By MAMAMIA TEAM
During this election campaign, Opposition Leader Tony Abbott’s family have been front and centre. Two of his daughters, Bridget and Frances Abbott have, in particular, stepped firmly into the media spotlight.
These young women have spoken up in their father’s defence after embarrassing gaffes (‘sex appeal’, anyone?), had feature articles written about their lives in national newspapers, and today Bridget and Frances introduced the Opposition Leader to the stage, at the official launch of the Coalition’s election campaign.
Abbott’s daughters introduced their father to the stage, emphasising their close relationship with their dad: “Today we want to tell you about our dad. Like all dads, our dad has been known to embarrass us,” the pair said.
“Our dad is not just a politician, not just a Rhodes scholar, or an author, not just a volunteer firefighter or a lifesaver, not just a husband and a father. He’s something else as well,” they continued. “Tony Abbott is also a netball dad.”
The girls then shared anecdotes of their father watching them play from the sidelines at sports matches. “For us, he’s not just the guy on TV, he’s the man, along with our mum, who’s helped us become the women we are today.”
It was a genuinely lovely speech. Watching two girls who are clearly big fans of their dad, gush about a man who they so authentically want to see achieve his ambitions. But then again – is the endorsement of family members really all that relevant? After all, the Abbott girls aren’t exactly unbiased.
Here’s some video of the Coalition’s election campaign launch held earlier today:
Tony Abbott’s daughters are articulate, photogenic, and intelligent – and have undoubtedly played a role in softening their father’s image. Indeed, they seem to have played a large part (with a bit of help from mum, Margie and Abbott’s chief of staff Peta Credlin) in turning the public perception of their father’s attitude towards women around.
Top Comments
Abbot's daughters and Jessica Rudd are adults and can choose whether they want to participate and if so, to what extent. I disagree strongly however with the use of Josephine, a baby, in KRudd's campaign. Just distasteful.
Actually, it looks to me that Kevin's granddaughter is used to him and likes grandad feeding her. Politics aside, you would never see that from head of state elsewhere. I like it, even if I am not a fan of Kevin's.
I became quite alarmed when I saw Kerrie's comment re the LNP today re-emphasising that they would lower the tax-free threshold as this was the first I'd heard of it. Although I've been a very vocal proponent of abolishing the Baby Bonus even before the LNP's decision to do so and of the LNP's paid parental leave plan, I would be absolutely against these changes coming at the expense of our lowest-paid workers. It would defeat the whole purpose of trying to encourage parents (mainly women) back into work in the first place.
Thankfully after quite awhile searching online, I have seen no mention of this anywhere other than in a very slanted SMH article that was debunked in the comments. I did, however, find Abbott's statements from his May budget right of reply speech where he stated: "A Coalition government will keep the current income tax thresholds and the current pension and benefit fortnightly rates while scrapping the carbon tax". http://au.finance.yahoo.com...
The Conversation in May: "The pledge, made in his budget reply, is a major backflip from the line the opposition has consistently taken. It has previously said the compensation would not be needed when the tax was repealed, although it had promised that there would be some alternative tax and welfare help." https://theconversation.com...
So I'm not sure if there is some confusion because of his statements pre May 16, 2013 or this news just hasn't hit the media yet today but if anyone has any reference to the LNP saying anything differently please provide it here. This issue would be a very significant one for many voters and as low-income workers are already doing it tough as it is, care should be taken when labeling things as fact and thus scaring the piss out of them if links can't be provided.