Lisa Owen interviews former Australian Prime Minister Julia Gillard

Headlines:

Julia Gillard says there is “sufficient evidence” to fight Islamic State and does not think it will increase the risk of a domestic attack

“I think whether or not we deployed, we would be facing a considerable security challenge, and that security challenge is the siren song of radicalisation”

“We are reaping some of the consequences” of the failure to create a stable and secure Iraq after the last war

Says countries like Australia and New Zealand can be close to both the US and China, it’s not a “zero-sum game”

Says China has aspiration for greater military sophistication but there are questions of transparency as its military grows.

Believes that when the leader of a political party is toppled, they should remove themselves altogether to avoid being a distraction

Says the sexism she faced as a female leader isn’t confined to Australia

“…there is still this unfinished business about women and leadership and true equality, and gender stereotypes, often very harsh stereotypes playing out around women”

Lisa Owen: Ms Gillard was toppled by arch-rival Kevin Rudd in June last year and retired from politics at the election three months later. She's now written about the highs and lows of her political career in a memoir called, 'My Story'. I sat down with Julia Gillard in Brisbane this week and began by asking her if Australia's decision to go to war with Islamic State was justified or simply scare-mongering.

Julia Gillard: No, I think that the evidence is sufficient for us to deploy. I mean, we've all seen on our TV screens some of the brutal images, some of the horrible things that are happening to people, so that, I think, would move even the hardest of hearts. At the time that we discussed and debated our deployment into Afghanistan, of course the comparison was Iraq and that deployment then. I was not in favour of deploying then, and I think the evidence is now in that that deployment to Iraq did not give the kind of security and stability that one would hope for and that we are reaping some of the consequences of that lack of security, stability and plurality now.

Would you not have any concerns, though, that it may lay Australia open to a potential attack on your soil or even present an opportunity for, say, jihadists to recruit people by involving yourselves?

I think whether or not we deployed, we would be facing a considerable security challenge, and that security challenge is the siren song of radicalisation and what they may motivate people to do. It is the return of people that have voluntarily participated in the fight and become hardened and militant terrorists who would come back and would potentially seek to act that out in the context of our society. So you don't minimise those threats to zero by not deploying. They are there, and they've got to be successfully managed.

I wanna talk to you about another area of security. Australia is obviously involved in the Five Eyes alliance, as is New Zealand, and that's presumably about keeping Australia safe too. So, did that mean during your time as Prime Minister that you were at any point spying on citizens or allies?

I'm going to disappoint you and give the stock-standard and only proper response to a question like that, which is, as Prime Minister, I wouldn't have commented on intelligence matters, and as a former prime minister, I'm not going to comment on intelligence matters either.

You know, you are in Five Eyes with New Zealand. You're also in there with America. So, how do countries like ours balance those tensions and relationships between, say, a closeness to China and a closeness to the United States, which Australia and New Zealand both have?

Yes, we both do, and we've got a lively domestic debate and policy discussion about whether or not this can be managed, and I was acutely aware of that as prime minister, that there was a stream in our domestic debate that said this is a zero-sum game. If you get closer to the United States, you're going to put some damage into your relationship with China and vice versa. I never believed that. I don't believe it now. And I think during my period as prime minister, I demonstrated that theory as wrong. We took a step forward in our alliance with the US — marines training in the Northern Territory — whilst at the same time securing with China new diplomatic architecture, putting us in the front row as one of the few nations on Earth that's got a standing commitment to an annual leaders-level meeting with China and supporting ministerial meetings. So it's possible to grow and improve both relationships at the same time.

There's been a lot of commentary about China and whether it is a military threat, whether it's an emerging threat. What do you see it as? Do you see it as an emerging threat?

What I see is a nation that is economically rising, hauling people out of poverty still, creating a middle class in the hundreds and hundreds of millions. It along with the other countries in our region that are changing and growing are going to create the biggest middle class the world has ever seen. That gives our nation and yours huge advantages. It's unsurprising that great economic weight brings with it great strategic weight, which brings with it an aspiration for greater military sophistication. I don't think that that in and of itself should be surprising or something that causes fear. But we do have a set of issues about transparency as China's military grows.

In saying all of that, though, during your time as prime minister, you obviously carried on Kevin Rudd's moves to new submarines and other military hardware. So, if China is not necessarily a threat, what is the threat? Why do you need those things?

Well, what you do with your, you know, defence acquisitions policy is you look at your whole world and what you may be called upon to do. So yes, of course, you've got to calibrate risks. You do make assumptions about what the world will look like if it went badly.

So you cover your back? You cover your back just in case?

Well, but— But you don't lose sight of what is the overwhelming conclusion and the absolute overwhelming probability, and in my view that is very, very clearly the continued peaceful rise of China.

I wanna bring you a bit closer to home now. Let's talk about some tensions that were on your home turf. So, Rudd vs Gillard, and it has been described endlessly by any number of people as a holy war, a soap opera and by one person as Armageddon. So, there's always tension in politics, but I'm wondering why do you think that got to such a nasty situation?

Look, I didn't feel like that about it. I wouldn't have adopted any of those ways of summarising it. How I saw it is how I've written it in the book, which is Kevin is a man of tremendous strengths, you know, truly formidable strengths, a great campaigner. Look at what he did at bringing us into government in 2007. A fantastic leader when we faced the Global Financial Crisis, aided by Wayne Swan as treasurer.

But there's a but, isn't there?

Yes, but human beings are complex. Kevin, a man of remarkable strengths. If you wanted to have a discussion about our world and public policy considerations in it, you couldn't get a better interlocutor than Kevin Rudd. But, yes, also a human being with some flaws that ultimately showed in his leadership as he got more paralysed and miserable in the moment and in adverse political circumstances.

In saying that, though, you paint a picture in the book of a disloyal man, a man who is characterised as being a meddler and in some cases a borderline bully when you talk about staff being left in tears, and also as a saboteur, someone who extorted a portfolio out of you, in essence. And I think you do use the word extortion. So how did he—? How could the public not see that? And how does he eventually get enough support to have another crack at it?

Well, you know, politics is a business where people can feel a lot of pressure. It breeds a lot of pressure, and as we got closer and closer to the 2013 election, clearly many of my colleagues were very worried about how the party was going to fare at that election. I had governed with a lot swirling around me, which had been net political negatives. Minority government made it easy for people to characterise me as doing things to save my political skin rather than in the interests of the nation. The destabilisation within my own party had not helped. We'd stepped up to some very big decisions like putting a price on carbon; this curious issue of gender was in the mix too. So I think that pressure showed on a number of my colleagues, and that explains the return to Kevin in the lead-up to the 2013 election.

You think when a leader gets toppled, that's time to bow out altogether. You say in your book 'it's absolutely the right thing to do if you want your political party to prosper'. So exit stage left, like you did. Why do you think that's the only way to go?

Well, I was making a conclusion in the context of Australian politics, so I'm not here to preach what should happen in other countries. But in Australian politics, for me, having seen what happened when I took the leadership and Kevin immediately starting a campaign of leaking and what that did to our chances during the 2010 campaign, I didn't think that was right. And I'm clear in the book: I didn't think it was right. So the last thing I was going to do when I faced the loss of the prime ministership was to do anything that would distract from my political party's ability to successfully campaign at the next election.

But do you think someone that has been leader can sit on the backbenches and make a contribution, in some way? Is that possible or will there always be that discontent and the want to be back in that role again?

Look, I think it's possible, depending on a few things — the nature of the individual. Alexander Downer is an example in point, briefly a leader of the Liberal Party in Opposition. He settled in very successfully as a long-term foreign minister and was not ever talked about in dispatches as creating leadership tension with John Howard. He was one of John Howard's strongest supporters. So it's possible depending on the individual.

When you took over from Kevin Rudd, you were portrayed as being a treacherous backstabber, basically. I'm wondering, do you think that picture would have been painted had you been a male making that move?

I think in part, yes, and maybe a bit no. I think that there was some of that imagery about me taking over the leadership, which was used to knit into some of the worst cultural stereotypes about women. Our cultural stereotypes about women still aren't very inclusive of women of ambition. I think it's easier for people to conclude that a woman who takes a leadership position is pretty hard edge, pretty hardboiled. So I think there was an element of that. But I think there were elements beyond that, and had I been a man and had Kevin conducted himself exactly the same way, that a number of the same things would have flowed.

Because the former Australian governor-general, also a woman, has said recently that as the first female prime minister, you were subjected to 'sexism, cruelty and overt abuse'. Why do you think that was?

Well, I think still think that that's about women in leadership and our image, and I don't think this is a purely Australian thing. I can look around the world. I know New Zealand's going to give itself a big tick for a proud track record with Helen Clark and with other female leaders, so I understand that. But if you look around the world, when Hillary Clinton was contesting in the primaries, I think that there were a number of ways in which she was reported, and—

But would you accept it's pretty bad in Australia? I mean, right now in the media, you've got the case of a woman working for the Wallabies who was allegedly tormented and harassed almost. So, would you accept that maybe there is a stronger element of this in the Australian culture?

No, I wouldn't. I think this work of— You know, we live in a wonderful country; you live in a wonderful country. The US, the UK, you know, right around the world, there are so many great places where women have experienced so much change and empowerment, greater life choices over the last 20, 30 years, and we should celebrate that. But for many of those countries, there is still this unfinished business about women and leadership and true equality, and gender stereotypes, often very harsh stereotypes playing out around women.

What was the worst of that for you, do you think?

Oh, look, I think, you know, one thing is it's cumulative. Obviously the 'ditch the witch' moment, you know, at a carbon-pricing rally was a bad moment. It wasn't the only bad moment, but it was one. But it's the cumulative, you know, focus, gendered abuse, appearance, criticisms being made and how that all adds together and how it also takes oxygen and distracts from the things that you're trying to do.

Do you wanna be remembered as the 27th prime minister of Australia or the first woman?

Oh, I want to be remembered as the 27th prime minister of Australia, but if I could make a contribution to better reception of women in leadership, I'd be happy about that. I mean, I said very deliberately, in my last speech as Prime Minister, gender doesn't explain everything about my prime ministership. It doesn't explain nothing. There are plenty of shades of grey.

Thank you so much for joining us. We really appreciate your time.
Thank you. Thank you.

ENDS

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