Maxine McKew
Encyclopedia
Maxine Margaret McKew (born 22 July 1953), is a former Australian politician and journalist; she was the Parliamentary Secretary for Infrastructure, Transport, Regional Development and Local Government in the Rudd Ministry and the First Gillard Ministry. Between 2007 and 2010, she was the member of the House of Representatives
for the Division of Bennelong
, New South Wales
. Until 2007, the seat was held by the then Prime Minister
John Howard
, who had been the member for 33 years. She was only the second person to unseat a sitting Australian prime minister in their own electorate. At the 2010 Federal election she lost her seat to the Liberal Party
candidate, John Alexander.
Before entering politics, McKew was an award-winning broadcast journalist. She hosted a number of programmes on Australian Broadcasting Corporation
(ABC) television and radio, most recently Lateline
and The 7.30 Report
.
, Queensland
. Her father, Bryan McKew, was a boilermaker who at times struggled with alcoholism.
When Maxine was five, her mother Elaine died, and she was sent to live with her grandparents for three years. Maxine and her sister Margo moved to Moorooka
to live with their father after he remarried. McKew attended All Hallows' School
in Brisbane.
McKew currently lives in the Sydney
suburb of Epping
with her partner, former ALP National Secretary Bob Hogg
(they have chosen not to marry as McKew is Roman Catholic and Hogg is divorced).
McKew had previously indicated active plans to move into the electorate of Bennelong, before doing so in March 2007.
On 3 March 2007, allegations of death threats against McKew were widely reported. There has been speculation that attempts to tamper with her car were by car thieves looking for spare parts rather than by politically motivated individuals.
for two years. She supported herself with a variety of temporary jobs, including relief typing at a London BBC
office. A letter requesting a job—written by McKew on BBC letterhead paper—was rewarded with a cadetship at the Australian Broadcasting Corporation
(ABC) in Brisbane in 1974 following a brief stint as a news analyst at the investment bank Goldman Sachs
. In 1976 she moved on to host This Day Tonight
, a local current affairs program.
McKew appeared as herself in the eighth episode of the first series, and in the sixth episode of the second series of the Australia television series The Games.
In over 30 years working at the ABC, McKew worked as a presenter on the 7:30 Report and Lateline
, and also worked on The Carleton-Walsh Report, AM
, PM
, and The Bottom Line. McKew was honoured for her broadcasting work with a Logie award, and for her journalism by a Walkley Award
. In October 2006 she announced that she was leaving the ABC saying "This is more than likely the end of my broadcasting career".
From 1999 to 2004 she wrote Lunch with Maxine McKew, a column
for The Bulletin
, a weekly magazine,
based on her interviews with prominent Australians. McKew frequently elicited newsworthy revelations from her subjects, and was named by The Australian Financial Review
as "one of the top ten exercisers of covert power in Australia".
Following her election as the member for Bennelong in 2007, the Canberra Times had a photo of McKew in a Basic Instinct
moment, referring to the scene where Sharon Stone
was allegedly not wearing underwear.
McKew was reported to have been a possible Labor candidate for the safe federal seat of Fowler
at both the 2001 and 2004 elections.
In 2004, it was the Labor leader Mark Latham
who attempted to lure McKew with preselection
to the Western Sydney
seat. Latham recorded in his diary that his efforts failed because the broadcaster would not move from her home in Mosman
to Labor's outer-suburban heartland, an area which he represented as the Member for Werriwa
,
while McKew told ABC Radio that a big factor in her 2003 decision was that she regarded the party as being without direction at the time.
McKew had also been approached by John Hewson
in the past to join the Liberal Party
.
After resigning from the ABC in December 2006, McKew joined the Australian Labor Party
in January 2007 as a special adviser on strategy to Labor leader Kevin Rudd
. The Australian reported in early February that McKew was again in contention to gain preselection for the Division of Fowler, a safe Labor seat held by Julia Irwin
who had supported Kim Beazley
in the December leadership ballot. However the article also stated that a Labor source had suggested that a different seat was possible.
On 25 February Rudd's office confirmed that McKew would run against Prime Minister
John Howard
in the Division of Bennelong
at the election,
and McKew announced that she and Hogg were selling their Mosman home. The seat had once been a Liberal stronghold (it had been in Liberal hands since its creation in 1949), but it had shifted increasingly to Labor in recent years. Howard had held the seat since 1974, but in two out of the three elections he had fought since becoming prime minister, he'd needed to go to preferences to win another term in his own seat.
McKew outlined her position on issues such as the environment, education and women in The Bulletin in mid-2007.
Following a redistribution in 2006, the already marginal Liberal seat had become slightly more so
, with Labor needing a swing of 4 percent to win it. This placed Bennelong just barely on the edge of seats that would likely fall to Labor in the event it won government. However, much of the area was already represented by Labor at the state level. A previous week's Morgan poll conducted for the website Crikey
put Labor's two-party preferred vote in the seat at 55%.
The state of play in the battle for the electorate, as it was on 12 October 2007, had leaked polls showing McKew with an edge over the incumbent.
On 24 November 2007, it was obvious when the first returns came in that the contest would be very tight. The ABC and several other sources projected Bennelong as a Labor gain, and Howard himself said in conceding the election to Rudd that it was "very likely" he had been unseated. However, McKew hesitated to claim victory, saying that the seat was on a "knife edge." In a press conference held on 26 November, McKew declared Bennelong "a Labor seat for the first time", but stopped short of formally claiming victory. Earlier Antony Green
said there was "no doubt" McKew had won.
On 1 December 2007, while counting was still under way, McKew formally claimed victory in Bennelong, saying that she was "comfortably ahead" on the two-party vote. In her victory speech, McKew thanked Howard for his 30 years of service and could understand why he hadn't formally conceded, saying that "Mr. Howard and his family clearly had a huge amount to do this week." She said that her polling numbers indicated a uniform swing to Labor, with many people who had never voted Labor before crossing over to her. However, she said that many voters felt neglected by him in recent years. By most estimates Howard would have needed an improbable majority of the outstanding mail-in and absentee ballots to retain his seat.
It was not until 12 December that Howard formally conceded defeat, with the Electoral Commission formally declaring McKew the winner by 44,685 votes (51.4 percent) to Howard's 42,251 (48.6 percent).
The final tally indicated that McKew had won victory on the 14th count due to a large flow of Green
preferences to her; 3,793 (78.84 percent) of Green voters listed McKew as their second preference. This was enough for her to defeat Howard by 2.8 percentage points on the two-party vote.
A few days earlier, on 29 November, Rudd announced that McKew would be one of his Parliamentary Secretaries
when his ministry was sworn in on 3 December. In this role she had responsibility for early childhood education and child care.
Less than a week after the official declaration of her victory, McKew launched a book and described the Howard era of government as one characterised by "brutish" politics.
Maxine McKew delivered her first speech in the House of Representatives on 14 February 2008.
On 6 June 2009, in a ministerial reshuffle brought on as a result of the resignations of the Defence Minister, Joel Fitzgibbon
, and the Parliamentary Secretary for Health, Senator Jan McLucas
, Maxine McKew became Parliamentary Secretary for Infrastructure, Transport, Regional Development and Local Government.
McKew was defeated at the 2010 federal election, losing the seat of Bennelong to John Alexander, her Liberal Party
opponent. She suffered a swing against her of more than 5 per cent, remarking as she conceded defeat that Labor's national campaign 'left a lot to be desired'.
businessman Phil Scanlan.
Additional activities include membership of the Women’s Advisory Group to the National Breast Cancer
Centre, and membership of the University of Sydney
’s Research Institute for Asia Pacific. She is a member of the Sydney Symphony Council, and was the Patron of Osteoporosis Australia.
Australian House of Representatives
The House of Representatives is one of the two houses of the Parliament of Australia; it is the lower house; the upper house is the Senate. Members of Parliament serve for terms of approximately three years....
for the Division of Bennelong
Division of Bennelong
The Division of Bennelong is an Australian electorate in New South Wales. The division was created in 1949 and is named for Bennelong, an Aboriginal man befriended by the first Governor of New South Wales, Arthur Phillip...
, New South Wales
New South Wales
New South Wales is a state of :Australia, located in the east of the country. It is bordered by Queensland, Victoria and South Australia to the north, south and west respectively. To the east, the state is bordered by the Tasman Sea, which forms part of the Pacific Ocean. New South Wales...
. Until 2007, the seat was held by the then Prime Minister
Prime Minister of Australia
The Prime Minister of the Commonwealth of Australia is the highest minister of the Crown, leader of the Cabinet and Head of Her Majesty's Australian Government, holding office on commission from the Governor-General of Australia. The office of Prime Minister is, in practice, the most powerful...
John Howard
John Howard
John Winston Howard AC, SSI, was the 25th Prime Minister of Australia, from 11 March 1996 to 3 December 2007. He was the second-longest serving Australian Prime Minister after Sir Robert Menzies....
, who had been the member for 33 years. She was only the second person to unseat a sitting Australian prime minister in their own electorate. At the 2010 Federal election she lost her seat to the Liberal Party
Liberal Party of Australia
The Liberal Party of Australia is an Australian political party.Founded a year after the 1943 federal election to replace the United Australia Party, the centre-right Liberal Party typically competes with the centre-left Australian Labor Party for political office...
candidate, John Alexander.
Before entering politics, McKew was an award-winning broadcast journalist. She hosted a number of programmes on Australian Broadcasting Corporation
Australian Broadcasting Corporation
The Australian Broadcasting Corporation, commonly referred to as "the ABC" , is Australia's national public broadcaster...
(ABC) television and radio, most recently Lateline
Lateline
Lateline is an Australian television news and current affairs program produced by the Australian Broadcasting Corporation, airing weeknights at on ABC1. The program has developed a reputation for head-to-head debates on current issues and political interviews. Lateline is followed by its sister...
and The 7.30 Report
The 7.30 Report
The 7.30 Report is an Australian nightly television current affairs program, that was shown on ABC1 and ABC News 24 at , Mondays–Thursdays...
.
Personal
McKew was born and grew up in BrisbaneBrisbane
Brisbane is the capital and most populous city in the Australian state of Queensland and the third most populous city in Australia. Brisbane's metropolitan area has a population of over 2 million, and the South East Queensland urban conurbation, centred around Brisbane, encompasses a population of...
, Queensland
Queensland
Queensland is a state of Australia, occupying the north-eastern section of the mainland continent. It is bordered by the Northern Territory, South Australia and New South Wales to the west, south-west and south respectively. To the east, Queensland is bordered by the Coral Sea and Pacific Ocean...
. Her father, Bryan McKew, was a boilermaker who at times struggled with alcoholism.
When Maxine was five, her mother Elaine died, and she was sent to live with her grandparents for three years. Maxine and her sister Margo moved to Moorooka
Moorooka, Queensland
Moorooka is a suburb of Brisbane, the state capital of Queensland, Australia. Bordering with Toohey Forest Park, it is seven kilometres south of Brisbane's central business district...
to live with their father after he remarried. McKew attended All Hallows' School
All Hallows' School
All Hallows' School is a Catholic day school for girls, located close to the central business district of Brisbane, Queensland.Founded in 1861, the school follows in the tradition of the Irish Sisters of Mercy, and caters for over 1,300 girls from years five to 12...
in Brisbane.
McKew currently lives in the Sydney
Sydney
Sydney is the most populous city in Australia and the state capital of New South Wales. Sydney is located on Australia's south-east coast of the Tasman Sea. As of June 2010, the greater metropolitan area had an approximate population of 4.6 million people...
suburb of Epping
Epping, New South Wales
Epping is a suburb of Sydney, in the state of New South Wales, Australia. Epping is located 18 kilometres north-west of the Sydney central business district in the local government areas of the City of Ryde, the City of Parramatta and Hornsby Shire and is located in the Northern...
with her partner, former ALP National Secretary Bob Hogg
Bob Hogg
Robert Duncan Hogg AO is an Australian Labor Party identity, and former ALP National Secretary.-Career:* 1976-78: Secretary of the Victorian Branch of the ALP.* 1983-86: Senior adviser to then Australian Prime Minister, Bob Hawke...
(they have chosen not to marry as McKew is Roman Catholic and Hogg is divorced).
McKew had previously indicated active plans to move into the electorate of Bennelong, before doing so in March 2007.
On 3 March 2007, allegations of death threats against McKew were widely reported. There has been speculation that attempts to tamper with her car were by car thieves looking for spare parts rather than by politically motivated individuals.
Media career
After matriculating, she briefly attended university before dropping out and living in LondonLondon
London is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...
for two years. She supported herself with a variety of temporary jobs, including relief typing at a London BBC
BBC
The British Broadcasting Corporation is a British public service broadcaster. Its headquarters is at Broadcasting House in the City of Westminster, London. It is the largest broadcaster in the world, with about 23,000 staff...
office. A letter requesting a job—written by McKew on BBC letterhead paper—was rewarded with a cadetship at the Australian Broadcasting Corporation
Australian Broadcasting Corporation
The Australian Broadcasting Corporation, commonly referred to as "the ABC" , is Australia's national public broadcaster...
(ABC) in Brisbane in 1974 following a brief stint as a news analyst at the investment bank Goldman Sachs
Goldman Sachs
The Goldman Sachs Group, Inc. is an American multinational bulge bracket investment banking and securities firm that engages in global investment banking, securities, investment management, and other financial services primarily with institutional clients...
. In 1976 she moved on to host This Day Tonight
This Day Tonight
This Day Tonight was an Australian Broadcasting Corporation current affairs program of the late 1960s and early 1970s.- Overview :...
, a local current affairs program.
McKew appeared as herself in the eighth episode of the first series, and in the sixth episode of the second series of the Australia television series The Games.
In over 30 years working at the ABC, McKew worked as a presenter on the 7:30 Report and Lateline
Lateline
Lateline is an Australian television news and current affairs program produced by the Australian Broadcasting Corporation, airing weeknights at on ABC1. The program has developed a reputation for head-to-head debates on current issues and political interviews. Lateline is followed by its sister...
, and also worked on The Carleton-Walsh Report, AM
AM (ABC Radio)
AM, the Australian Broadcasting Corporation's flagship current-affairs radio program, is one of Australia's longest-running productions. Its tagline is Ensure you are informed.-History and timeslots:...
, PM
PM (ABC Radio)
PM is one of the Australian Broadcasting Corporation's flagship current-affairs radio programs, and is one of Australia's longest-running productions. It is the sister program to AM...
, and The Bottom Line. McKew was honoured for her broadcasting work with a Logie award, and for her journalism by a Walkley Award
Walkley Awards
The annual Walkley Awards, under the administration of the Walkley Foundation for Journalism, are presented in Australia to recognise and reward excellence in journalism. Finalists are chosen by an independent board of eminent journalists and photographers. The awards cover all media including...
. In October 2006 she announced that she was leaving the ABC saying "This is more than likely the end of my broadcasting career".
From 1999 to 2004 she wrote Lunch with Maxine McKew, a column
Columnist
A columnist is a journalist who writes for publication in a series, creating an article that usually offers commentary and opinions. Columns appear in newspapers, magazines and other publications, including blogs....
for The Bulletin
The Bulletin
The Bulletin was an Australian weekly magazine that was published in Sydney from 1880 until January 2008. It was influential in Australian culture and politics from about 1890 until World War I, the period when it was identified with the "Bulletin school" of Australian literature. Its influence...
, a weekly magazine,
based on her interviews with prominent Australians. McKew frequently elicited newsworthy revelations from her subjects, and was named by The Australian Financial Review
The Australian Financial Review
The Australian Financial Review is a leading business and finance newspaper in Australia.Fairfax Media publishes it in a compact format six days a week, Monday to Saturday....
as "one of the top ten exercisers of covert power in Australia".
Following her election as the member for Bennelong in 2007, the Canberra Times had a photo of McKew in a Basic Instinct
Basic Instinct
Basic Instinct is a 1992 erotic thriller directed by Paul Verhoeven and written by Joe Eszterhas, and starring Michael Douglas and Sharon Stone....
moment, referring to the scene where Sharon Stone
Sharon Stone
Sharon Vonne Stone is an American actress, film producer, and former fashion model. She achieved international recognition for her role in the erotic thriller Basic Instinct...
was allegedly not wearing underwear.
Honours
- 1998 Walkley Award for Broadcast InterviewingWalkley Award for Broadcast InterviewingThe Walkley Award for Broadcast Interviewing has been awarded since 1997. Until 2001, it was known as the Walkley Award for Broadcast Presenting...
for her work on Lateline - 1999 Logie AwardLogie AwardThe TV Week Logie Awards are the Australian television industry awards, which have been presented annually since 1959. Renamed by Graham Kennedy in 1960 after he won the first 'Star Of The Year' award, the name 'Logie' awards honours John Logie Baird, a Scotsman who invented the television as a...
for Most Outstanding News-Public Affairs Broadcaster - 2003 Centenary MedalCentenary MedalThe Centenary Medal is an award created by the Australian Government in 2001. It was established to commemorate the Centenary of Federation of Australia and to honour people who have made a contribution to Australian society or government...
for services to broadcasting - Named as "Columnist of the Year" by the Magazine Publishers Association in 2003
Quotations
- "People have a nervous collapse when I've actually broken through and got someone to say something honest. It is either regarded as a gaffe, or people say they must have been drunk, or publicly musing aloud, or they didn't realise the tape was running, or I must have had oral sex with them under the table. I find it absurd."
- "Women do give up something. It's biology..... Let me tell you what I gave up. I wanted my career. And so I never had children." (Quoted in Jack WelchJack WelchJohn Francis "Jack" Welch, Jr. is an American chemical engineer, business executive, and author. He was Chairman and CEO of General Electric between 1981 and 2001...
's 2005 book, Winning)
Politics
Division of Fowler
The Division of Fowler is an Australian Electoral Division in New South Wales. It includes the suburbs of Ashcroft, Austral, Bonnyrigg, Bonnyrigg Heights, Busby, Cabramatta, Cabramatta West, Canley Heights, Canley Vale, Cartwright, Cecil Hills, Cecil Park, Edensor Park, Green Valley, Greenfield...
at both the 2001 and 2004 elections.
In 2004, it was the Labor leader Mark Latham
Mark Latham
Mark William Latham , an author and former Australian politician, was leader of the Federal Parliamentary Australian Labor Party and Leader of the Opposition from December 2003 to January 2005....
who attempted to lure McKew with preselection
Preselection
Preselection is the process by which a candidate is selected, usually by a political party, to contest an election for political office. It is also referred to as candidate selection. It is a fundamental function of political parties...
to the Western Sydney
Western Sydney
Western Sydney is a major region of Sydney, Australia. It has a number of different definitions but one consistently used is the region composed of the 11 councils which until recently were all members of the Western Sydney Regional Organisation of Councils:* Auburn Council* Bankstown City Council*...
seat. Latham recorded in his diary that his efforts failed because the broadcaster would not move from her home in Mosman
Mosman, New South Wales
Mosman is a suburb on the Lower North Shore of Sydney, in the state of New South Wales, Australia. Mosman is located 8 kilometres north-east of the Sydney central business district and is the administrative centre for the local government area of the Municipality of Mosman.-Localities:In February...
to Labor's outer-suburban heartland, an area which he represented as the Member for Werriwa
Division of Werriwa
The Division of Werriwa is a Federal Electoral Division for the Australian House of Representatives.The name Werriwa derives from a local Aboriginal name for Lake George, which was located in the division when it was established in 1900. The division was one of the original 75 divisions first...
,
while McKew told ABC Radio that a big factor in her 2003 decision was that she regarded the party as being without direction at the time.
McKew had also been approached by John Hewson
John Hewson
John Robert Hewson AM is an Australian economist, company director and a former politician. He was federal leader of the Liberal Party of Australia from 1990 to 1994 and led the party to defeat at the 1993 federal election.-Early life:...
in the past to join the Liberal Party
Liberal Party of Australia
The Liberal Party of Australia is an Australian political party.Founded a year after the 1943 federal election to replace the United Australia Party, the centre-right Liberal Party typically competes with the centre-left Australian Labor Party for political office...
.
After resigning from the ABC in December 2006, McKew joined the Australian Labor Party
Australian Labor Party
The Australian Labor Party is an Australian political party. It has been the governing party of the Commonwealth of Australia since the 2007 federal election. Julia Gillard is the party's federal parliamentary leader and Prime Minister of Australia...
in January 2007 as a special adviser on strategy to Labor leader Kevin Rudd
Kevin Rudd
Kevin Michael Rudd is an Australian politician who was the 26th Prime Minister of Australia from 2007 to 2010. He has been Minister for Foreign Affairs since 2010...
. The Australian reported in early February that McKew was again in contention to gain preselection for the Division of Fowler, a safe Labor seat held by Julia Irwin
Julia Irwin
Julia Claire Irwin , Australian politician, was an Australian Labor Party member of the Australian House of Representatives from October 1998 to July 2010, representing the Division of Fowler, New South Wales...
who had supported Kim Beazley
Kim Beazley
In the October 1998 election, Labor polled a majority of the two-party vote and received the largest swing to a first-term opposition since 1934. However, due to the uneven nature of the swing, Labor came up eight seats short of making Beazley Prime Minister....
in the December leadership ballot. However the article also stated that a Labor source had suggested that a different seat was possible.
On 25 February Rudd's office confirmed that McKew would run against Prime Minister
Prime Minister of Australia
The Prime Minister of the Commonwealth of Australia is the highest minister of the Crown, leader of the Cabinet and Head of Her Majesty's Australian Government, holding office on commission from the Governor-General of Australia. The office of Prime Minister is, in practice, the most powerful...
John Howard
John Howard
John Winston Howard AC, SSI, was the 25th Prime Minister of Australia, from 11 March 1996 to 3 December 2007. He was the second-longest serving Australian Prime Minister after Sir Robert Menzies....
in the Division of Bennelong
Division of Bennelong
The Division of Bennelong is an Australian electorate in New South Wales. The division was created in 1949 and is named for Bennelong, an Aboriginal man befriended by the first Governor of New South Wales, Arthur Phillip...
at the election,
and McKew announced that she and Hogg were selling their Mosman home. The seat had once been a Liberal stronghold (it had been in Liberal hands since its creation in 1949), but it had shifted increasingly to Labor in recent years. Howard had held the seat since 1974, but in two out of the three elections he had fought since becoming prime minister, he'd needed to go to preferences to win another term in his own seat.
McKew outlined her position on issues such as the environment, education and women in The Bulletin in mid-2007.
Following a redistribution in 2006, the already marginal Liberal seat had become slightly more so
Mackerras federal election pendulum, 2006
The Mackerras federal election pendulum, 2006 shows the state of the major political parties ahead of the 2007 Australian federal election. The table shows seats in the Australian House of Representatives arranged in the form of a Mackerras Pendulum based on their 2004 federal election two-party...
, with Labor needing a swing of 4 percent to win it. This placed Bennelong just barely on the edge of seats that would likely fall to Labor in the event it won government. However, much of the area was already represented by Labor at the state level. A previous week's Morgan poll conducted for the website Crikey
Crikey
Crikey is an independent Australian electronic magazine comprising an open access website and an email newsletter available to subscribers. Well known in Australian political, media and business circles, Crikey was described by former Federal Opposition Leader Mark Latham as the "most popular...
put Labor's two-party preferred vote in the seat at 55%.
The state of play in the battle for the electorate, as it was on 12 October 2007, had leaked polls showing McKew with an edge over the incumbent.
On 24 November 2007, it was obvious when the first returns came in that the contest would be very tight. The ABC and several other sources projected Bennelong as a Labor gain, and Howard himself said in conceding the election to Rudd that it was "very likely" he had been unseated. However, McKew hesitated to claim victory, saying that the seat was on a "knife edge." In a press conference held on 26 November, McKew declared Bennelong "a Labor seat for the first time", but stopped short of formally claiming victory. Earlier Antony Green
Antony Green
Antony John Green is an Australian psephologist and commentator for the Australian Broadcasting Corporation.-Early years and background:...
said there was "no doubt" McKew had won.
On 1 December 2007, while counting was still under way, McKew formally claimed victory in Bennelong, saying that she was "comfortably ahead" on the two-party vote. In her victory speech, McKew thanked Howard for his 30 years of service and could understand why he hadn't formally conceded, saying that "Mr. Howard and his family clearly had a huge amount to do this week." She said that her polling numbers indicated a uniform swing to Labor, with many people who had never voted Labor before crossing over to her. However, she said that many voters felt neglected by him in recent years. By most estimates Howard would have needed an improbable majority of the outstanding mail-in and absentee ballots to retain his seat.
It was not until 12 December that Howard formally conceded defeat, with the Electoral Commission formally declaring McKew the winner by 44,685 votes (51.4 percent) to Howard's 42,251 (48.6 percent).
The final tally indicated that McKew had won victory on the 14th count due to a large flow of Green
Australian Greens
The Australian Greens, commonly known as The Greens, is an Australian green political party.The party was formed in 1992; however, its origins can be traced to the early environmental movement in Australia and the formation of the United Tasmania Group , the first Green party in the world, which...
preferences to her; 3,793 (78.84 percent) of Green voters listed McKew as their second preference. This was enough for her to defeat Howard by 2.8 percentage points on the two-party vote.
A few days earlier, on 29 November, Rudd announced that McKew would be one of his Parliamentary Secretaries
Parliamentary Secretary
A Parliamentary Secretary is a member of a Parliament in the Westminster system who assists a more senior minister with his or her duties.In the parliamentary systems of several Commonwealth countries, such as the United Kingdom, Canada and Australia, it is customary for the prime minister to...
when his ministry was sworn in on 3 December. In this role she had responsibility for early childhood education and child care.
Less than a week after the official declaration of her victory, McKew launched a book and described the Howard era of government as one characterised by "brutish" politics.
Maxine McKew delivered her first speech in the House of Representatives on 14 February 2008.
On 6 June 2009, in a ministerial reshuffle brought on as a result of the resignations of the Defence Minister, Joel Fitzgibbon
Joel Fitzgibbon
Joel Andrew Fitzgibbon is an Australian politician and Australian Labor Party member of the Australian House of Representatives since March 1996, representing the Division of Hunter in New South Wales. From December 2007 to June 2009 he was the Minister for Defence in the Rudd Ministry...
, and the Parliamentary Secretary for Health, Senator Jan McLucas
Jan McLucas
Jan Elizabeth McLucas is an Australian politician, representing Queensland and the Australian Labor Party in the Australian Senate.-Biography:McLucas's parents are Ronald and Audrey McLucas...
, Maxine McKew became Parliamentary Secretary for Infrastructure, Transport, Regional Development and Local Government.
McKew was defeated at the 2010 federal election, losing the seat of Bennelong to John Alexander, her Liberal Party
Liberal Party of Australia
The Liberal Party of Australia is an Australian political party.Founded a year after the 1943 federal election to replace the United Australia Party, the centre-right Liberal Party typically competes with the centre-left Australian Labor Party for political office...
opponent. She suffered a swing against her of more than 5 per cent, remarking as she conceded defeat that Labor's national campaign 'left a lot to be desired'.
Other interests
McKew is a long-term participant in the Australian-American Leadership Dialogue, a bipartisan bilateral civil diplomatic initiative founded by MelbourneMelbourne
Melbourne is the capital and most populous city in the state of Victoria, and the second most populous city in Australia. The Melbourne City Centre is the hub of the greater metropolitan area and the Census statistical division—of which "Melbourne" is the common name. As of June 2009, the greater...
businessman Phil Scanlan.
Additional activities include membership of the Women’s Advisory Group to the National Breast Cancer
Breast cancer
Breast cancer is cancer originating from breast tissue, most commonly from the inner lining of milk ducts or the lobules that supply the ducts with milk. Cancers originating from ducts are known as ductal carcinomas; those originating from lobules are known as lobular carcinomas...
Centre, and membership of the University of Sydney
University of Sydney
The University of Sydney is a public university located in Sydney, New South Wales. The main campus spreads across the suburbs of Camperdown and Darlington on the southwestern outskirts of the Sydney CBD. Founded in 1850, it is the oldest university in Australia and Oceania...
’s Research Institute for Asia Pacific. She is a member of the Sydney Symphony Council, and was the Patron of Osteoporosis Australia.
Further reading
- The Battle for Bennelong: The adventures of Maxine McKew, aged 50something by Margot Saville, Melbourne University Press, 2007