A Premier's State

"In May 1994, while I was going through pre-selection for the seat of Williamstown, I sat down at my desk at home and I wrote a note. I was thirty-nine years old and in that note I mapped out what I hoped would happen in my life." By the time he was forty-eight, Steve Bracks had achieved the goal he'd set himself nine years earlier. He was Premier of Victoria. In A PREMIER'S STATE he reflects on his ambition to make a difference, and how he reached his goal. He talks about his early childhood growing up in a conservative but impassioned family that supported the Democratic Labor Party, and about his gradual evolution from left-wing university radical to pragmatic centre-right Premier. He reveals for the first time the background to his decision to take the party's leadership from his friend John Brumby in 1999-then to hand it back to John in 2007 when he sensationally resigned from office. He gives insights into how to run a successful government and how to manage the factions, and talks about everything from the impact of public life on his family, to forming minority government with independents. This wide-ranging, thoughtful and incisive look at Steve's life and his career encompasses not only his thoughts on the Labor Party, but at the state of Australian politics generally, both during Steve's time in politics and after it.

Steve Bracks is the former Australian premier of Victoria; an advisor to the prime minister of East Timor, Xanana Gusmao; the chair of the superannuation fund Cbus; and an advisor to KPMG. He is also a nonexecutive director of numerous nonprofit and industry bodies, including the Deakin Foundation, the Bionics Institute, Jardine Lloyd Thomson Australia, the John Button Foundation, the Union Education Foundation, and the Beirut Hellenic Bank. Ellen Whinnett is a journalist with more than 20 years experience and the deputy editor of News Ltd’s Sunday Herald Sun. She is the recipient of numerous journalism awards, including a Walkley award for news reporting.