Culture

Stan Grant Revealed He’s Open To Entering Federal Politics On ‘Q&A’ Last Night

"If you want to make a change, you need to get in and make a change."

by Alex McKinnon  2 February 2016

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Last night marked the first Q&A of the new year, and it boasted a line-up mercifully bereft of the junior government ministers and dubious think-tank representatives that so often make Q&A an exhausting experience, rather than an enlightening one. The panel was made up almost entirely of recipients or finalists in the 2016 Australian of the Year awards, including St Vincent’s Hospital Director of Emergency Professor Gordian Fulde, slam poet and performing writer Manal Younus, youth educator and executive director of Sydney Story Factory Catherine Keenan, and former Chief of Army David Morrison.

With Guardian Australia Indigenous Affairs editor Stan Grant rounding off the panel, the five covered topics as weighty and varied as the Republic, the problematic nature of celebrating Australia’s national day on January 26, the Sydney lock-out laws, the ongoing effects of racism and domestic violence, society’s predisposition to listen more to men of privilege like Morrison than people from the marginalised communities he hopes to empower, and the consequences that arise from embedded cultures of socialised drinking and gambling in sport. It was a hell of an episode to kick off 2016, and we’ll likely be missing the tone of respectful and thoughtful debate this time next week when normal transmission resumes and politicians come galumphing back to the show.

The only narrowly political moment in the entire program came towards the end, when an audience member asked Grant whether, given the overwhelming response to his Ethics Centre speech on racism in Australia that went viral just before January 26, he would consider a career in politics.

That question gets asked a lot of panellists on Q&A, and the answer is almost invariably “no”. But Grant admitted the response to his speech had given him a lot to think about, and while it was only a thought bubble, he would consider entering the political arena to improve the lot of Indigenous Australians. 

“Is it in my thoughts? Yes it is, but it is just a thought … Federal politics, potentially advocacy, potentially staying in the media and continuing to do what I do — in some way, having an obligation to honouring the words of that speech. This is a great country and my people still suffer in this country, and if I can make a contribution to that, then I think it behooves me to do that. But at this stage there’s no flesh on the bone. I’m not saying I’m entering federal politics, or I’m going to–”

At this point, host Tony Jones cut in: “You might get a few few phone calls tomorrow.”

“The Indigenous issue is a national project; it is beyond partisan politics. Every single time we open Parliament, we open it with an Indigenous Welcome to Country, and we disappear,” Grant said. “It has taken over 100 years since Federation to put an Indigenous person on the front bench of either major party, in Ken Wyatt. We are so underrepresented, and Noel’s right; if you want to make a change, you need to get in and make a change.”