Political analyst and Dunstan government insider Stuart Sweeney sits down with Steve Davis to dissect the battle for the Adelaide Park Lands, tracing a direct line from the tobacco industry’s doubt playbook to Premier Peter Malinauskas’ handling of protesters, before John Schumann debuts his new protest anthem, “Rag-tag Extremist Blues.”

If you’ve ever felt that nagging sense that the South Australia you were promised at the ballot box isn’t quite the one being delivered, this episode is for you. Stuart Sweeney arrived in Adelaide in 1975 to work inside the Dunstan government’s industrial democracy unit, and fifty years later he’s applying that same insider’s eye to a premier he believes is running the tobacco industry’s old doubt-sowing playbook against the citizens fighting to save the Park Lands. It’s a long, unhurried conversation – fitting, Steve notes, for an episode built around a Negroni “made to be sipped slowly and savoured.”

On that note, before the main event, in the SA Drink Of The Week, Alexis and Tina Cattley – the show’s resident cocktail authorities – put Never Never’s Panettone Negroni through its paces, fresh off its win as World’s Best Contemporary Cocktail at the 2026 World Drink Awards in London.

And in the Musical Pilgrimage, Adelaide music legend John Schumann returns with the Vagabond Crew to perform and unpack “Rag-tag Extremist Blues,” the song born directly from Malinauskas’ now-infamous put-down of Park Lands protesters.

You can navigate episodes using chapter markers in your podcast app. Not a fan of one segment? You can click next to jump to the next chapter in the show. We’re here to serve!

The Adelaide Show Podcast: Awarded Silver for Best Interview Podcast in Australia at the 2021 Australian Podcast Awards and named as Finalist for Best News and Current Affairs Podcast in the 2018 Australian Podcast Awards.

And please consider becoming part of our podcast by joining our Inner Circle. It’s an email list. Join it and you might get an email on a Sunday or Monday seeking question ideas, guest ideas and requests for other bits of feedback about YOUR podcast, The Adelaide Show. Email us directly and we’ll add you to the list: podcast@theadelaideshow.com.au

If you enjoy the show, please leave us a 5-star review in iTunes or other podcast sites, or buy some great merch from our Red Bubble store – The Adelaide Show Shop. We’d greatly appreciate it.

And please talk about us and share our episodes on social media, it really helps build our community. Oh, and here’s our index of all episode in one concise
page.

Running Sheet: Rag-Tag Extremists

00:00:00 Intro

Introduction

00:04:32 SA Drink Of The Week

There SA Drink Of The Week this week is Never Never Panettone Negroni.

Steve, self-declared “Negroni newbie,” calls in reinforcements for this one: returning cocktail experts Alexis and Tina Cattley, last on the show refereeing a Crows-versus-Power gin showdown. They start with a reference Negroni built by Alexis from Never Never triple juniper gin, a Ruby Bitter in place of Campari, and a small-batch Rosso vermouth from David Franz, north of Adelaide – a drink Steve describes as landing “like a cloud-like pillow,” with a gentle bitter-orange finish. Tina, a self-described “Negroni naysayer” put off by Campari’s bitterness, finds herself won over by how the flavours linger and play off one another.

Then comes the star of the segment: Never Never’s bottled Panettone Negroni, fresh from being crowned World’s Best Contemporary Cocktail at the 2026 World Drink Awards in London, and born behind the bar of the brand’s McLaren Vale distillery door before going nationwide. Built from triple juniper gin, a bitter citrus aperitif, sweet vermouth, aged muscat, orange liqueur, rye distillate and vanilla bean, it lands as something else entirely – “IMAX Christmas cake inside my mouth,” in Steve’s words. Alexis reckons it’s the perfect entry point for Negroni sceptics and a ready-made Christmas gift (buy two bottles, he warns – one won’t survive the wait), while Tina, newly vindicated in her Campari aversion, likens it to a sherry or port with all the spiced-cake flavour of the season, minus the traditional Negroni’s lingering bitterness.

00:18:51 Stewart Sweeney

Stuart Sweeney has spent fifty years watching power slip loose from democratic control, and he’s watched a lot of it from the inside. In January 1978 he was working inside the Premier’s department when Don Dunstan sacked his own police commissioner over the Salisbury affair – a decision a Royal Commission later vindicated. Nearly fifty years on, Steve posits that the shoe is now on the other foot: where Dunstan acted because he felt deceived by an official, he contends today’s citizens are the ones being deceived, by a premier “savaging our Parklands for a golf tournament and a motorcycle race.”

Sweeney’s own arrival in South Australia is a story in itself. A Glaswegian socialist who’d been coaching tennis in upstate New York and found himself unexpectedly unemployed back in Scotland, he stumbled into a tutoring job at the University of Tasmania, landed – almost by accident – in the middle of the Lake Pedder fight, and was introduced to the Democratic Labor Party within his first week in the country by his next-door neighbour, a young Gerard Henderson. From there it was a short hop to Adelaide and Don Dunstan’s Unit for Industrial Democracy, where Sweeney worked alongside economist Phil Bentley on an initiative to bring worker participation into South Australian workplaces – and where, as a footnote that says a great deal about how political communication has evolved, a young Mike Rann landed his very first Adelaide job doing media for the unit. Steve puts it to Sweeney that this early media training was the first real sign of rot in the system – the moment premiers became unreachable, hiding behind stage-managed doorstops instead of being interviewed. Sweeney doesn’t fully disagree, though he tempers it: whatever else came of it, Rann’s genuine gift was for writing speeches fast and communicating big-picture ideas clearly, “sort of decades before AI.”

The conversation’s sharpest edge comes when Steve puts the government’s own numbers to Sweeney: the premier’s claim that only 585 of the Park Lands’ roughly 9,000 trees are affected by the disputed golf and motorsport development, against Park Lands management’s markedly different tally. Sweeney names the mechanism he believes is at work – the doubt strategy pioneered by the tobacco industry against the medical evidence on smoking. You don’t need to win the argument, he explains – you just need to plant enough doubt to keep people from acting on their convictions. Layer social media on top of that old tobacco-industry trick, he argues, and doubt becomes exponentially more powerful. Steve adds a live example of his own: an anti-protester Facebook page mocking demonstrators as “NIMBYs,” liked by the premier and half his ministry, that nobody in Labor will admit to running.

None of this is abstract history for Sweeney – he’s a park guardian for Park 11 North, and he brings real texture to what’s actually at stake. He unpacks his argument that Adelaide’s Park Lands and squares are treated as “available” land rather than civic inheritance – fenced off for events for weeks at a time, repeatedly re-turfed and re-fenced in what he calls an annual cycle of “fence, event, repair” – and traces the intellectual lineage of the neoliberal thinking now driving those decisions back to a 1949 gathering in Switzerland convened by Friedrich Hayek. He also charts how a shrinking, disciplined leadership pipeline – what he only half-jokingly calls “Farrellism,” after Senator Don Farrell – has narrowed South Australian Labor’s internal debate at exactly the moment its base is most restless, evidenced by the wave of Adelaide residents telling him online, in effect, “I loved Peter Malinauskas, but now I hate Peter Malinauskas.”

Sweeney closes on a note that’s more hopeful than the rest of the conversation might suggest. Reaching for the “world systems” thinking that has shaped his outlook for three decades, he reminds listeners that empires, ideologies and premierships all eventually give way to something else – pointing to the radical London reformers who dreamed up the idea of Adelaide in the first place, and to public servant Wainwright, whose ideas quietly transformed the Playford-era economy, as proof that a handful of good ideas, patiently pursued, can still redirect a small regional economy like ours.

Further articles by Stewart Sweeney

Manufacturing Doubt: Peter Malinauskas’s Political Weapon

Think “outside the fence”

Power without power: Is Farrellism Labor’s solution or its problem?

Productivity is the symptom. Rentier capitalism is the disease

01:45:23 Musical Pilgrimage

In the Musical Pilgrimage this week we listen to Rag-Tag Extremist Blues by John Schumann & The Vagabond Crew.

The episode closes with John Schumann and the Vagabond Crew performing “Rag-Tag Extremist Blues” – a song that exists purely because Peter Malinauskas dismissed Park Lands protesters with that exact phrase.

Schumann, a good deal more measured these days than in his fiery Redgum years, tells Steve he “grabbed it and expanded on it,” deliberately framing his cast of extremists as ordinary South Australians: a retired teacher, a war veteran, taxpaying citizens who’ve never broken a rule in their lives.

He’s candid that his fear is less about the golf course – “that boat’s sailed” – and more about the MotoGP development still to come, and about a public whose attention span, he admits, will inevitably wane long before the next election.

Streaming and download proceeds go directly to the Adelaide Park Lands Association, and the band will donate part of every ticket sold for their show at The Gov on 29 August to the same cause.

Link to all things John Schumann including links to upcoming shows and music

Here’s this week’s preview video

There is no video this week.

SFX: Throughout the podcast we use free SFX from freesfx.co.uk for the harp, the visa stamp, the silent movie music, the stylus, the radio signal SFX, the wine pouring and cork pulling SFX, and the swooshes around Siri.

An AI generated transcript – there will be errors. Check quotes against the actual audio (if you would like to volunteer as an editor, let Steve know)

S08E09

Steve Davis: [00:00:00] Hello, Steve Davis here. Welcome to episode 436 of The Adelaide Show podcast. Um, it’s a, a full set. We have an SA drink of the week this week, which is a new pre-made cocktail by Nevernever. Uh, and I’ve got two guest tasters, Alexis and Tina, uh, long-term listeners of the show, and they were last with us when we had the, the playoff between two different distillers and their, um, Crows and Power gins.

Um, but they’ll be helping me taste this, uh, panettone Negroni, a very interesting drop. Our main interview today is Stuart Sweeney. He is a- an author In fact, a political analyst and lecturer, now retired. He’s heavily involved in helping to defend but also boost interest in the [00:01:00] civic inheritance that the Parklands represent, not just the Parklands, but also our squares, which are ridden over roughshod, ah, particularly of late by this neoliberal government that we have in power now at both state and federal levels.

So he writes the most beautiful articles that bring clarity and coherence to all the different things that are gripping our attention here in South Australia at the moment. So I look forward to that. Of course, he first came to South Australia to work with the Dunstan government in 1975. So we get a little bit of behind-the-scenes glimpse of the Dunstan decade and lots of other insight into the ALP in particular on that journey.

And finally, John Schumann is here with a song that he’s written in response to Peter Malinauskas’ attempt to denigrate and diminish [00:02:00] the worthwhile value and passion of protesters around, uh, the Parklands destruction that he is overseeing. Uh, John’s got a song called Ragtag Extremist Blues. We’ll have a chat to him about that and have a listen to the song.

This is longer than some of our recent interviews, but it’s one just like the Panattoni Negroni, which I realize is a drink made to be sipped slowly and savored over the long distance. I think this conversation is one. Don’t rush it. Don’t look for a gem every two seconds. Let yourself marinate in it, particularly with what Stuart Sweeney brings to the conversation.

And I should say I’ve been suffering a terrible flu. I’m about two weeks past that and just trying to shake this cough. So my throat, my vocal cords are a bit ragged as you’ll hear in this episode today. They’re a bit all over the shop. Hopefully, it won’t be [00:03:00] too distracting. Enjoy, and I hope we shine a bit of sunlight on some of the issues that are clouding our peace and relaxation and enjoyment of what it is to be a South Australian living in South Australia.

TAS Theme: Wave on wave, she’s got a bad rep

Who brings it down and swoon your knees. Adelaide, Adelaide who? Oh, oh, little Adelaide

Caitlin Davis: In the spirit of reconciliation, the Adelaide Show podcast acknowledges the traditional custodians of country throughout South [00:04:00] Australia and their connections to land, sea, and community. We pay our respects to their elders past and present, and extend that respect to all Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples today.

TAS Theme: Adelaide, Adelaide, Adelaide.

Steve Davis: For the SA Drink of the Week, we’re doing something a little bit different. Um, we’re trying a Negroni. This is made by Nevernever. It’s the Panettone Negroni. Um, I’m feeling a little bit more Italian just for having attempted to pronounce that. I will confess, I’m not much of a cocktail person, so whenever I think cocktails, there are two people I turn to, and that is Tina and Alexis Catley.[00:05:00]

You are my go-to cocktail people. Tina, welcome.

Tina Cattley: Thank you. Thank you very much.

Steve Davis: Actually, I should say welcome back ’cause, um, you were last here for our big grand final Crows versus Power gin-off, I think it was.

Tina Cattley: Yes, it was a, um, a touchdown match. Oh, wrong sport. Never mind.

Steve Davis: Excellent. So that’s why we don’t get you here for the football, but we get you here for the drinks.

And Alexis, um, longtime friend of the show. I think you’re one of our longest listeners. I haven’t measured you, but I’m assuming that’s the case. And of course, you’re a podcaster yourself from your PBA FM days, uh, continuing on with, uh, was it Two Lonely Guys?

Alexis Cattley: Uh, Two Sad Guys. No, it’s just actually just, uh, two guys.

I think it is. Geez, I can’t even remember our podcast name. That’s, that is really sad, which explains why we, uh, dwell at the bottom of the barrel.

Steve Davis: All right. Now what you’ve done, because you’re a fastidious person when it comes to your drinks- … uh, we’re standing in your resplendent bar, is you’ve [00:06:00] made a reference Negroni.

Um, for me to get my head around, because I’m a Negroni newbie. Tina, what are you?

Tina Cattley: I’m a Negroni naysayer.

TAS Theme: And why?

Tina Cattley: Uh, most Negronis, as I’m sure you’re about to describe, are traditionally made with Campari, and I, for me, the Campari flavor is just too, too bitter. Too… It’s too much for my palate.

Steve Davis: And Alexis, you are a Negroni man.

Alexis Cattley: Well, I mean, you could say it that way. I mean, I, I enjoy them. I like to try them. I… What I like about them is the fact that they are three equal measures of three very distinct flavors with there’s so much variety that you can basically, uh, science your way, uh, into oblivion.

Steve Davis: Well, you’ve started, um, because this reference one you’ve made before we actually taste the SA Drink of the Week is…

Of course, it’s an Italian cocktail, we should say. What have you pulled together here? ‘Cause when this hit my lips, [00:07:00] it was velvety smooth. It was like a A cloud-like pillow. You know, a lot of pillow makers say it’s like a cloud. They’re wrong. This is. This is, um… What I’m trying to say is it doesn’t poke any particular part of my palate anywhere.

It’s r- it sinks uniformly and then floats. It sort of hovers almost with this viscosity and lovely mouthfeel. Nothing seems to overplay anything else, and I finish with that nice little bitter slap that the bitter orange bits and pieces leave with me. Um, a- and of course, for me, I’m getting the classic cocktail elements there with the vermouth and the gin, but what did you put in the glass?

Alexis Cattley: Uh, well, so I built it with, uh, a Never Never, a triple juniper gin. Uh, so that was the base. Uh, then we’ve used, [00:08:00] um, a Ruby Bitter’s bitter, so we don’t have Campari here at the moment. We’ve got about three or four different bitters. This is the one we picked for this one, and then a, uh, a Rosso vermouth from, uh, Franz, um, n- north of Adelaide.

David. David Franz, I think it is. It’s just a small batch, uh, vermouth, and so equal parts of that, and what I find with, with this is you’re right. It’s, it’s, it’s got different elements that come to you at different stages, and, uh, yeah, it’s, it’s smooth and, smooth and beautiful.

Steve Davis: I think Tina wants to try more of yours, uh, because I’ll just get Tina to update us, but what did you…

Is… I’m out of my depth in naming what I’m f- tasting here. This is your home turf. What, if you closed your eyes and someone popped this into your mouth with a straw, what would be the, your first guess about what you’re drinking?

Alexis Cattley: Well, well, the, the bitterness, the orange comes through first, particularly if you put a fresh orange slice in it or bit- So you have.

Which, or even more so if you’ve [00:09:00] squeezed a b- bit of, uh, a lemon rind, uh, sorry, lemon, orange o- over the top, um, just so you get really aromatic straight off the bat. Um, it’s, it’s bitter, it’s orange. Uh, but the, you will taste the vermouth, and that’s, again, the different ways you build this, um, each of these elements play differently.

So I don’t really get much gin. I find it’s much more of a, the biggest element of this is what bitters you use in the first place.

Steve Davis: I’m getting, the vermouth actually is there, like the cloud of dust that the roadrunner leaves behind. That’s when the vermouth makes its appearance for me. Everything else is like luxurious Chinotto without the bubbles.

Alexis Cattley: I’m gonna have to, uh, just accept your description on that ’cause I have no idea what you’re talking about, which is pretty much half the time I’m listening to your podcast. But look, aside from that, I find you’re right. It’s, it’s, it gathers together, it bursts out, and it stays with you for quite a while.

Steve Davis: Oh, that’s also my Tinder profile. [00:10:00] Tina, you just had another taste of the reference Negroni. Um, are you still a naysayer?

Tina Cattley: Look, um, that one is, uh, uh, is much smoother, I think, than probably the typical Negroni you’ll get in most, um, when you go to most cocktail places, and many people love that Negroni. Um, for me, I, I definitely prefer an alternative to Campari.

Please, Campari, nothing against you. Um, what I do find remarkable, remarkable about the Negroni is, is the linger, how much it just lingers and those different spirits play off each other. It’s still not my go-to drink, I will say, but, um, that one I don’t find as offensive as others.

Steve Davis: Maybe the gin’s doing that.

Maybe there’s something with the, the volatiles of the gin that have, like, not only laid the picnic blanket out over my, um, palate, but they’ve sort of, they’ve got pegs. They’ve pressed it down, and so it reaches all the way across

Tina Cattley: Um, I’m usually really [00:11:00] good with analogies, but I don’t know where to go with that one.

Um, I feel like there’s ants in there somewhere. Um, there’s, there’s definitely a sandwich. Um, uh, for me, I think it’s probably the, the ver- vermouth that kind of creates that “mouth feel” and, uh, the vermouth was playing out and then just creating, I guess, a, a canvas for, for the Campari or the bitters to play out.

Steve Davis: All right. So I’m gonna hand over to you now, Alexis, because you’re gonna make these. I will just say there’s a reason we’re drinking this, and that is because this bottled Negroni, which is inspired by Italian panettone, was just crowned World’s Best Contemporary Cocktail at the 2026 World Drink Awards in London, um, just a couple of weeks ago.

So congratulations to the people from Never Never for that. It began life behind the bar of the brand’s McLaren Vale Distillery door. It has become a crowd favorite there, and now they’re bottling it for people [00:12:00] nationwide. So over to you. Um, they say, pour it over some ice and enjoy. And we’ll try and get some of the sound effects, Alexis, and, and explain what you’re doing.

Alexis Cattley: Well, look, I’m, I’m opening up a, what looks like a very nice gift box. Um, I’ve, I’ve seen that you can actually get it, um, in a gift box if you’re, uh, purchasing it for a gift, which I would already automatically recommend, ’cause to my mind, this makes a good, um, planned Christmas gift.

Steve Davis: Oh, because of the panettone, et cetera, the, all those spices that we should be getting?

Alexis Cattley: It’s, it’s what I assume is what I’m gonna be getting. I haven’t smelt it yet. I’m gonna hold off onto that for a second. But it does feel like that this is gonna be a, uh, bit of a Christmas experience, and I could imagine initially-

Steve Davis: Before you pour the last one, I’m gonna photograph that one moment while you’re doing it.

So don’t let me interrupt your- … uh, your flow there.

Alexis Cattley: Um, yeah, I could imagine that this is an excellent cocktail for Nonna or yourself to be, [00:13:00] um, drinking when you are putting together some Christmas desserts, when you’re cooking in the kitchen.

Steve Davis: Oh, hang on. Cooking, not serving?

Alexis Cattley: No, no, this is… Ah, this, no, s- this is not for your guests straight away.

You get a second bottle for the guests. I think this is one that, uh, you should be giving to your Nonna. Oh. Give, give to Mum or Grandma for when they’re making your Christmas, uh, d- desserts.

Steve Davis: And I should explain, you have poured them into some nice, um, tumbler gl- what do we call these? A low ball. What are they?

Alexis Cattley: A low ball.

Steve Davis: A low ball. It’s got a big ball of ice in it, and you’ve just poured that over there. You’ve got a little slither of fresh orange, and you also ran the orange over the lip of the glass, too. Before we taste it, of course, we do need to toast our late patron, Queen Adelaide. To the Queen.

All right, here we go. My first panettone negroni Oh, this is totally, totally [00:14:00] different. Hang on I do feel like If you, if I had no feeling in my mouth- … and I was unconscious, you poured this in, and you only woke me up, you brought me back once it was disappearing into my gullet, I would think you fed me Christmas cake.

That is Christmas cake like they would show, what’s that big cinema? The IMAX. It’s IMAX Christmas cake inside my mouth. Alexis, I’m gonna go to you first. What– That, I was not expecting that. That is totally different. That is in line with your Christmas analogy.

Alexis Cattley: Yeah, there’s a lot of, lot of red fruit sort of feeling there.

It’s not as orange as a standard Negroni. You can taste a, I don’t know, a bit of a spiced cake maybe. It’s, yeah, I can, I could see that if they didn’t even label this what [00:15:00] they have, I would think of it as a bit of a Christmas flavor

Steve Davis: It’s very potent, isn’t it? Very strong, the flavor. I’d almost feel like I’d be tempted to add a little soda or something to it to make it even longer on a nice hot Christmas day.

Does that make you shake your head or?

Alexis Cattley: No, no, I, I could imagine you could put this in a highball, uh, with crushed ice and soda- Mm. Mm … um, as a more refreshing drink. And I also think for people that don’t like Negronis in general, this is, feels like an entryway because there is still the bitters, there’s still like a, an element of, of a standard Negroni to it.

I think you could tease somebody into drinking Negronis by giving this to them over Christmas.

Steve Davis: If only we had someone with us who is classified as a non-Negroni per- Oh, Tina, what’s been your experience with this one?

Tina Cattley: Look, I, um, I actually tend to agree with both of you. It’s, uh, it’s Christmas in a glass.

[00:16:00] It is, um… I could very much imagine myself, uh, having a, having a tipple whilst, whilst decorating the Christmas tree. I’m not sure what the Christmas tree will look like at the end, but I certainly would have a good time. And, um, I do find the flavors in this one, yeah, Christmas in a glass, but very kind of, at the risk of sounding like I’m in my l- twilight years- Yes

um, a little bit like a sherry. Oh. A little bit like a sort of almost a port sort of, uh, feel to it, and maybe that’s the Christmas, you know, the Christmas cake kind of flavors coming through. Um, but doesn’t have the mouth linger that the, um, the original Negroni has, um, which, you know, for some people that would probably be preferred.

Steve Davis: This is like a house where they don’t keep the Christmas tree up for the, for, until the January 6th or whatever it is. However, well done you, I haven’t told you this yet. Here’s how they make it. They’ve got their triple juniper gin, bitter citrus aperitif, [00:17:00] and sweet vermouth. They’ve combined it with aged muscat, which I think is what you’re getting there, orange liqueur, rye distillate, and vanilla bean.

You’ve been vindicated.

Tina Cattley: Thank you. About time.

Steve Davis: Um, Alexis, before I ask for your final thoughts on this, you’re, you’re, you’ve almost finished off your glass. Uh, where is it, where is it sitting with you now?

Alexis Cattley: Um, well, look, it’s, it… Well, as clearly, I’ve almost finished my glass. Um, I, I think it’s I can’t imagine you’d recreate this with a combination of the elements that they’ve, they’ve- Ah

produced here or, or suggested are part of the makeup. There’s no way you’d make this. It has to come in this bottle. Um, and so consequently, like I said before, I think you should buy two bottles because that’s what … Clearly I’m gonna have to store one away for Christmas. It wouldn’t make it to Christmas if it was on the shelf.

Um, and yeah, apparently if, if it’s out [00:18:00] now, um, it’s somebody’s gift in six months’ time. They just don’t know it yet.

Steve Davis: There you go. If you know Alexis, uh, and you listen to the Adelaide Show, that could be you. I think we all kind of like this. Definitely get some for when you’re in a Christmas mood. I mean, let’s say you’re driving along and Harry Connick Jr.

comes on the radio, uh, you might wanna pull into a bottle shop, get some, and go home and just alleviate your Christmas needs, or I’m not even sure what that means. Uh, but, uh, I think that all that’s left me to say is the Never Never Panettone Negroni is the South Australian drink of the week.

Dr Bill Griggs: Hello, this is Dr. Bill Griggs, and you’re listening to the Adelaide Show podcast. If you happen to be driving while you’re [00:19:00] listening, I suggest you stop listening and concentrate on your driving, and maybe listen again when you can concentrate on the podcast.

Steve Davis: Stuart Sweeney has spent 50 years studying how power slips loose from democratic control. In January of 1978, he was inside the Premier’s department when Don Dunstan sacked his own police commissioner. It caused uproar in some circles, but a Royal Commission later vindicated our Premier. Today, though, he’s watching a Labor Premier savage our parklands for a golf tournament and a motorcycle race, with even talk of permanent concrete grandstands going into this unique natural heritage.

But also, what he’s seeing now, I sense, is a different playbook, one where the government’s learned from Big Tobacco on how to undermine protesters by sowing doubt in their arguments. And things are coming to a head here in South [00:20:00] Australia. We have court action underway, a petition with more than 13,500 signatures opposed to the opaque, and some would say, disingenuous way these developments are being run.

And I haven’t even mentioned the shadowy deal involving a skyscraper and some very sweet arrangements for some. Stuart Sweeney, though, today, what I want to do is find out not just what you make of the current state of play, but what processes and principles let you write so clearly and coherently about it all.

Stuart, welcome to the Adelaide Show.

Stewart Sweeney: Look, thank you, Steve. Yes. Look, where do I begin? Well, perhaps I could begin with my arrival here in Adelaide, uh, in 1975. Uh, I very deliberately decided to come to Adelaide. I’d spent the previous few years, uh, after arriving in Australia [00:21:00] in Hobart, um, which in itself was a very interesting experience at that time.

It was a time where, uh, the early environment movement was emerging. Uh, the whole issue over, uh, the proposed flooding of Lake Pedder, the Franklin River. Uh, there were also emerging issues of t- in Tasmania rediscovering the reality that there really were indigenous people still living and surviving in Hobart.

And so my, uh, early weeks, literally, in Hobart was, uh, very fast-tracked learning, uh, about Australia, having just, uh, sort of accidentally arrived for what was supposed to be a one-year adventure, uh, at the University of Tasmania.

Steve Davis: Yeah. I, I, I have to in- interrupt here [00:22:00] about this inclination to adventure and to the univer- and to, to Australia because, and, and one of our dearest, longest listeners, Alexis, is about to have a drink ’cause I’m just about to mention that I worked in Budapest for a few years at Hungarian Radio.

My boss there was a Scot, Charlie Coutts. He moved over in the ’50s to be part of a movement, uh, and he wanted… He was a rabid, uh, socialist. He was really firebrand. He was actually from the Fireman’s Union, I believe. So him, you, attracted somehow to moving out of Scotland to go where things are happening in flux.

W- is that part of the inclination, or were you unaware of what you were stepping into?

Stewart Sweeney: Look, it was a bit push and pull. Uh, I had just arrived back in Glasgow, uh, from, as you do, coaching tennis in Upstate New York in, uh, summer camps. Uh, [00:23:00] and because I’d enjoyed myself so much in the US, I’d overstayed, and when I got back to Scotland, I found myself unemployed.

Uh, so there was a bit of push as well as pull. Uh, however I was rescued by a fr- a friend who pulled a tiny scrap from a newspaper advertising a job as a tutor in political science at the University of Tasmania. So in the most casual adventure, uh, way, I said fine. And duly had the interview, got the telegram, got the job, and jumped on the plane.

W- I think within three months of leaving New York, I was in Hobart, uh, thinking, “Well, this will be an interesting contrast.” Um, and it was both contrast, but also opened me up [00:24:00] to all sorts of other, uh, unexpected changes that were occurring in what proved to be a very lively small city at the other end of the world, um, and kept me fully intrigued and occupied for a good three years.

Also, interestingly, given what is now happening in Adelaide all these years later, it got me off to a flying start in discovering a little about Australian politics. Because, uh, I think gi- because my name was Sweeney and that signaled Irish Catholic, when I stumbled off that airplane to be met by what seemed like most of the uni- the university’s leadership, those were the days.

There I was, a humble tutor. Um, to be whisked in a car up the hill to find that my accommodation had been organized [00:25:00] in the St. John Fisher Jesuit College. Uh, even better, the person who was the leader of the college had sadly died in recent months, leaving available effectively the penthouse suite with the massive view from all s- all windows of the river.

And so there I was. Um, woke up the next morning, uh, to bump into my next-door neighbor, who proved to be the young Gerard Henderson Someone who, of course, has subsequently risen to some prominence in the political, the world of ideas, established the Sydney Institute, has written the biographies of one Bob Santamaria.

So on day one in Hobart, I was introduced to something called the [00:26:00] DLP.

Steve Davis: Yes, the Democratic Labor Party.

Stewart Sweeney: The Democratic Labor Party. And of course, that takes us right up to today here in South Australia, uh, with the political leadership and the political situation here. Even more, um, I think by the end of that first week in Hobart, I got a phone call from somebody introducing himself as Brian Harradine, um, who was then the Secretary of the Trades and Labor Council in Hobart.

Brian had heard, I guess, that There was somebody new in town, somebody who might have some potential, I guess, uh, from the world that Brian was in, that Brian was trying to work on. And so I had that lunch. Um, uh, and, and so I had this kind of, in retrospect, uh, astounding kind of fast track introduction to something of course I knew nothing of, [00:27:00] because I was indeed that classic Irish, Scottish, Glasgow class, uh, oriented, socialistic kind of character who was really, uh, looking at life, uh, from a different way of thinking about the world.

Steve Davis: Before I forget, in, when you were talking about early things and themes in Tasmania, you mentioned Lake Pedder. I have to mention, uh, the, the final guest in this episode, John Schumann, in one of his Redgum songs had a line, “We’ll never, ever get Lake Pedder back.” So I’ll just, I’ll just park that as a footnote off,

Stewart Sweeney: off to the side.

Yes. A- and, you know, in those final weeks, I, I, so somebody who I, uh, became a friend of in Hobart came complete with a light aircraft, and I turned out to be one of the last people to fly in and land on the beach, uh, before it was flooded. Yeah. So that was Hobart, but meanwhile, of course, I was discovering that [00:28:00] really there was even more excitement happening in Adelaide, uh, because there was Don Dunstan.

So, uh- Had you heard of him before? Ha- hadn’t heard of Don Dunstan back in, in Scotland, back in Glasgow. In fact, look, when I got the job offer, uh, to come to Australia, almost all my friends strongly advised coming to Australia because the image of Australia i- in my little world back in Glasgow was very much still focused around the White Australia policy.

Yeah. Uh, uh, and so it, it was not a place … It, it was seen as not that dissimilar to South Africa, and from my world, you wouldn’t particularly choose to go to either South Africa or Australia. Anyway, in my case, my curiosity was sufficient that I did in fact jump on the plane.

Steve Davis: So what was the [00:29:00] link that then brought you into the world of Don Dunstan?

Stewart Sweeney: My little bucket of, I suppose, intellectual capital at the time was in my university course at Glasgow, University of Strathclyde. I was fortunate, um, uh, to s- really stumble upon a bunch of academics who were doing quite exciting, innovative things with what they were putting together by way of courses.

Uh, and a big part of it was, uh, really looking closely, uh, at a whole bunch of countries in Europe as well as in the UK who at that time, uh, in the ’60s becoming the ’70s, were experimenting with all sorts of forms of worker participation, industrial democracy, workers’ control. There was a whole continuum of ideas about change from the status quo, going from quite small changes all the way through to quite radical [00:30:00] comprehensive changes.

And I guess, uh, you know, I was fortunate, uh, that I got exposed to that whole kind of body of thinking and ideas. Uh, and so that’s, uh, what I had as maybe my distinctive, uh, both, you know, bucket of intellectual capital, but also my own personal interest in those ideas and pursuing them. And so I became aware that Dunstan, as part of what he was doing here, had opened up.

The initial idea was, or, and, and the initial, um, li- language was the language of worker participation.

Steve Davis: And so was he and, and, and his cabinet Were they, did they have a vision in mind and they needed someone with some of your background in industrial democracy to help put some framework around [00:31:00] what they wanted to achieve?

Or were they standing on the edge and, and not really sure what the future had in, in store? They didn’t know what the, uh, restrictions and opportunities were.

Stewart Sweeney: Uh, yes and no. I mean, the wheels had already been turning. Uh, uh, they had established, uh, a couple of committees of inquiry into the idea in, in both the public and private sector.

Uh, and that had resulted in the establishment of the, uh, unit for in- I think it was in- originally called the Unit for in- Worker Participation. It subsequently got rebadged as Industrial Democracy. So the, the wheels were turning, and the specific job I come over to do wasn’t directly in the beginning for Dunstan.

Uh, it was up at the then still fairly new Institute of Labor Studies at Flinders University. Uh, and they had got themselves quite a large [00:32:00] research grant to do some empirical research in workplaces, public and private, around Adelaide, into, uh, the, uh… Well, i- into, uh, labor turnover, uh, uh, l- absenteeism, uh, and into ideas of worker participation and reorganizing workplaces, initially designed to try and deal with, uh, the levels of absenteeism and, uh, turnover.

Uh, it was a time of relatively high, uh, employment levels, and, uh, it… So it had that kind of practical, if you like, al- almost managerial focus. ‘

Steve Davis: Cause that does surprise me. The way you’re talking about that, it sounds like it’s led by management wanting to get more productivity out of their workers.

Whereas in my initial idea, I was thinking worker [00:33:00] participation, that means having more agency in their day-to-day Uh, activity

Stewart Sweeney: Look, it was a bit oil and water. Uh, th- th- th- those two agendas, those two, uh, uh, challenges were in the mix. Uh, and, and that’s actually illustrated if you look at the history, uh, of what happened to that initial, if you like, phase one of the Unit for Worker Participation with its s- perhaps more, uh, managerial orientation rather than a grand vision, you know, for changing the world.

Um, because quite quickly, uh, the unions, particularly the Amalgamated Metal Workers Union of the day, which was very much locally and nationally a real, uh, thought leader in many respects, uh, they became concerned about what they felt was the overly managerial focus of that initial phase of the Dunstan initiative.[00:34:00]

Um, and the initial leadership had been appointment of someone who came from a management background. So there was a bit of a revolt, uh, which actually, uh, featured a, a debate and resolutions and conflict at the s- uh, South Australian Labor Party conference of the day. Uh, the unions were especially concerned that the worker participation idea would create a, a separate channel of representation in the workplace.

Steve Davis: Sidelining the union.

Stewart Sweeney: Sidelining the shop steward structure and the shop committees. And so there was a something of a crisis, uh, in that first year or two. And meanwhile, I was up at Flinders University working in particular with, um, uh, Philip Bentley, a, a, an [00:35:00] economist, uh, at, at the Institute of Labor Studies at Flinders.

And Phil had a very strong reputation in the labor movement broadly and academic world, and it was Phil who was, uh, headhunted by Dunstan, uh, to really come in and rescue the whole idea. And Phil, uh, and I, uh, I, I, I’d become… You know, Phil and I were working closely at that time. And so Phil and I came from Flinders to the unit to kind of get it back on track, uh, which is part of what then happened over what in the end was a relatively short period of time, because it really was only I think from something like 1973, before I was here, I arrived in ’75, and then it all [00:36:00] disappeared really in 1979, the day that Dunstan resigned, uh, early due to ill, ill health really brought the whole business to an end.

Steve Davis: We have so much to get through, but before we leave this topic, do you feel it left any lasting legacy on the industrial relation makeup or economy in South Australia, or did it come flourish and wither, and the momentum of everything else continued business as usual?

Stewart Sweeney: Yeah, I think in South Australia, uh, ironically perhaps the impact was less than it was, uh, nationally because the South Australian model of industrial democracy, we, we did kind of invent a kinda local, uh, combination of changes to the status quo, uh, that got picked up by the ACTU.

Uh, and so the [00:37:00] afterlife of the Dunstan industrial democracy set of ideas probably did, uh, survive, uh, um, uh, not in a way that transformed the world by any means, but bits of it, uh, did, did continue to evolve. Uh, and indeed bits of it I guess got re-brought back into management thinking, uh, in terms of initiatives that developed through the 1980s.

But ironically perhaps not so much right here in South Australia. It was an example, I suppose, of Dunstan being in this area probably more than any other area in front of the rest of his cabinet. Uh, uh, when he later wrote his, uh, autobiography, Felicia, uh, if you go to the [00:38:00] final chapter, uh, where he’s reflects a little on his regrets as to what he didn’t achieve, he, he identifies three, uh, areas.

Uh, and I think the second one he highlights is industrial democracy, uh, where he recognizes in a sense perhaps a degree of failure, uh, in his, uh, the extent to which he didn’t get other members of cabinet, uh, uh, engaged with that particular agenda.

Steve Davis: If we take a step deeper into the Dunstan government, so moving back from that role in particular, can you reflect on what it was like behind the scenes?

Because I was too young to really be cognitively aware of everything that was happening. To me, there is a mythology around it about it being a [00:39:00] reform laboratory and, and quite highfalutin, if you like. Grand ideas, grand… Was it like that? Was it not? Was it a m- a sweaty mixture of pragmatism and ideology?

Was there fisticuffs? Were there heated argument? What… Take a, give us a glimpse of the, the machinations.

Stewart Sweeney: Look, there was, there was all of the, all of the above. Uh, it was exhilarating, exciting, exhausting. Uh, you, you, y- you, you… And for those of us who’d, you know, I guess to some extent were true believers in the big ideas, we, we w- we were people with a, a mission, you know, to change, uh, the workplace in, in both the public and the private sector.

Uh, we were working everything from going into individual workplaces, uh, kind of, uh, if you like, at the front line of trying to make [00:40:00] changes right at the point of production. Uh, then, but then we were, uh, working through… There was two tripartite committees where, uh, senior public service heads of departments and a private sector tripartite committee with senior management of the day were brought together to learn about, to ask questions, to try and work out a consensus that they would be comfortable with in terms of introducing these ideas into their businesses.

Um, there was lots of long lunches. There was lots of long meetings. Uh, uh, uh, I, I recall one meeting where the key issue of the role of the trade union back to that, um, area of conflict in the early phase of the Industrial Democracy Initiative [00:41:00] came to a head. Uh, and, you know, doors were slammed, people were locked out of meetings, uh, numbers were counted, numbers were changed.

Uh, uh, a- about what should be the model that the project officers who worked in the unit for Industrial Democracy would take into the workplaces with them. How would you go about it? Did, did you have to spend weeks and months talking to the unions, uh, before you would talk to the management or to the workforce?

Uh, or did you start talking to all parties right from the start? Um, you know, the kinda nuts and bolts of how do we actually do this? Uh, and I think, in fact, there was multiple situations happening all over [00:42:00] different public sector agencies, different private sector firms. Uh, it was very dynamic, uh, quite unpredictable.

It was fun. It was fun. It was exciting.

Steve Davis: And was the focus really on the ideas, or was there always an eye kept on the next election? Which is the, the image we get these days.

Stewart Sweeney: The next election wasn’t in the picture at all. We didn’t, we didn’t, we didn’t think about that at all. Uh, the focus was on How much could be changed?

How quickly? There was a feeling, uh, that we… Although, of course, we didn’t know what was going to happen to Don Dunstan, but there was al- always, uh, maybe just an energy, a momentum for every day you w- you would go in, uh, feeling, uh, energized about what you were going to be doing, who you were talking to, what you were trying to change.

Uh, yes, uh, i- [00:43:00] it was a special four years, I think, for most people involved. Uh, interestingly, as an aside, uh, the, uh, uh, I s- I, I recall the d- the, the Unit for Industrial Democracy kept expanding in numbers, but also expanding in terms of the capabilities and expertise that was available in the unit. Uh, uh, and so we, we expanded to include legal expertise.

Uh, we, uh, expanded to include, surprise, surprise, some media, uh, expertise. Uh, and interestingly, that took the form of the interview that I was on, myself and Phil, out of which came the appointment of one Mike Rann, uh, to what was Mike’s first job here in Adelaide in the Unit for Industrial Democracy. Uh, so there’s a little, uh, connection and continuity there that came out of that initiative, [00:44:00] uh, in terms of what subsequently developed regarding, uh, Mike, Mike Rann’s career.

Steve Davis: I might almost say, in fact, I think I am saying, that I, I feel like that first taste of media training and awareness is the first sign of rot in the system. Uh, because I was in the newsroom at, uh, Mix 102 and 5DN, uh, back when he was premier, and he controlled us like playing yo-yos. You… He would call the station at about quarter to 6:00 in the morning, and, “Are you rolling?”

“Uh, yes.” “Okay, here’s some stories.” And he would- wouldn’t let you interview him. He just gave his doorstop bits and pieces, and we were just grateful to have the premier. Beside that, he was almost unattainable, and I really feel that vacuum sealing away, uh, is the first real dent in [00:45:00] democracy being able to breathe with society.

Stewart Sweeney: Look, I’m, I’m sure there’s something in that. Although, uh, the other, um, thing I, I recall with Mike then certainly, and I think subsequently, was his, uh, ability to write speeches and to do it very quickly, uh, and to gather research information, you know, sort of decades before AI, you know, and its ability to gather stuff quickly.

Mike was really quick at being able to, in terms of the other side of that job, uh, to create speeches. And they were important at, at that time in communicating, uh, if you like, the big picture, uh, ideas and the, the conferences that were being held. Uh, so that, that was a, if you like, another side to, to the Mike, Mike Rann coin.

Steve Davis: I agree, ’cause oratory is an important part, [00:46:00] very important tool in the political, uh, endeavor because you need to be able to communicate your ideas. And I guess the other side of the coin though is quenching critical evaluation of it through not so much trickery, but just skill, you know?

Stewart Sweeney: Yes.

Steve Davis: Um, now Salisbury, the Salisbury affair.

Don Dunstan, uh, sacked his police commissioner because it all boils down to he believed the commissioner deceived him. Uh, a royal commission, um, under Justice Romer Mitchell later agreed and vindicated with his decision. Of- obviously, there was a political price he paid for a lot of that. There was some flak that he copped.

I would argue as we start moving it to the, the current day, that what we have now is almost the opposite. We have a premier who I would contend is doing the deceiving by deceiving his public. When Dunstan felt [00:47:00] deceived, he had to sack the police commissioner. Do you think that for those of us who are just annoyed with the government they voted in and have since felt hoodwinked by some of the ideas that were smuggled through, have an inclination of that same human instinct to banish, sack, or correct the person who they feel is deceiving them?

Stewart Sweeney: Yeah. Well, you know, certainly, uh, you know, the democracy idea and, uh, the living democracy and actually practicing democracy is complex, difficult, frustrating. Uh, and possibly today, democracy here and elsewhere is really on the back foot. Uh, and I think what’s happening here in our small regional economy [00:48:00] reflects really global trends, uh, regarding both democracy as an idea and as a practice, but also labor parties and laborism as an idea and a practice.

Uh, and we’re really seeing our local variety of what are actually global challenges, uh, in the relationship between, uh, policy, uh, decision-making, control public opinion, public interests. There’s a sort of, uh, global situation. We have a local version of it, and our local version has got its own, I guess, specific features.

Um- [00:49:00] in terms of the variety of, if you like, Labour Party that we now have. And of course, it’s a Labour Party still in the first, is it three months, four months of a four-year term, uh, with the degree of, um, electoral success that it had at the beginning of that term. Uh, and I guess it features all of the narrowing of thinking about, uh, economic policy, uh, that really can be s- found all around the world at the moment, uh, and specifically the Social Democratic parties.

Uh, the, the parties that came out, I guess, um, of the Second World War, 1945, you can really see a period, 1945 to somewhere in the 1980s, where those parties were, [00:50:00] uh, going forward, if you like, were expanding their vision, were expanding their ambition, were expanding their policies. Um, however, we’re now 40-odd years into another phase of retreat, uh, by really all of those parties everywhere.

Uh, and we are now, uh, having our version of that general retreat. And in our case, I guess it’s a version, uh, that has been further narrowed, I think you could argue, in a sense because of the success of, uh, the people associated, uh, with the, uh, thinking that does again take you back re- really to the, the Second World War and before, because there really is a link, I think, [00:51:00] between the rise and fall of the Democratic Labor Party, uh, here in the Australian labor movement, where for a long time, of course, that was a movement that, uh, focused on breaking away from the mainstream labor party and labor movement and did so, uh, and people would say kept labor out of power for many years as a result.

But you can see, of course, a change of strategy, and it’s a change of strategy, uh, that really was in part centered upon a change of strategy by the Farrell family, because you can distinguish between, uh, Don Farrell, who’s a key player in this, um Don’s father was very much associated with the breakaway [00:52:00] period, whereas Don himself, and I think he has to be given credit for the success of switching strategy from being outside trying to create a whole separate Labour Party movement to go inside and to, with all of the, I guess, kind of commitment, faith, discipline, patience, organization to work so successfully as he has to mean that the current vehicle where the older DLP thinking is transmitted, namely the Shopies Union, has become over the last 25 years really the training school for what is now really a considerable number of key players within the South Australian Labour [00:53:00] Party and none more clearly than Premier Peter Malinauskas.

And all of this has meant a smaller and smaller group of people determined and focused are now in the leadership group in a way that probably has never been quite so clear and so narrow in a sense. And that really does raise questions about democracy and control and where to from here for people who across a number of issues are concerned that their voices are not being heard.

Steve Davis: The narrowing is interesting because you’re painting a picture that there’s an engine room with energy. Had that been in, say, that Dunstan era, it had a broad field to play over and now that’s narrowed and it’s [00:54:00] narrowed in a way that my colleague David Olney mentioned on a previous episode, I think the most recent one.

And he said, yes, we’ve got these people who are coming through the machine, but really it’s neoliberalism that has become the beat that they all march to. And that itself is probably the narrowing power, the narrowing dynamic, because it doesn’t really care too much about the social aspect. It’s focused on numbers and figures and bottom lines.

And what can we do with a big splash to get bottom line oomph and heft? Do you concur? Do you think David Olney is right in saying it’s not so much Malley, et cetera, it’s neoliberalism that both major parties, and even One Nation, he would argue, are really slaves to?

Stewart Sweeney: Look, I think it’s [00:55:00] a double narrowing, and certainly the long trajectory.

And again, it’s another astounding story. To trace neoliberalism back to its beginnings, you have to go back to 1949 and to a gathering, uh, in Switzerland, uh, brought together by F- uh, Friedrich Hayek, uh, who was an, an economist, philosopher, one of many people, Jewish background, who had fled Europe, uh, in that 1930s period.

And coming out of the Second World War, they were very concerned, uh, about both the threat of communism, uh, and also the degree to which government controls had been extended in order to win the war. Uh, and, uh, Hayek wrote a famous book which got very much popularized. I think Reader’s Digest did a cut-down version called The Road to Serfdom.

Uh, and that gathering of … It was about 30-odd people, economists, philosophers, thinkers. [00:56:00] Only one woman, uh, set up the initial ideas framework, id- ideology, if you like, that really was the origin story of what became neoliberalism. They quickly got supported by, uh, significant US capital. And, um, fast-track to, uh- Thatcher, or R- Reagan and Thatcher some decades later, their ideas had been slowly spreading.

Think tanks had been getting created, newspapers, media, television pro– There was a whole enormous infrastructure was slowly being created, which then got turbocharged when Reagan and Thatcher together, uh, really adopted those ideas. And so what came to be known as neoliberalism, uh, became the way of thinking about matters economic that really has taken over the [00:57:00] planet and become the common sense of, uh, thinking among thought leaders in politics, in business, in media.

Um, however, uh, uh, you can also say, uh, there was another element to what’s happening here, uh, connected but different, uh, and that’s relating to the astounding success of the property industry, uh, in the complementing really and riffing off the neoliberalism overarching mo- way of thinking and confining thinking.

If you look at the, uh, Property Council of Australia based in Sydney, and the, again, astounding success of their CEO, Mike, uh, Zola, and then of course, each of the state branches here, we have Bruce Dicher, uh, with [00:58:00] the Property Council of South Australia. Their agenda, uh, in regard to, uh, doing what they’re paid to do, namely vigorously pursue the profit maximizing interests of the property industry, uh, has added to the narrowing coming out of the global, uh, phenomena of neoliberalism to create in Australia, uh, I think a very specific situation nationally and here locally, where, uh, we end up with governments, the Albanese government, the, uh Malinauskis go- Ma- Malinauskis government who have increasingly, uh, put actually much of their political fate, their electoral fate in the hands of the property industry.

Uh, around of course [00:59:00] housing, uh, uh, uh, and the solution to the housing, uh, crisis, uh, has really been handed over to that industry because the thinking of that industry as to how you deal with that problem is their solution. Which is ironic of course, because in that 30 year, 40 year period, part of the labor movement retreat here in Australia and elsewhere has been a, has been a retreat from the idea of public housing.

And we’ve, we’ve actually handed over housing and other areas of infrastructure to the private sector for 40 years. Everybody seems to be agreed it’s failed. You know, co- cost of housing, homelessness, quality of housing, uh, ina- inadequacies regarding sustainability of housing. Uh, but [01:00:00] that failure, I think you can fairly say might have something to do with that retreat and 40 years where the private sector has been given the lead role.

Rather than that producing reflection on whether Has that really been the best way to go? If you think of the old-fashioned idea of a mixed economy, if we think about that in terms of housing and the mixed economy idea in housing, uh, perhaps there’s a need to rebalance the role and reestablish much more of a public housing, uh, element in the market.

But, uh, the Malinauskas government and the Albanese government are, it would seem, very much, uh, taking the, as I say, almost common sense solutions that the property industry would [01:01:00] promulgate. So I think it’s neoliberalism as a global generic set of ideas, but then we have layered on top of that and around that the specific, uh, application of that idea around the property sector and labor parties going along with that.

Steve Davis: Is this what leads us to problems in expanding suburbs, especially southern suburbs where the streets are so narrow? Everyone’s got their big trucks. You can hardly drive down. The Mount Barker gets saturated with housing, all the lovely same boxes everywhere, stripping way ahead of any, um, uh, services to support people.

We’ve got beautiful, um, food producing land up north of Adelaide that’s being ripped up and turned into housing developments Is, is this the, the ideal sensible solution? Because I did, I thought I heard Bruce Ditcher, uh, complain that there wasn’t enough medium density and high density in the mix. [01:02:00] It’s all low density.

I, I could be wrong in getting my signals there. But, um, is this how the rubber hits the road? And what would be the alternative if we did have more public involvement? I mean, we’ve divested ourselves of all sorts of infrastructure, and then we complain that the private enterprise is not keeping up our poles and wires and all those sorts of things.

Stewart Sweeney: Yeah, look, the housing area, I, I guess it’s a specific example of where this retreat from, by social democracy, by labor parties, by governments, has been a retreat from, uh, government capability really. If, if, if you think of the capability that we had here as it happens specifically in South, South Australia, uh, with the public building department, with the, uh, literally the trade skills, the apprenticeship numbers, the, uh, the d- the, the design, the architectural skills, the full range of [01:03:00] skills involved in, uh, planning housing, thinking about housing, building housing, that was a public capability.

Uh, and we’ve allowed that to unravel, uh, to where we are now. And the… We’ve got ourselves into something of a kinda trap, uh, i- i- in, in how far that has gone. And, and I guess it sort of reminds you just of that simple idea of balance and mixed economy and the balance of the mix, uh, and, uh, whether we have, and for me, I think it’s quite clear that we have, uh, put together a mix in Australia across the board, uh, where too much reliance on market, uh, has created, uh, unproductive, uh, outcomes.

Uh, and again, that for me goes back to, um, I mean, [01:04:00] the Hawke Keating government’s opening of Australia to the market. Uh, it was essential. Protectionism had run its course. However, um- They were good perhaps unraveling what we had, but they were not so good in putting Humpty Dumpty together again to create, if you like, a new settlement between capital and capital’s animal spirits, uh, and society.

And so, uh, I think I’ve argued in, in, in one of the pieces I think I’ve had published in Perils and Irritations that we’ve sort of gone from an economy, uh, that could be described as really in- in- imbued with protectionism, which had to work for quite a number of years, but it was past its use-by date, into an economy that [01:05:00] can be described as a renterism.

That is an economy where too much capital, uh, is focused on accumulating wealth and profit from broadly defined rent rather than … In, in fact, it’s not profit, it, it is rent, which is an entirely different way of accumulating wealth and making money. Uh, profit is really something associated with, uh, more productive enterprise where you make things, you deliver services, you invent things, you innovate, you upgrade, uh, you export.

That’s a whole different kind of economy. That was the economy we did have when we were a country that could be defined as protectionist. Okay, that did need to change, but we’ve created perhaps a suboptimal economy, and we here in [01:06:00] Adelaide are having our local experience of living with that economy.

Steve Davis: And that’s where the Property Council, et cetera, has moved in to fill that vacuum.

Uh, so I imagine from that … I’ll put some links to some of your articles in the show notes, by the way, for, for our listeners. Um, you probably are perhaps predisposed towards some of the changes starting to be made to dissuade people from just racking up, uh, investment properties. You would much rather see that capital invested in entrepreneurial, uh, businesses, things that produce something and aren’t just there to extract rent.

Am I right or?

Stewart Sweeney: Definitely. Uh, I, I still remember quite vividly sitting in a cafe. Uh, w- we had a, a home exchange actually g- that got us parked in San Francisco for about six weeks. And I remember, uh, we were hanging around in cafes San Francisco a few years ago, and I always enjoy [01:07:00] eavesdropping in cafes.

And, uh, all around me you could see groups of, uh, people, uh, having their coffee and chatting. Uh, th- they, they were chatting about algorithms and th- th- they were chatting about, uh, uh, ideas to do with software development, uh, and systems and so on. They were excited and exchanging. You could hear the, you know, the conversations.

Uh, for years I’ve noted as maybe a bit less so right now, but certainly going back over years, sitting around cafes in Adelaide and groups, uh, generally used to always be men of an age sitting around with, you know, plans for the next, uh, small, medium, or large real estate project. Uh, and, you know, t- and also talking about all the t- tax dodges and tax tricks and so on that one could perhaps potentially use.

So too much of the, uh, animal spirits, [01:08:00] uh, were really focused in that particular chunk of the economy. Uh, and I think we’ve gone even further down that track. Uh, a- and that’s a real issue. I mean, if you think through in the case of South, South Australia, I used to imagine very positively about 2036 when we will be having our bicentenary of colonization in a very positive way.

I, I’m now struggling, but haven’t entirely given up, on quite how does one, uh, imagine, uh changing the trajectory that we’re now on

Steve Davis: I want to come to that just as we finish the interview a little bit later. But I don’t want to leave the Farrellism and Don Farrell behind. You mentioned him earlier. You’ve written some wonderful pieces.

You either coined or borrowed the term Farrellism. Uh, his model of politics, very, um, centrist, disciplined, professional. [01:09:00] And you also mentioned the deficit in, uh, competency within government. The capability has shrunk. It’s been outsourced. They bring in all these big accounting firms. They spend countless dollars of our money to cover their butts, to have someone else do the thinking and, and give them a chance to hide behind it.

That, that’s my head in. Don Farrell in particular, lovely man. I’ve heard him speak many times. He’s like a lovely Sir Les Patterson who’s well-behaved. He’s got that lovely demeanor. He also, and this is where I struggle with this approach to politics. He had a post recently where he was over in some international, um, uh, G7 or some sort of talk fest, and he said how he had said to the room, “Trade should be fair and rules-based,” and everyone clapped as if he was delivering something innovative, whether it was just a, a motherhood statement.

And even in the speeches, nothing of substance ever gets said. [01:10:00] I feel there’s a theater of political discourse or even politics that’s happening that doesn’t move any needles. The momentum happens behind, perhaps within the narrow focus you talk about I, I don’t know how, how… Uh, uh, and to me, I think it’s running out of puff, and we- I think we’re seeing the, the jagged edges of that when a premier wants to push big things through.

It disenfranchises people, uh, uh, like me. It opens the door for fringe parties like One Nation. It’s almost like it’s too clever for itself in this polished, protected little world. We said we’d left protected, um, protectionism behind. Politics seems to still operate in that bubble. They’ve got no media to worry about.

I feel like there’s an end to the runway coming up for this professional political area. Do you, or am I [01:11:00] being too jaundiced in my view?

Stewart Sweeney: Well, look, uh, nothing’s forever. Um, uh, uh, I mean, a, a, a big part of my own kind of intellectual framing these days evolved about 30 years ago when I, I discovered something called world systems analysis.

Um, and that’s a way of thinking which, uh, doesn’t so much focus on the hardly burly of events, um, but nor does it focus so much on what’s happening in individual nations. It really says that in order to better understand what is happening around you in the immediate, you do need to, uh, look at a, the dynamics of a world system.

Uh, and you do need to think in the very long term. Uh, and that has certainly influenced my thinking about trying to make sense of what’s happening around me. [01:12:00] It’s also help- probably helped my mental health, you know, in terms of dealing with what can sometimes seem like the difficulty of imagining in any practical, pragmatic way, uh, real change are happening in the small scale of your own individual lifespan.

Um, and so there’s a real balancing act required, uh, you know, to juggle, uh, that reality, uh, and the daunting prospect it can seem you’re faced with. Uh, e-even just right here in Adelaide, the, if you like, daunting prospect of four more years of the current government, eight more years potentially, 12 more years.

Not really much that looks all that promising in terms of any, uh, practical alternatives. Um, and that really is something we all have to [01:13:00] really deal with. As I say, I did start by saying nothing lasts forever, and the evidence on that is clear. Um, empires ri- fall, rise and fall, leaders rise and fall. We’ve, uh, gone through, um, a period where slavery was the dominant way we organized our economy.

We then moved through to a p- long period where feudalism was the dominant way we went a- about our economy and society Slowly capitalism emerged, uh, in my w- way of thinking of it, 500 years ago. Um, we’ve had, uh, over that time, uh, we had a period where it was the, the Italian city states were the dominant players where the money was, the bankers were, the loans were coming from.

We had the rise of Amsterdam, the Dutch Empire, the rise [01:14:00] and triumph of the British Empire. We’ve had the, and we’re still living through the rise, triumph, and now unraveling of the US period. We’re into 40 years of the rise of China, um, and Australia and South Australia is, uh, caught up in those, if you like, world system events.

So there’s both those kind of very general big picture material changes happening to the actual economic structure, and then there’s also the changes happening to the ideas that are regarded as okay, acceptable, or even common sense. In our lifetimes, I think most of us would have … Well, certainly mine, we’ve gone through the period of the rise of Keynesian thinking about the economy.

Uh, and it’s interesting to look at how long it took Milton Keynes, uh, from his initial [01:15:00] scribbles. It was decades before his ideas became, uh, accepted and for a period became the received wisdom. Then of course those ideas were unraveled by the triumph of neoliberalism. So you like to imagine that somewhere, somehow, somewhere on the planet, uh, is it Asia?

Is it Africa? Uh, is it South America? Europe still? Um, there are ideas emerging that will, uh, in time, uh, displace the current dominance of neoliberalism. Who knows?

Steve Davis: Who knows? But I- I’ll pick up on your theme that nothing lasts forever because you might well use that in relation to the Adelaide Parklands, because they are under threat- Mm

at the moment. Mm. And I do note that you are park guardian, I believe, for [01:16:00] Park 11 or thereabouts.

Stewart Sweeney: Yes.

Steve Davis: Park 11 North.

Stewart Sweeney: Yes.

Steve Davis: What does that mean? I’ve heard there’s a, there’s a swan warden in Stratford-on-Avon. Is it like that?

Stewart Sweeney: Look, it’s, uh, uh, I guess it’s just a phraseology that the, the Parklands Association came up with to try and, uh, associate, particularly individuals who were involved in the association would, uh, focus on particular chunks of the parkland, would become a bit more familiar with them, would once or twice a year, uh, uh, take walks through those parts of the parkland, uh, just to try and, uh, introduce to more people more information about what the parklands are and w- what different, uh, histories and what different, uh, flora and fauna exist in different parts of the, of the parkland.

Steve Davis: They’re a wonderful focus for this conversation. There’s a few [01:17:00] different angles I want to come at it from. One is a piece you wrote recently about think outside the fence, because you just talked then about walking through our parklands. Well, you can’t do that every day of the year because major events hogtie, uh, huge tracts of our parklands To the benefit and, uh, to the delight of, uh, a portion of the population and, and tourists.

Uh, but there’s a price that comes with this. I hadn’t thought about it like this. You argue in a piece that Adelaide is one of the very few cities where a major piece, like our Parklands, is fenced off for large tracks of time in the year. Can you just expand briefly on that and why that is, doesn’t sit comfortably with you?

Stewart Sweeney: Well, I think it’s not just Parklands, but, uh, perhaps even more so it’s Parklands and the squares. Um, uh, uh, I think again, in terms of balance, uh, we’ve really fenced ourselves [01:18:00] up for too long, too often through the year. Uh, uh, and, and, and that means that the, there’s an opportunity cost to that. And, and the opportunity cost, uh, and for me, I see it particularly in Victoria Square, uh, where if you look at the design of Victoria Square, which I think was put together about 20-odd years ago, uh, with its, uh, considerable infrastructure, uh, and, and facilities of, you know, ele- electric supply, water supply, lighting supply to fit it up, I guess, for, uh, holding events, leaving a kind of postage stamp sized patch of grass on both of the main elements of the square.

And really, uh, because we, I guess, live fairly close to that, we see what happens each year. Uh, first of all, we see the extent to which the square is fenced off. [01:19:00] Sometimes you even have to pay to get into the square. Uh, and time after time, the bit of green stuff in the middle is ruined. Uh, uh, in come, you know, the repair people, new turf is laid, and then a few weeks later, it’s fenced again.

And, and so there’s a whole cy- uh, uh, a kind of in- infor- annual cycle of fence, event, repair. Uh, and, uh, it’s also noteworthy, sometimes, you know, for what might be a two-day event, the fences can be up for weeks and weeks on end. Uh, and, and, and so, um- There is a real dilemma here and a question about are we making the best use of the squares and of the parklands?

Um, if you try to imagine Adelaide, let’s think, let’s imagine the Adelaide that might have been with no parklands, [01:20:00] uh, and few, fewer squares. Where would we be holding events? Well, we would’ve, we would’ve held them in infrastructure that had been constructed and invested in for those events. Um, and it would’ve almost certainly been infrastructure, uh, that didn’t have grass on it and trees on it and didn’t have another potential.

So there’s, there’s, there’s a, there’s a clash and, and there’s a balance, uh, that I think we need to review. Um, and so if you think of the city, and don’t forget the city council, certainly the Property Council, uh, and again, it’s for me part of the evidence about the ascendancy of the Property Council, have got sort of everybody agreeing we need to double the CBD population from 40…

What’s 25, 26,000 to 50,000 by 2036. [01:21:00] Um, and that’s fine, and here we are, new-ish residents right in the heart of the city, and there’s more to come. A- and, and so As each resident comes in, that creates a different potential for a different kind of square in the city, a square which becomes focused on residents and visitors.

Uh, uh, y- y- you think of all of those European squares, uh, and the kind of, uh, experience that you get from them, uh, which is quite different from the stop-start, it’s open, it’s closed, it’s fenced, it’s unfenced, that we’re experiencing. Um, it, it really needs to be, I think, reviewed and thought about. Is, is this the best way of holding what we do need to hold?

We do need events.

Steve Davis: We, uh, in a recent piece, you s- you called this current model of using our parklands as land being [01:22:00] described as available. You know, it’s empty. It’s like terra nullius, um, rather than civic inheritance. That’s where there’s the disconnect, isn’t there? Yes.

Stewart Sweeney: Yeah. A- and look, out behind me from where we’re sitting at the moment in the window, you, you see, um, uh, y- uh, yeah, out behind me from where we’re sitting, you’ll see, uh, some intriguing evidence of the reality, uh, that increasingly it seems that the thought leadership in the city, and perhaps just m- more and more of the citizens, uh, have no conception of the ideas that were embedded in Adelaide in its origin story or in its subsequent history and in its potential.

And so, uh- From my window, we can see, uh, [01:23:00] the early stages of the emergence of what I think will be three new high-rise buildings by a, I think, relatively recently active developer in the city. I think just completed what was the first major project, uh, the Victoria Tower building, uh, just, uh, over the, from the market.

And that’s a developer who, uh, uh, in, in an interview, um, uh, I think in the, in daily publication, told something of, uh, his personal story, which I thought was very telling ’cause it, it was a very interesting classic, in a sense, migrant success story. Uh, coming from, uh, China, I think from Shanghai, arriving in Adelaide about 15 years ago and really taking to Adelaide because as was described, it seemed a place that was very [01:24:00] safe and secure, um, and a place that, uh, would be a, a good place to live in.

And so, uh, a choice was made. However, uh, the… As reported on arrival, uh, the, the new migrant was also scratching his head, uh, because, um, he couldn’t see the city. Where, where was the city? Where was Adelaide? And that of course turned out to be the fact that there was no high-rises. So there was no city. And so I, I think, uh, that, uh, response to arriving in Adelaide, uh, from a base in another country with a different kind of city, uh, really kind of [01:25:00] highlights perhaps in an extreme way, uh, both current thought leadership in government, in the Property Council, in the development community, but also in probably an increasing number of new arrivals.

Uh, the idea of a city has become normalized in much of the world. It’s not normalized in much of Europe, uh, but in much of the rest of the world, and certainly in a place like China. And so as a result, we have a new developer, a new entrepreneur, a new success story, a new migrant. I mean, it ticks a lot of, I guess, boxes that you might want to tick, but it’s, uh, someone who has a vision, and that vision is to build as many high-rises as possible, as quickly as possible, to create a city and I guess to accumulate personal success.

Steve Davis: Which risks wedging between that [01:26:00] and that civic inheritance. And I wonder if the people in power, uh, would, uh, disappoint Socrates, who said the unexamined life is not worth living. There doesn’t seem to be a lot of reflection on that civic inheritance. It’s not about being stale and not changing, but it’s about honoring the things that are important, that have a through line that can benefit all of us.

And to that point, just before we leave the Parklands and, and start winding up, the Premier, uh, in recent times in the argy-bargy over, um, our, uh, talk about me here, uh, displeasure at what’s happening with the ripping out of trees, uh, not just for a golf course, but also a MotoGP, et cetera. He said, “Oh, look, there’s 9,000 odd trees in the project area.

585 is a really small, um, uh, um, percentage of that.” But of course, Parklands management says, “Actually, no, the number is different. There’s a smaller number of trees, which makes that [01:27:00] a bigger bite of the pie,” et cetera. You’ve called this approach the deliberate doubt strategy. You’ve inflated the total tree count.

Oh, it makes the protester, “Oh, have we gone off the handle half-cocked?” Can you walk us through this doubt strategy? Because part of my mission at the moment is to strip naked all the different costumes that are worn to, uh, push criticism aside. It’s almost like the emperor’s new clothes. I want us to be able to point and say, “No, no, the Premier is naked,” but we need to understand the mechanism.

What tricks are being played? What, what mechanisms are in play to sow doubt?

Stewart Sweeney: W-well, again, I mean, I think the whole, the whole idea of using doubt really is a, a weapon, uh, in the war of influence and power and control. Uh, of course, really was pioneered, uh, by [01:28:00] the tobacco industry, uh, as they fought their decades-long campaign against the reality of the medical evidence on the impact of cigarette smoking on health and death.

Uh, and they very successfully, uh, used, uh, th-th-the idea of doubt, in a sense, the modest idea of doubt, and that, uh, that you don’t need to, um, necessarily persuade someone fully about your view, your opin- y-your opinion, your evidence. It can be sufficient, uh, to maintain the status quo and maintain the current trajectory by simply instilling small, medium, and large doubt in the minds of both a general population as well as people who may have concerns.[01:29:00]

Uh, doubt can do a lot of work for you, uh, and it’s much more achievable and easy perhaps to, uh, s- uh, provide argument, evidence, uh, put together words and phrases, uh, uh, that can do that work for you, and that can be sufficient. It’s not sufficient to change the world, but it’s sufficient to keep the world in the trajectory that’s already been established continuing to be dominant.

So it’s very powerful. Uh, and of course, that was all being pioneered by especially the ta-tobacco industry in a period before social media. Uh, and now with social media so important, that really absolutely, uh, supercharges the, uh, value and the power of doubt, uh, [01:30:00] exponentially. Uh, and I guess it’s now really part of the standard, uh, equipment in government, in the private sector, in any, uh, area of life where people, uh, basically want things to keep going along more or less as they are.

So it means that those people who, uh, have concerns about the status quo and who want to reflect on them, ha-have… think about them, consider changes, uh, have an extra challenge, an extra difficulty of dealing with the power of doubt. And obviously, you know, Peter Malinauskas, any political leader, uh, would, uh, uh, not be, in a sense, doing their job if they didn’t make sure that they surrounded themselves with people who were generating doubt, [01:31:00] uh, on a daily basis and articulating doubt in response to troublesome citizens.

Steve Davis: It’s the next exponential growth phase of that early media training we talked about in the ’70s with your Mike Rands. This is the next level. And, and because it’s ameliorated across so many different channels, every person and their dog, plus robots, uh, are fueling anger and glancing, uh, shots at each other.

The beautiful book Angertainment by Ed Koper, we talked about two episodes ago, is a must-read for people to understand what’s happening. So thank you for that. But also on, on this very point, InDaily had a story in the week we’re recording this, that there’s a Facebook page- Mm-hmm … that’s mocking the protesters, uh, as NIMBYs, not in my backyards.

It’s liked and followed by the premier. Half his ministry like it, but nobody in Labor admits that Labor’s behind it. This [01:32:00] is where you just get these, I wanna say dirty, but they, those cunning tactics might be a better choice of word, as part of muddying the water to just keep that doubt, uh fired up and then p- um, pushed out by the algorithms.

And if someone wants to just say, “Ah, mate, it’s only a game of golf,” they, they can find enough to satisfy them and dismiss these ragtag extremists as just that, to belittle their argument. And this rush to the next story, the next story, the next thing robs many of us of that intellectual space to pause and reflect.

Stewart Sweeney: True. B- I, I think, however, what’s interesting, uh, the protest, if you like, and protests, particularly about the Parklands, uh, th- that’s really transformed itself from protest into something more akin [01:33:00] to a movement. Um, it really has, from what I’ve seen of it, uh, expanded, uh, out of the narrow confines of the usual players, perhaps the usual suspects.

Um, that’s perhaps evident by the fact that the, uh, the Adelaide Parklands Association, which of course has been around for decades, uh, and has itself now got a new younger leadership, uh, uh, w- more social media savvy and have a broader vision of what they want to achieve. It, it’s now actually, uh, accompanied by two or three other, uh, embryonic organizations which have emerged out of the protest becoming movement.

Um, uh, a- and so the, uh, one of those, um, [01:34:00] uh, spontaneous formations, uh, and, and of course on social media, a, a web presence with, what is it, 8,000, 9,000, uh, people involved in it. Um- Uh, is, it, it has created a, a, a, a, a place where people who have these concerns can connect, can communicate, can coordinate, can organize spontaneous public actions, uh, in Rundle Mall, down at the Parliament building.

Uh, and so I suspect three, four months since the election, there’s probably never been a premier who has been so challenged by so many people so quickly in such a short time. And one of the astounding things I’ve noticed is the number of people communicating around those social media platforms who will say things like, who will literally [01:35:00] say, “I loved Peter Malinauskas, but now I hate Peter Malinauskas.”

That kind of, uh, change in opinion both recognizes, you know, Peter Malinauskas’ uh, success, which produced that election result, but also indicates the scale of, uh, protests becoming movement. Uh, now having said that, of course, we’re still faced with the reality of, uh, the first months of a four-year term.

We’re faced with the degree to which the SDA, the Labor right faction, which is Malinauskas’ base, is in pretty complete ascendancy within the Labor Party. And so people are having to juggle momentum and protests becoming movement with that reality, uh, [01:36:00] in terms of thinking, thinking ahead and the choice of options for the future.

Steve Davis: Second to last question. We moved a number of years ago to fixed term, four year, uh, terms. Mm-hmm. Yeah. Which we thought was great to save us from the blight of these early elections on a whim. Is that coming back to haunt us?

Stewart Sweeney: Yeah, very good question. Uh, and that was a, a Mike Rann initiative. And of course, it was time to hold those elections just as we were moving into Ma- Mad March period, so it combined fixed term with circus, um, as part of, I guess, uh, an idea of trying to, uh, open up more fully the possibility of sustained periods of government.

You know, uh, the, the, the mu- there was much talk of the, you know, the, the Dunstan decade, the Bannon decade, the Rann decade. I don’t think any of them quite achieved that, but we’ve now faced with the prospect of the, the Malinauskas 25 [01:37:00] years, um, in part because of the electoral system, I guess, uh, as well as lots, lots of other factors.

So yeah, uh, uh, it, it, it, it, it perhaps is now, uh, well, it’s just another reality that you have to just… That that’s part of the furniture.

Steve Davis: My last question, you are– you do have a couple of books on the go, if my research is correct. One of them is about South Australia and looking at our period of colonization up to 2036.

You would include references to different figures. I imagine Don Dunstan is in there somewhere. Are there any other people in South Australian history who have grabbed your imagination and attention as you piece together the story of who we are?

Stewart Sweeney: Well, I mean, well, I mean, I gu- I guess the, the people, the, the, the names that are usually mentioned, I mean, it starts with, uh, Wakefield.

Uh, uh, and, [01:38:00] and that’s quite interesting because South Australia, uh, think of London in the 1820s, 1830s, hotbed of radicalism. It was actually a hotbed where, unlike perhaps Adelaide today, it was filled with people who were wanting to change their world. Um, it was a world of feudalism, it was a world of absolutism, it was a world of the Church of England, uh, and it was a world, uh, that really, uh, still, uh, took you back hundreds of years in terms of the economy and society.

But there we were, London, London radicals, and as part of what they were th- thinking about, out of all of that came the idea of Adelaide. Um, and, uh, it was an idea which Had to go through political struggle, uh, m- grand meetings, uh, [01:39:00] grand debates, uh, about a whole new idea of colonization. So we d- really did get off to a, a radical flying start.

Uh, if the SDA had been around in London at that time, I suspect that the idea would never have got off the ground. So

Steve Davis: for-

Stewart Sweeney: And there’d be no Parklands. And there’d be no Parklands. So for me, I, I, I do think the, uh, w- uh, that start, uh, a- and as we contemplate, we’re now in the cusp really of the lead up to 2036, the bicentenary.

It, it, it, it still inspires me, uh, to think that that origin story is something we shouldn’t imagine is impossible to return to, uh, if, if not earlier, by 2036. Um, I think another name that w- w- would come to mind w- would be the [01:40:00] name, uh, Wainwright. Uh, Wainwright was really, if you like, the, the ideas guy, uh, behind Premier Butler who…

And, and then Premier Playford. The whole emergence of what became known as Playfordism, with its success in, uh, having a government and a state that increased its capability, you know, through taking over the electricity supply, developing the housing trust, uh, opening up essentially a transformation of the economy from, uh, pastoralism and agriculture to manufacturing.

A great success. Uh, it was, uh, uh, uh, Wainwright, uh, who was a public servant. He was the person who, uh, I think got onto what was then emerging in the UK by way of Keynesian thinking about the economy. [01:41:00] Uh, and he became the individual in the public sector who brought those ideas to the attention of, first of all, Premier Butler, who preceded Premier Playford, uh, and persuaded them that those were ideas about government and the role of government that could and should be expanded if you wanted to, uh, do the unthinkable, and to create, in effect, a whole different new economic structure and economic activity in a small regional economy.

Uh, so, uh- That’s encouraging in evidence about the power of ideas and even the power of, of one individual with some ideas. And one can only hope that that leaves [01:42:00] open the possibility that new ideas about a better South Australia, even within the confines of the realities we’re faced with, is still a possibility.

Steve Davis: And especially you’re alluding to there, premier leaders who would roll their sleeves up and, and get stuck into real things.

Stewart Sweeney: Yes.

Steve Davis: Uh, that confidence. I will just close by saying there’s a book being launched in September about Lady Galway, the, the wi- Marie Galway, the wife of our then, uh, governor, who became quite despised by the people of South Australia, but she was the counterbalance.

And it’s during World War I, she did every- she started the Red Cross here. She opened up the government house so that they could do things I’m not sure people like that exist these days. Everything seems buried under protocol and whatnot. There’s a distance, there’s a rubberiness, there’s [01:43:00] some sort of impermeable layer between those in power and boots on the ground doing things.

I could be wrong. I mean, Malley might get out with an ax himself. I don’t know.

Stewart Sweeney: Yeah, look, uh, uh, I mean, it is interesting because Adelaide has probably never been full of so many, uh, uh, entrepreneurs and startups, uh, uh, than ever before. Um, however, the question is turning all of the activity happening in those hubs dotted all around the city and i- in, in the regions, uh, to scale up, uh, those ideas is the challenge.

And in a way, I’m probably more confident that real change and real difference will come from there rather than from government. Uh, [01:44:00] a- and that for me is a, is a worry b- because our best moments have come from when, uh, thinking that was coming through government did play a positive role about real change.

Uh, I like to think we’re at or close to what you might call the low point of the nadir of government and openness to ideas that change our trajectory. Um, I like to think we’re at the low point. I mean, it’s a low point which can still extend for some time. But all of history, as I think I said earlier, does indicate that nothing is forever, and no trajectory continues endlessly in the direction it’s going.

Steve Davis: No things last [01:45:00] forever, including this interview. Stuart Sweeney, thank you for sitting down with me this morning and, and taking us through this patchwork quilt of the, the different elements that, uh, are bound together to create South Australia. I’ll put links to your writing and other sites, uh, on, uh, in our show notes so people can click through and find you.

And, uh, it’s been a pleasure.

Stewart Sweeney: Thank you.

Brett Monten: Now it’s time for the musical pilgrimage

Steve Davis: In the Musical Pilgrimage today, we’re going to feature a new song by John Schumann. It’s been, uh, performed by John Schumann and the Vagabond Crew. It’s called The Ragtag Extremist Blues. And John is with us once again, returning to Adelaide Today. John Schumann, welcome back.

John Schumann: Hi, Steve.

Steve Davis: I wish we were here under happier [01:46:00] circumstances, and you didn’t need to write this song, but, um, we’ll come to that in a moment. I am surprised that I have a new label because I, for a long time, have been a citizen of South Australia. I’ve long time been a voter. I actually even voted for our cuff- current, uh, Labor government.

Now I’m also a ragtag extremist, uh, a label I never thought I would have. Um,

John Schumann: it’s- Wear the badge with pride, Steve Yes … wear it with pride.

Steve Davis: Do you also share this badge?

John Schumann: Oh, oh, absolutely. Absolutely. I mean, look, I, I think in, in fairness to Pete Malinauskas, I think it was an uncharacteristic misspeak, as they say.

Steve Davis: Yeah.

John Schumann: Um, and I, I think, uh, he was, you know, specifically referring to those demonstrators, who I support actually, who broke down the fence and, and, you know, sort of moved into the area to [01:47:00] try to s- to, to prevent the, the trees coming down. Um, but unfortunately for, um, Pete, uh, it was a great idea and a great hook line, so, uh, I have grabbed it and expanded on it.

Steve Davis: Well, I mean, there’s a line of quiet citizens who never broke the rules. They call them extremists on the early evening news. It, I, obviously you can’t see that happen without your songwriting brain kicking into gear. What similarities are there or differences between this song that you’ve just written and the stuff that you were turning out, in particular, in the heyday of Redgum when you had so many things to swing an ax at?

What’s changed, if anything? Um,

John Schumann: well look, look, look, I, I, I think that I am probably, um, a little more measured, um, and that comes with age.

Steve Davis: Mm.

John Schumann: Uh, I think [01:48:00] that I am, uh, I think I’m a bit better at it. Uh, um, though I am, I’m, I’m not prolific, Steve. I, I wish I were able to write songs at the drop of a hat, and I can’t.

I’ll have an idea, and I will cult it and, I, I, you know, I’ll sculpt it and carve it and edit it and go back and rewrite and I will do that, you know, until it’s almost, you know, time to record. And then even when I record it, I, I will wish that I made some- changes. So it does take me time, but I think I’m a bit better at it, and I think I’m a, a little more measured and a little more tolerant now than I was back then

Steve Davis: Yeah, there’s certainly an economy in the, the word usage that I was listening to it again just before we, we went to air, and, you know, there is an understated power the [01:49:00] way that the messages get dropped.

You don’t have to drive out 3,000 miles to come back to make a point. And it may be- On, on a corrugated- That’s very nice of you … highway north of Port Augusta. It’s, I g- I guess that comes with age and experience too. So I mean, it’s probably a bit weird saying this to you, but this is amazing songwriting.

This is just, this, this shows you’re at the top of your game.

John Schumann: Uh, yeah, look, I think I’m okay at it. Um, I don’t think I’ve lost the touch. Um, a- and I, I’m, I’m glad. I think when I decide that I have lost the touch, then I won’t, I’ll, I’ll, I’ll put the pen down. Well, essentially. But, but, but I th- you know, I think it’s, you know, I think the magic still comes in from time to time.

As I said, Steve, I’m not prolific. Um, um, I wish that I were. Um, but I [01:50:00] like to think that what I do write has worth and power.

Steve Davis: Some of this comes from the way you ground this and many of your songs in the, the view from the ground, from, uh, one person. Uh, so here you’ve noted that among the people who are protesting what’s happening to our parklands are teachers, there’s a veteran, uh, the majority of them are taxpayers.

And what I find this song does that’s important is go against the lazy narrative that gets bandied around to dismiss these people as tree huggers. That, I mean, Leonard Cohen said, “In the particular, you find the universal.” I’m guessing that’s what you’re doing here in ha- having it centered around actual humans who are real and just normal, in inverted commas.

John Schumann: Well, yeah. Uh, I mean, that’s [01:51:00] been a sort of a mark of, of my work, uh, up till now, and I think it will be until I, I eventually lay the quill down. Um, but I, in this particular instance, I was, I was keen to frame the ragtag extremists as advocates and commerns, uh, uh, concerned cit- citizens from all walk of life.

What disturbed me a little bit about Peter’s use of the term ragtag extremist, and I bet he regrets that now, um, i- is that it, it was a, a- I- in a sense, I got the idea that it was a, um, an attempt to, uh, uh, denigrate and, and stifle dissent. Mm. Uh, to make, to make it d- dissent uncomfortable on the part of those who don’t ordinarily dissent.

Uh, and I am, um, very much of the belief that dissent is regarded [01:52:00] as a legitimate and necessary part of, uh, a democratic process. And I, I, I think all you need to do is have a look at the USA currently- Yeah … to see what happens when dissent is stifled and denigrated.

Steve Davis: We know that dissent’s important. I mean, that’s the voice of the people.

But have you ever come across a government that’s good at dealing with dissent? Have, have we actually had politicians who had, uh, used their two ears versus the one mouth, you know, that, that analogy, to actually listen well? Or does the machine take over and it’s just every now and then an issue comes up that draws some of us to the streets?

John Schumann: Look, I think that, I think that’s right. Um, I think that, uh, um, a government, uh, th- those who find themselves elected to conduct our, our either national affairs or our state affairs, find themselves inevitably, and without any perhaps wish on their part, [01:53:00] they find themselves cocooned, if you like, from the world outside.

And they come to believe their own bullshit.

John Schumann & The Vagabond Crew: Mm.

John Schumann: Um, and they come, uh, y- yeah, they, they, they… And, and because they believe their own bullshit, because they’re surrounded by a, a, you know, bunch of spin doctors, uh, they, they tend to get a bit angry when their judgment is called into question. Now, I don’t think that, um, they have any right to be angry if their, uh, judgment is called into que- question.

I don’t think Malinauskas will, to be frank. I, you know, I, I was quite pleased with him on his first election night when he, um, when, when people began to boo, uh, Stephen Marshall.

John Schumann & The Vagabond Crew: Mm-hmm.

John Schumann: And he shut them down and said, “Look, you know, Stephen is my political opponent. He’s not an enemy. He [01:54:00] served South Australia well and through a very difficult time, and he deserves our respect and thanks.”

And I thought that was very Obama-like.

Steve Davis: Yeah.

John Schumann: Uh, and I was, I was really quite pleased to hear that. Um, so I am hoping that the government actually pays attention to what is now a very significant, uh, volume of, of opposition to, um, the Mo- MotoGP. Look, the fact is that the, um, the, the golf course, that, that, that boat’s sailed.

Um-

TAS Theme: Mm …

John Schumann: and there’s nothing we can do about that. But we can prevent the MotoGP. And I think those of us who understand that the Adelaide Parklands are unique internationally, and that they are a gift from the past handed down to us for our care for the next and subsequent ge- generations, I [01:55:00] think we, we, we have an obligation to stand up, you know, r- raise a cautionary finger and say, um, “Just a minute now.”

And I think that’s what we’re doing now.

Steve Davis: I think you’re right, and I think it’s not just stick in the mud, don’t change anything. It’s choosing the things to keep that have enduring value. And science is learning more and more the importance of green space, full stop. Uh, nothing to do with being a hippie or anything of that ilk.

No.

John Schumann: No, of course not.

Steve Davis: And also, Tourism SA makes great mileage out of our beautiful, the scenic photos you get from our green ring that goes around the city. But one thing my colleague David Olney said on last episode, um, ’cause I’ve met Peter Malinauskas a couple of times and was impressed by a deep thinker.

John Schumann & The Vagabond Crew: Yeah,

Steve Davis: yeah,

John Schumann & The Vagabond Crew: absolutely.

Steve Davis: And, and so I am going through the double shock [01:56:00] of this brittle approach and stubborn approach, but David said, “Don’t play the man, because this is neoliberalism. This is what we’re dealing with.” Mm. And, and your line I think touches on that when you say, “Well, it’s concrete over country every time they come to choose.”

It’s almost like the default is what can we lay down with concrete so that we’ve got some sort of big edifice to prove we were here. Is, do you see it through that lens as well? ‘Cause you’re more studied in that realm of the, the political aspect from your own studies and, and being a commentator over the many years.

Is that what’s going on? Well,

John Schumann: uh, yeah, look, look, I, I’m puzzled actually. I mean, I’m not quite sure what’s going on, ’cause it, it, it is uncharacteristic, um, in my view. But, but I, I- What I, I do feel is [01:57:00] that, um, that the, the protection of the Park Lands, uh, um, uh, i- entails a breadth of vision and understanding that is not being demonstrated by, uh, the government currently.

That is that, that more people, I think, will come to visit a city that, um, i- is comfortable in its own skin- Mm … and doesn’t have to con- you know, sort of hold a, a, as I say in the song, “Events that rent attention.” Yeah. Um, you know, the, uh, like, um, uh, p- people who will come to marvel at our, our, our wonderful green spaces so close to the CBD, not necessarily, um, uh, because there’s a, there’s a golf event on.

Caitlin Davis: Yes.

John Schumann: Um, and I think, I think, you know, the, the tourism infrastructure, and I think the Park Lands are, are a part of that infrastructure, are too valuable to destroy for an [01:58:00] event that rents attention for three days. That’s kind of my, my position on it.

Steve Davis: Yeah. Look, uh, I, I’m in furious agreement. I wish I wasn’t, then we could have a feisty chat, John, but w- uh, our thoughts are aligned.

I do wanna draw home with this bit, ’cause this also talks to the political aspect going on here. Um, and it was a piece that, um, our previous guest, uh, Stuart Sweeney, talked about in analyzing the way the government sows doubt in the voices of opposition to gaslight, uh, opponents and make them double-guess themselves and peter out.

‘Cause you talk about the fact that, “Will we let the raging fire burn down to embers on the sand? The dying of the voices is exactly what they planned.” We don’t have a strong, um, uh, opposition. We don’t have much of an opposition at all. We don’t have a f- fourth estate, the journalism, uh, componentry- Oh

[01:59:00] there to sh- to hold government, uh, feet to the fire. So really, they just need to weather a few hiccups in the nightly news, uh, and it’s gone. It, it all, and- Yeah … and all the other MPs I’m noticing are flooding the zone with lovey-dovey little posts saying, “Oh, we’re opening discussion on a small park in a small suburb somewhere,” as if this consultation theater distracts us from what’s going on with the big tower, with MotoGP, et cetera.

So is this- This, this to me means the ragtag extremists listening in do need to dig in for the long run, if I can use that term with you. Uh, um, do you concur? Is that, is this a, a game of attrition and they’re hoping that our attention spans will peter out?

John Schumann: Oh, look, absolutely. And look, the, the, the sad fact is, Steve, that our attention [02:00:00] spans will wane, you know?

It is, it is a necessary and sufficient condition of the human condition. You know, you’ve, you’ve got things, you get angry, um, it’s like a magnesium flare. You, um, uh, you know, you protest and you make a statement, and you write your letter, and you have discussions in pubs and all of that sort of thing. But we are now, you know, a, a little under four years until the next election.

My fear is that they will proceed with this, um, you know, because Malinauskas has his own reputation attached. I mean, he’s made a deal with the MotoGP, he’s announced it nationally. He’s hardly likely to back down without a huge fight just because of his own reputation and his own sense of himself. I think it’s wrong- Yeah

that he will be like that, but I’m pretty sure it will be. And they will be relying on, you know, the, the, the, the, the, the, you know, the, the dying of the embers, you know, the dying of the vo- [02:01:00] voices, and how many of us will remember and vote with anger against the Malinauskas government in four years. I suspect few.

This is a pl- playbook. Stuart, Stuart was quite right. I mean, it, it, it’s, it’s a, you, you, um, you sow doubt. You, um, you, you, you sort of, ah, you kind of blur the lines of the discussion. You, you claim a mandate which, which I, I think is, um, is unsustainable. Um, you know, I- Mm … I did, uh, a fair bit of research before I wrote this song to find out to what extent there was a mandate, um, for this and, and, and to what extent Peter is true when he says, um, everybody knew.

Well, I think that’s bullshit. I call bullshit because, um, I couldn’t see or find Any evidence at all that prior to [02:02:00] the election we had any detail at all about what was going to ha- happen, what was going to happen to the, the, the tree, what was going to happen to the boundaries of the park, what, what sort of footprint the pits and a grandstand was going to entail, um, what sort of de- detailed tr- track plans.

I mean, there, none of that was all carefully sort of concealed in generalities and, and, and genial arm-waving-

Steve Davis: Mm …

John Schumann: until after the election. Uh, and, uh, um, you know, so, so, you know, on the mandate and the fact that everybody knew, I call bullshit.

Steve Davis: I agree, ’cause had I known, there was no way on God’s sweet earth my vote would’ve gone the way it did.

John Schumann: Well, yeah. I mean, I, I, I, uh, I, I, I would be the same. Uh, um, um, you know, I would’ve been, [02:03:00] I would’ve been out, uh, ma- manning the barricades if I had known about this. Of course, look, I mean, uh, the other interesting thing that I learned when I researched this was Jane Lomax-Smith asked the chief executive officer of the Motorsports board why they didn’t declare, you know, the number of trees and the footprint and all that sort of stuff that were going to be affected.

Mm. And he said, a bit foolishly from a professional’s point of view, uh, “We didn’t want to dis- upset the public.” Well, the public’s upset now, brother.

Steve Davis: Oh, they, we’re not, we’re seeing checkered flags

John Schumann: We are indeed. So, you know, I, I, I… Look, I would, if, if Peter, um, Malinauskas was big enough to understand that he is going against the will of the people, uh, [02:04:00] and, and reneges on the contract for the MotoGP and sends it to Tailem Bend, which is the appropriate place for it- Mm

then I would think he would be a politician, a leader, um, whom I would follow for quite a number of years to come, because that would be, that would be courageous, it would be an exercise in humility, and it would be, uh, him coming to, um, a late understanding that the government’s role is to protect the sort of heritage that constitutes the Parklands, not sell it off for a mess of pottage.

Steve Davis: Wow. John, this song, you’re gonna be playing at The Gov in August. What’s the deal there? And also proceeds are going, is it towards the Parklands Association?

John Schumann: Yeah. Look, the streaming and the downloads, we’re encouraging people, if they can, to go onto, I [02:05:00] think it’s iTunes, where you can buy it for a couple of dollars.

Steve Davis: Mm-hmm.

John Schumann: Um, but, um, all the proceeds from the streaming and any downloads are going directly to the Parklands Association. Uh, and we have decided, um, as a band and a ma- management to donate part proceeds from every ticket sold at The Gov on August the 29th also directly to the Adelaide Parklands Association.

Steve Davis: As if we didn’t need any other reasons to go and have a listen. John Schumann, thank you. You remind us that if you don’t fight, you lose. I think someone wise said that once. Uh, thank you again for what you’re doing and for being part of The Adelaide Show.

John Schumann: Thanks, Steve.

John Schumann & The Vagabond Crew: Gonna walk the creek lines, where the river red gums stand.

Now the shadows hide the song lines, on a bruised and broken land. Stories drifting softly through the grass, through the trees. They [02:06:00] dress it up as progress while they steal it by degrees. Well, it’s concrete over country, every time they come to choose. Mum’s sitting here with the chopping of a tree down.

Now we’ve got a golf course, let’s have a bike track. There go the Parklands, ragtag extremist blues.

Nana watches grandkids chasing magpies through the grass. There’s an old man in the twilight wondering how it got this far. Well, we let the raging fire burn down to embers on the sand. The dying of the voices is exactly what they planned. Well, it’s money over memories ’cause we don’t get to choose. I’m sitting here with a chop another tree down.

Now we’ve got a golf course, let’s have a bike track. There go the parklands, [02:07:00] rat-pack it.

There’s a teacher long retired. She taught kids to read and think. There’s a bloke who fought in Dorrigo Sham, still walking with a limp. There’s a line of quiet citizens who never broke the rules. They call them extremists on the early evening news. They’re the

ones who paid their taxes. They’re the ones who paid their dues. But I’m sitting here with the chop another tree down. Now we’ve got a golf course. Let’s have a bike track. Forget about the parklands. They’re extremists.[02:08:00]

If Colonel Light could see us now, I wonder what he’d say. Guess he’d hoped that down the years we’d keep the parklands

safe. But we traded shade for open ground, fences, tickets, gates. Rent that rents attention that he’s rolling in his grave. Motel nights and cafe meals for people passing through. I’m sitting here with the chop another tree down. Now we’ve got a golf course, let’s have a bike track. There go the parklands, bike track extremist cruise We gotta go for flag-tacking extremist moves[02:09:00]

It’s that bike track, backpack extremist blues. There go the parklands, bike track extremist blues

Steve Davis: John Schumann and the Vagabond Crew, and that is Ragtag Extremist Blues. Thank you, John. Now, something weird happened in my dreams of, be- the night before recording this. I had this vision that there was a band called The Grubby Mouse Kiss and the Axemen. I think it’s weird the way the subconscious gets [02:10:00] crazy ideas as it’s trying to pull disparate thoughts together.

Uh, and I don’t know. I, I thought maybe it’s a, a satire band, maybe it’s an indie band that started up as part of the protest movement. I don’t know. Anyway, uh, that wasn’t who we just listened to. We listened to John Schumann and the Vagabond Crew. Thank you very much, John. Thank you for listening through.

Um, I’ll, uh, rest up this throat now. I might have, I think, a panettone negroni from Nevernever just to soothe the vocal cords. Enjoy the rest of the weekend. Until next time, it’s good night from me, Steve Davis. Good night, Don.

AJ Davis: The Adelaide Show podcast is produced by my dad, Steve Davis. If you want to start a podcast or get some help producing creative content, talk to him.

Visit stevedavis.com.au. Thanks, AJ. I’m Caitlin Davis, and I agree with everything my sister said. But there’s one more [02:11:00] thing to say. If you’ve enjoyed this podcast, please leave a rating or a review, ’cause that will make my dad really happy. Oh, and one more thing. If you really, really liked it, please help a friend put The Adelaide Show on their phone.

Thanks for listening.

Buzz, buzz, I wanna be Adelaide,

TAS Theme: Adelaide, Adelaide