne Comedy Festival last year. And I reckon part of the best part about the comedy festival was watching comedians actually just talk about their mental health and how depressed they got and everything. It was quite, it was a completely different tone. Because usually sort of comedians, especially male comedians, use mental health as a sort of

isn't it funny that you know like they sort of they're using their comedy as their sort of therapy whereas this time it was they sort of actually got down and were more vulnerable about it it was quite a nice change I thought

I thought maybe actually we'll get more sort of subtle Hannah Gadsby style comedy out of this pandemic maybe I was well 2020 itself I did sort of okay I got through it okay It was sort of novel and I was sort of chucking along. Okay. And then the second half of 2021, I hit some real, some real weird areas.

And really, it just, yeah, really hit me like nothing else. I was supposed to write this book, this deadline pressing down on me that I could not do, could not get out of bed, watched all of Game of Thrones again. Nice. And just ventured into some really unexplored parts of my brain in quite a bad way. So if I was to do a show this year, it would be a lot of, oh, Tom was sad. But you were living in Melbourne, weren't you? Mm-hmm.

Yeah, so that, yeah, there's, you know. I mean, I'm sorry for you guys, and I'm sure it was really tough or whatever, but yeah. Yeah. Talk to me. Talk to me when you've been there for, what, 150 days or something. There were moments there where we weren't allowed to have full pool parties under our lockdown doors. So it was pretty... That must have been tough. It was tough, yeah. And I don't know about you, but...

This summer, the supply chain has been fucked. Like, I went to the local Woolies the other day, and there was none of the good caviar left. Oh, no. Like, just the lumpfish caviar. And there was no smoked salmon left and no cream fresh. Clean out of cream. We had to use sour cream. How will you make caviar stroganoff?

What are you making? With those ingredients, salt. We're making potato blinis. I don't even know what that is. And we had to use Lumpfish fucking carrier rather than the good shit. Tell you what, I'm fine with this supply chain issue, to be honest, because I've been eating just completely processed boxed and canned shit for as long as I've been alive.

So, like, I don't even go. Like, when they were like, oh, it's affecting the fresh food section. I was like, oh, that's fine. That's not going to affect me at all. Yeah. I'm getting a lot of emails from my food delivery service are saying, hey, we've had to change one of the ingredient items in your thing. I don't give a shit.

Don't email me. Just deliver the box. Don't look me in the face. Leave me away. Let me eat the same food that I cook, quote unquote, every single week. That's the system that we've set up. Did you see how somebody got ordered celery and it got swapped out for celery seeds? And it was like, you got celery for a lifetime.

It's the long game. Yeah. It's the, you wanted celery. We'll give you an endless supply. You'll have celery eventually. Yeah. You don't have chicken, but here are some. eggs that you could use.

So wait a minute, if you're not doing stand-up this year, like the Melbourne Comedy Festival, what do you do? Are you going to tour or you've just given up on that as well? I've been getting up on the very concept of comedy. There'll be no laughing. No, it's, oh, I think it's fine for people to know. The project itself has been announced. A little TV show called Deadlock, which the Kate's,

who did the catering show and Get Cracken have written, and that's going to be filmed in Tassie. and I've got a medium role in that, but I'm not allowed to leave the state of Tasmania for four months in case I get caught up or catch COVID itself or get trapped in some kind of Victorian quarantine facility in the middle of the desert. So yes, in order to not disrupt production, I just get to hang out in Tazi for four months occasionally shooting a funny TV show

and yeah, that's going to be the first six months of my 2022. That sounds amazing. I can't complain. Yes, no, I'm really excited about it. It should be really fun. Congratulations. Is this a new way for Tasmania to prevent, you know, population loss, is it? That they actually just lock people in.

Yes. I can't leave and I have to fuck someone I'm not related to. This is part of the contract. I think this is more like the national version of the international Marvel situation. Remember when like the whole world went really nuts in America and then the Marvel studios were like, you know where we should move, Australia. This is like if Australia was the entire world and Phil, production companies were like, you know where we should move, Tasmania.

That's, it's going to be fine. And I think you'd be great. Yeah. Pop over to the Dane Tree, come back and film your show, it'd be great. It'll be, it'll be good. I'll try and track down Bob Brown, see if I can interview with him in Egg of Bacon Bay. Yeah, that's the dream. So, so one of the other projects that you're doing at the moment is a new podcast.

So you've already, you've still got the other one, the one about explain like I'm a six-year-old, don't you? Yes, yes. That's sort of limping along. It's, I would describe it as occasional. What do you mean? Limping along. That's a lovely podcast. No, I love, I like doing it.

I just, it's, it used to be a weekly release schedule and that sort of has fallen by the wayside. Yeah, but we're living in a pandemic, Tom. Yeah, we were going to write a book. You didn't write a book, but you don't do anything anymore. I can't release a podcast. I'm not writing a book, guys. Give me some space. Are you going to finish the book, by the way?

Is that a bit sensitive? In theory, the book could still happen. The editors were extraordinarily patient understanding, and they said, hey, give it another crack if you want, and we'll try and shoot for the end of this year. So that is still in the schedule, in theory. Okay, but your new podcast is called Serious Danger. And does that mean that it's serious?

Is it serious? Is that what's going on? Is this the new Tom Ballard? I think I've left behind any idea that I don't take myself seriously a long time ago and yes I tell funny jokes about my penis but also I'm a voice of a generation and I'm trying to make the world a better place and the podcast is it is funny I think we have we have fun making it but it is supposed to be a podcast about the Australian Greens and a look at Australian politics from a Greens perspective and I deal with my friend

Emerald Moon and she knows that that's a funny name for a Green's member to have. She's a hippie from Barrett Bay. And also a former Greens candidate and a very smart lady. And we get to talk about, yeah, what's happening with the Australian Greens and what we would like the Greens to do, why the Labour Party sucks and why the Tories are evil. So that's fun for everyone. Because I must say, I reckon, because you and Emerald had this amazing chemistry together. And yeah, it's fantastic when you sort of listen to you talking about everything and then you get these really boring Greens candidates on why do you do that um we're having this conversation everyone makes the point because she she works for she's a staffer for a political

for a Greens MP in the state of great said of Queensland and um yes indeed and so she's constantly consumed and I would say living in the world of Greens politics far more than I am and uh when I say hey maybe we should have a candidate on for this election that's coming up she's like oh god fine if we have to. But there are Grey Greens candidates out there and, you know, even if they do their little

stump speech. By the way, he's not being held hostage. At least they're not robots who are accepting money from the fucking banks, bro. What? What?

Yeah. You hurt me. Charles, we have a whole campaign about how shit the banks are and you're sitting there like, what? They're accepting money from banks?

Yeah. It's like their whole bit. Wait, man. We don't like coal companies. We will take their money though. Thank you. But wait, no. I don't understand why other people accepting money from banks

makes it interesting to have boring people on your podcast. That's a good point. There's a bit of a logical fallacy there. Look, you can't say that Greens candidates or MPs are boring. Sometimes they're very interesting, like Lydia Thorpe, not in a good way in a political respect. And sometimes I'll tweet some shit that you go, oh, for God's sake.

But if you ignore that, If you look at the policies and focus on that and think about how maybe they could be just a little bit different and make things less shit and a party that actually cares about the planet not burning, then hang on to that, I say. That's what gets me through anyway. I mean, honestly, I'll just sit off for some less corruption, to be honest. That would be a good place for me to start. Less corruption would be lovely. Great start. And hey, you know, no corruption with the Greens because they're never going to win.

So it's actually a perfect system. I'm probably not allowed to say that. That's fine. We can cut it there if you really want us to, it's fine. Definitely not going to cut there. But I reckon that begs the question. If they're never going to win, why should anyone support the Greens? Like, isn't it a bit of a sort of loser strategy?

Yes, well, that was a little bit of a joke, a bit of a lull there from a comedian. Obviously, the Greens aren't going to win government anytime soon, but Greens candidates totally can win they have been winning across local councils and state elections and even just look 10 years ago where the Greens were

and the more Greens we have in Parliament the more influence they can have and the better Labor government would be and when you get Greens into government like in the ACT for example really good shit happens and I understand why some people say you know no I'll

even though I'm a left-wing person in the Labor Party kind of sucks I will swallow that down because they're going to win government and it's the best chance for, I understand that argument, that's fine. But for me, it's like for paying membership every year to get out of bed, to tweet about it, to look people in the eye and say, I'm voting Greens and I think you should too.

In order for me to summon the cosmic energy to do that, it has to be for a party that lines with my values and doesn't accept massive political donations and thinks that the rich people should be taxed to help poor people. I need that to be the baseline for my entry level into politics to get excited about a pretty good time. So what you're saying is to be, to be invested in politics, you want human rights. I just want something good. Yeah, yeah. It's funny how that went so askew over time. Like,

some people are into that. Yeah, but what's the point of being right if you're not powerful? If you can't do anything with being right. I bet that quote is etched. How do we become more powerful? I bet that quote is etched on Murdoch's bed, by the way. Like a live-love laugh quote, like incursive bond? Like, what's the point of being? What did you say? No, no, no, but if you can't do anything because you don't ever get power, then what's the fucking point of being right?

Like, you might as well be a little bit wrong, but actually powerful. That's the whole pitch with the Labor Party is. Yeah, of course we do horrible things, but we at least get government. Well, that's fine. How do we get the Greens more powerful? you start a podcast, that's for sure, and you become a member a new campaign. And so obviously the whole project is to make them more powerful.

And this is my secret agenda for getting you on here, which is you obviously have a lot of sway now in the Greens, you know, having the only podcast about Greens in the country. And I just want to pitch to you my idea for what the Greens should do to become a bit more powerful, which is they should start accepting donations in fossil fuel companies, They should start doing a little bit of corruption because have you noticed all the powerful parties

end up incredibly corrupt all the time? And then they're, you know, profit and power. If you can't beat them, join them. Yes, exactly, Gabby. That is great. Although there is a risk we'd become like the Labour Party, we would be corrupt and not win elections. And that really is the double whammy for me.

Like, you've got to give it up to the Labour Party to both be a hollowed out, spyeless party. still not even fucking win. I love that they haven't won for several years now. And like, so it's like, hey, try something new. Try not accepting political donations. And they're still like, no, I think this is working. I think it's working.

Like, I'm not going to fix what's already, you know, like, why, if it's not broke, don't fix it. You know, I'm just like, you could just. Just think of this strategy, yes. Like, if you're going to lose anyway, try the radical option. Don't be a cunt. It'd be amazing. Thank you for your patience.

Your call is important. Can't take being on hold anymore. FIS is 100% online, so you can make the switch in minutes. Mobile plans start at $15 a month. Certain conditions apply. Details at FIS.ca. The Chaser Report, now with extra whispers. I mean, I hope our podcast doesn't become, you know,

constantly spire around this same argument. It does look likely with the. upcoming election that, you know, Labor, it's more like that Labor will win a minority government than actually a majority in their own right. That seems to be the way the electoral maths is working out. So it could be a real option on the table. And of course, in that, in that situation, as we all know, the Labor Party will absolutely reach a deal with the Greens in order to form government because otherwise, we either go back to the polls, which would be terrible for everyone involved. No one wants that. Or you would hand over government to the conservatives,

which we're told is the worst possible thing you can do, and it really is. So there's a real possibility that Adam Band becomes the most powerful person in Australia, isn't it? Because he's the only green currently in the lower house. And, you know, if he's the difference

between Labor holding power or not, he can basically call the shots. He can become a sort of dictator, Adam, don't you think? You know, like, if power goes to his head, what sort of future can Australia, you know, see?

Well, on a personal level, Charles, I think if Adamant got power, that would be really great for music parodies because you could go into the Adamant stuff and then you could make it all... That would be good. Yeah, like that's... For me, it's a great outcome.

I mean, yeah. I don't know if dictator band works though. Dictator band, yeah, that's good. I don't think that... I don't think it gives a zing, to be honest. Well, obviously, if Adam doesn't like that nickname, then he will kill all satirists to... Yeah, true.

To put it out there. He will make everyone trans. Every... Every sex dungeon will be sold. are powered. Oh, amazing. That'd be pretty good.

That's actually good. And, um, and, and, and, and, and, and, and I'm, that's, that's, that's, that's a vision for Australia that I, I can subscribe to. That's why I'm fighting. That's why I'm podcasting every single week, Charles, to make that, that future a reality. And then I hope other people will join me in that. That's why you're adamant, Adam, adamant.

I'm sorry. Well, you heard it here first. You'll be first against the wall, get me. Fuck yeah. That's not a good thing. It's a bad thing, Gabby. That's a bad thing, yeah. Oh, I don't know what's good and bad anymore.

When it comes to government, I'm up for anything. I think if Adam Bamp was a dictator, I think I would be lining up to volunteer to go against the wall, to be honest. Okay, right. Yeah. Actually, I'd be lining up to get into that solar-powered sex dungeon. That'd be great. Yeah.

Solar-powered is the deal breaker, actually. I think if they announced solar-powered sex dungeons, they'd be lining up around the streets. It'd be like getting a rat test these days. I was going to ask, though, does your podcast go over the, like, sort of, the way preferential voting sort of works? Because I think one of the things that, like, a lot of lefties sort of, oh, God, I sound like fucking Alex Jones. A lot of lefties, a lot of lefties think is like, oh, well, I'll vote for what we said before. I'll vote for Labor, even though they do all these horrible things because they're more likely to get government. But am I correct in saying that you can still vote ethically if you align with the Greens?

You could vote for the Greens. And does that somehow still become a vote for Labor in the end anyways? So, like, why don't go for the more ethical choice? That's sort of my way of thinking about it. But, yeah, do you... No, it's an extremely good point at a mind-bendingly infuriating wall that you come up to a cup against all the time.

And we live in a multi-party democracy with a two-party mindset. Okay, so everybody just thinks it is basically that choice and if to choose the lesser of two evils. But with preferential voting, which doesn't exist in, say, the UK or the US, that there's sort of two democracies we often compare ourselves to.

if you live in a really safe labour seat or you can vote number one Greens and number two for the Labour Party and if we can increase the Greens primary vote if you're in a Labour seat and you'd like your local Labour MP to be a little bit more progressive and send a bit of a message

that's one way to do it. You can say, look, I'd like you to be a little bit closer to the Greens vision of Australia, please if you want to maintain my vote. And, you know, it's, I mean, it's very hard to convince the drips on Twitter, that's for sure, or people who have rusted on Labor voters, or people who just

don't pay that much attention, and their parents have always voted Labor, and so that's the only option they could do, and voting for the Greens is they're constantly told, is ridiculous and silly. But if you give Labor your vote no matter what, they will not move anywhere. They will not become any more progressive or reevaluate their strategy or pay attention to you and other people in your community. Mind you, I don't think they're going to do that anyway, even if you do give you the Greens. Sure, but this is the little lies that I tell about. before I go to sleep at night to help us cope, right?

Yeah. Although I don't want to be seen as like being, you know, partisan here on this podcast. If you want to vote conservatively, but you want it to be a little bit more about farms, you can also put your vote for the nationals. You won't have any water

and you'll have no money, but you can do that. Woo! Sorry, I just wanted to make that clear. And also just for balance, Tom, I do want to say, yeah,

because we need to be balanced. which is, you know, why isn't Scott Morrison an unempathetic psychopath? Like, you know, like, I put it to you that actually he's a really great guy and that you should vote people. To explain why that as well, he cooks great fish. Oh, yes, yes. He does. He's got my life. You know who else cook great fish?

Jesus. Jesus did. Great fish. That's true. He's also cooking fish in the ocean by not doing anything about climate change and then it's an acidity of. Sorry, I got distracted. Smells great. He loves musical theatre.

I read Sean Kelly's profile, the portrait of Scott Morrison, and he played Artful Dodger as a child in a community production of Oliver, and I can't stop thinking about that every single day. Consid to yourself. Oh, my God. Consid to yourself, one of the family.

That's amazing. Didn't even know he could sing. He can sing. And he believes in God of Jesus, which is the true and real, way and hopefully he can bring that kind of vision to our society I tell you he doesn't believe in God

is that a band godless fucking Marxist socialist that's for sure is that enough balance yeah I think that was flawless I think we'll cut that part I don't think we should I want everyone to know that Scott Morrison once played the artful dodger

because now he's the artful dodger in government it's amazing it's like it kind of just begat what he became Do you think, as someone who has observed Australian politics for a very long time, Charles Swither Chaser, do you, is Morrison, he seems to be something of a black hole of, of even comedy. It's like, is he so, he's so boring, I just have a joke that he's both evil and boring at the same time. He somehow managed to get that sweet Venn diagram of being a horrific evil person, but with completely devoid of ideology or particular passions or motivating factors.

Is that fair to say? I don't think that's true at all. I mean, speaking in somebody who's got about three different live show tours out of making jokes about Scott Morrison, I think. Right, right. There's lots of questions. What is the thing, do you think? What is, like, the number one hook for the joke that you make about Scott Morrison? Well, it's just that there's, like, you know, he just literally has a photo op for every single occasion.

Like, we have done multiple different iterations of that exact joke. It could just be because we're shit at writing jokes, though. That's also, like, it could just be that we go, you know what, it works. I think the thing that nobody realizes is that, because we have such a sort of fragmented media landscape that you sort of exist in your own bubble and you think, oh, well, that's the version of Scott Morrison that I see is the sort of idiot psychopath who shakes hands with people

who don't want to shake hands with him during the bushfires. But actually, you know, because we were doing things. about, you know, because we had this joke about how, you know, you could actually hijack a focus group for Scott Morrison and really fuck with them, right? You could just say, oh, I want to see him doing ballet, and then suddenly he'd turn up doing ballet. And then we looked for all the photos, and it's true. You can find him doing ballet, party.

You can do, see him playing pool in the pool, you know, playing AFL, rugby, soccer. Like, he just has a photo op for every. every single occasion. Last year, he built zero quarantine facilities, but he had 35 different photos of him in different high viz in different trucks. Wow. That is an astounding thing to do during a pandemic, which is have 35 separate high viz truck-based photo ops.

That is fucking genius. I've fallen once a fortnight. Once a fortnight, the fucking PM is out there. Yeah, out there saying, it's on the calendar. Get me a truck. I need to. And that's why I think actually Sean Kelly's book does it best, right, in terms of getting a sense of what he is, which is he's suburban, he's spiritual. He's, well, there's four things.

What were the other two? They're all S's. I don't know. Spiritual, suburban, shit-cunt. Nice. No, sorry. Yeah. Stupid.

Stupid, idiot. Silly. The thing that stuck with me from that book that I still think about all the time now is the appeal that Morrison makes. So we all make fun of how good is Australia, right? But that really is the appeal. And this is something the right often has over people like myself on the left.

You know, we are constantly complaining, bitching about everything that's wrong with society. And to enough people out there who maybe don't want to subscribe to that view of this country, Morrison can make this appeal. There's like how amazing this country, Australia is pretty much perfect. We don't need to change too much.

All I need to do is protect you from the horrible changes that all these left people want to bring in to take away things from you, right? But this celebration and this idea that Australia has arrived and is fully formed and perfected and we don't need to do any much about it. Like it's a very appealing, lucky country, which, you know, again, is not what the original quote

about the lucky country was as made by Donald Horn. He was making the point that we were a lucky, we were a country that had a lot of dumb luck and was led by stupid people. that's the very appealing, you know, appeal that Morrison can present to the people of Australia and obviously it does seem to cut through. Yeah, and if you're not paying attention much, it sort of works. Like, if the only thing, you know, like I think of politics, for most people,

well, not for most people, but for certainly a certain segment of people which include a lot of swing voters, they pay attention to politics in the same way that I pay attention to NRL, which is I could not name for you who won the NRL grand final last year, but I'd probably have a guess. I'd say probably rabidos, maybe Saints. Like I reckon they were the two top teams, one of them probably. And then I would say, yeah, and there's a whole lot of bunch of rapists, but I wouldn't be able to name which team had the most rapists,

but I'd say probably, I don't know, the national party. No, sorry, I mean, maybe the paramountains. matter or I don't know like like don't you think and drug scandals my parents voted for rapists so I just vote for rapists too yeah it's just sort of a tradition yeah it's sort of like one of those things where you're just going you know like you sort of get this general impression and so therefore the photo ops matter the sort of big picture oh he wears an Australian flag on his mouth he must be pro-Australian oh yeah I'm pro-Australian boom um I think there is sort of something there. I think what happened over the summer, though, was a complete collapse of his ability

to match the reality, you know, that reality, which is everything's fine, with the reality that people were experiencing, which is everyone got sick and things weren't fine. And there was a sort of, and suddenly, and I think, you know, for Morrison to sort of be able to attach himself to this general sweep of, oh, everything's fine, so we don't really need to change anything. That has to be true. And that's where I think there is a real opportunity to, I mean, not that it's going to be seized. Like, Morrison's definitely going to win, right? Don't get me wrong. But, you know, like, he'll just run a scare campaign against brown people. But, but there is an opportunity there if somebody wanted to take it up. Although there are, there are fewer

brown people coming. So they could actually be in a trouble. Like, maybe that's why they really want to open the borders as soon as they can. Well, maybe a campaign against elite pro athletes or something about that. You know what, I will say, if they do bring back a scare campaign, they've got to have it with the same pizzazz of the AIDS campaign in the 80s. Like, I have never, like, bring back Grim Reaper going bowling. That's what I want. If they're going to do it, go hard.

I don't want to say just like a basic ad. It has to be like Scott Morrison dressed in the full cloaked outfit with the sife bowling. That's what I want. Killing the Governor General. Yeah. Yeah, perfect. That reference part of dated. But it's interesting because in that brief period

where it did feel like things were getting better, you saw Morrison immediately go to the personal responsibility angle and we've got to wind back the government, right? Like the whole pandemic has played to a more left-wing collectivist view of the world and that we actually do have responsibilities to each other and we should have a government that could allocate resources to address major problems like a pandemic, okay? Then things got a little bit better,

and Morrison immediately went for this, individuals get the government out of my life bullshit then it all goes to shit what do you know and hopefully you would you would hope that the labor party and the left more broadly can take advantage of that and say see how these conditions over the past two years expose the holliness of this entire ideological outlook vote for us and will immediately get better i that's my that's my my broad hope is that we can try and make that argument and that the ridiculousness of personal responsibility in the face of a pandemic or in the face of something like the climate crisis is exposed for the lie it is.

I think that's a political opportunity for the left. I'm loving the balance here, by the way. Thank you for respecting the balance rules of the chaser. Sorry, I'm sorry. Every five minutes, I have to say this legally. I love the Liberal Party. Yeah, yeah. Continue.

Thank you. You get an extra dollar for that. One of the sponsors on the show, yes. No, no, it's interesting because I was talking to a friend of mine who works for the Labor Party. Sorry, bo bo bo, bo, bo, bo, no, you weren't. No, no, and the Liberal Party. He works on both sides.

Yeah. And, well, Tom would actually say that they're the same thing. Same fucking thing. But he was saying that their internal polling, and this is towards the end of last year in December, was showing that women, 25 to 45-year-old women, had completely abandoned Scott Morrison. But when asked why, they couldn't name why.

it was just like one of the unprompted responses was it's just like he's the type of person who when he gets angry would go and hit a wall

was the was one of the things that it was in one of the focus groups that was an unprompted response no no no no no no that's like that's Kyle energy like that's not Scott Morrison couldn't make a dent

in a fucking berry floss can't yeah he'd have to be effective to be able to like he couldn't You can't convince me that man can punch drywall. There's no way. Sorry, I didn't think a delay on. He'd hire someone on a temporary worker visa.

There you go. Yeah, he'd hire like a rage room. Thank you for your patience. Your call is important. Can't take being on hold anymore. FIS is 100% online so you can make the switch in minutes. Mobile plans start at $15 a month. Certain conditions apply.

Details at fizz. The Chaser Report, news a few days after it happens. Labor is certainly going very hard on what they presume to be Morrison's unlikability factor and will whack the name Morrison on everything, on every single failure. And I don't know enough, maybe that there's a winning strategy, you know, maybe there is enough dislike for this guy out there in order to pull a few votes over. and Alba doesn't seem to have much cut-throughers yet either necessarily. So you do need something to offer as the alternative one would have hoped.

I still, and maybe this is ridiculous and naive, I still believe that people care about policy, or at least you can make them care about policy. And actually a lot of the election study stuff from after 2019 shows that party leader is nowhere near as important as we would think it is if we followed all the media coverage. And, you know, sure, the Greens, you beg all the arguments about the Greens, not making government, but the Greens members I talk to who are doing door knocking, who are actually

going and they're talking to people face to face in meaningful conversations, 15 to 20 minutes, asking them about what they care about, can very much get their head around the idea that giving tax cuts to massive billionaires is bad, taxing billionaires to fund services is great, and there's absolutely no reason why dental shouldn't be a part of Medicare. These are the things that the Greens are fighting for, and you can have, the argument about, you know, whether or not they can implement them is, I think, secondary to the idea of bringing people with you and getting people on board that kind of vision and contrasting it with the horrible conservative government that we can all agree we want to get

rid of and a Labour Party that doesn't seem to have much fight left in them to fight for those kind of big ideas. Well, on that hopelessly naive note, let's say goodbye to Tom. oh yeah and his podcast is called what's your podcast called again serious danger is a quote from scott morrison all right we played at the start of every episode which you'll know charles as you listen all the time it's a quote from morrison saying i've always considered the greens to be a real serious danger to australia rather so um uh that's where it's come from but yes people can subscribe to all the places where you get podcasts i'd love people to check it out

And we do have a good sense of hear about ourselves, I hope, on the show. Thanks, Tom. Thanks, you guys. Thanks, Gabi. Cheers. Our gear is from Road Microphones, and we are part of the ACASC Creator Network. See you tomorrow. See you then.

Bye.