He’s a multi-multi-multi-millionaire who likes to come across as a man of the people, and today he was doing his best to prove that he is.
Renowned train spotter, public transport user and Prius driver Malcolm Turnbull was out in his electorate of Wentworth today physically removing his campaign posters from lamp posts with one other helper.
I spotted Turnbull striding along the streets with requisite equipment to remove the posters that were then dumped in the back of a rental ute driven by an assistant.
Man of the people and member for Wentworth, Malcolm Turnbull, in campaign mode
When asked if Turnbull was actually doing the hard yakka himself, the driver said “yes”, with a big grin.
After a short-lived dummy spit in which he announced he was quitting politics before quitting on quitting, Turnbull won almost a 10 percent swing and netted 60 percent of the vote, which explains why he looked like the cat that got the canary on Q&A on Monday night.
ALP rival Steven Lewis had almost the same percentage swing against him winning just 14,416 of the votes to Turnbull’s 41,688.
Turnbull’s leadership intentions indubitably will have been reignited by the unequivocal victory. But he will have to bide his time following Coalition leader Tony Abbott’s amazing resurrection of the party’s failing fortunes in the nine months since he beat the eastern suburbs silvertail to the top spot.
Tonight, the man from Point Piper is taking on regular rival Tanya Plibersek, the ALP’s member for Sydney, at a “politics in the pub” event at The Clock Hotel in Surry Hills.
Plibersek had a 4.62 percent swing against her and scored slightly more than 26,000 of the votes cast in the inner city electorate.
Should be feisty.
