Yahoo Finance The Prime Ministers that came from Australia’s richest suburbs
During his time as prime minister, Malcolm Turnbull earned the nickname ‘Mr Harbourside Mansion’ from his own former chief of staff Peta Credlin.
And while Turnbull’s wealth is no secret, he isn’t the only top political leader to hail from a wealthy area.
New research from Roy Morgan has revealed that six of Australia’s post-war Prime Ministers come from Australia’s top 10 wealthiest electorates – and they’re all from the Liberal party.
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Turnbull topped the list, with the average per capita net wealth in Wentworth, the country’s wealthiest electorate, at $1,060,000, with median net wealth sitting at $338,000.
Following closely behind was Tony Abbott from the northern Sydney electorate of Warringah, where the average per capita net wealth was $992,000. Warringah is Australia’s second-wealthiest electorate.
The current prime minister Scott Morrison ranked third place, where the average per capita net wealth of Australia’s sixth-wealthiest electorate of Cook is $856,000.
The only two prime ministers that came from the bottom third of all electorates by wealth were Paul Keating, from Blaxland (108th-wealthiest) and Jullia Gillard of Lalor (131rd-wealthiest), both Labor politicians.
Here are Australia’s post-war MPs ranked by the wealth of their electorate:
Wentworth, Malcolm Turnbull, $1,060,000
Warringah, Tony Abbott, $992,000
Cook, Scott Morrison, $856,000
Higgins, both Harold Holt and John Gorton, $837,000
Kooyong, Robert Menzies, $775,000
Bennelong, John Howard, $543,000
Macquarie, Ben Chifley, $501,000*
Wills, Robert ‘Bob’ Hawke, $428,000
Griffith, Kevin Rudd, $426,000
Werriwa, Gough Whitlam, $385,000
Wannon, Malcom Fraser, $370,000
Blaxland, Paul Keating, $318,000
Lalor, Julia Gillard, $260,000
Here are all 151 electorates ranked by wealth:
Roy Morgan’s analysis comes as 2.7 million of Australians have stood down from their jobs and 3.8 million have had work hours reduced amid the business shutdown caused by the coronavirus pandemic.
“For many this will impact on their assets; around half a million people have already withdrawn money from their superannuation under special pandemic provisions. Consequently, it’s highly likely the gap between the richest and poorest Australians will continue to widen,” said Roy Morgan CEO Michele Levine.
Prime ministers are entrusted with governing for the whole country, she added, but Australia’s most recent prime ministers have hailed from some of Australia’s wealthiest areas.
“However there appears to be a significant disparity in the fact so many of our post-war leaders have represented such a narrowly wealthy slice of all the possible electorates. It is striking that this has been the case for the last three consecutive PMs,” she said.
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