He’s the lion in winter. At 69 the roar isn’t what it was. Nor the bluster nor the reputation for boorishness, pig’s arse and all that. It’s not about Jack any more, not about being a Master of the Universe, not about a ridiculously packed diary. It’s more about his kids and grandkids, and he seems OK with that.
He doesn’t have the money, power, influence or football club that he once did. But what John Elliott does have is a sense of perspective, a disinclination to look back with regret and a healthy philosophical approach to waking up every day and cracking into life. And that’s probably worth more than the $80 million paper money he once had.
We’re in his city office amid an array of elephants (he’s got 600), a Rubbery Figures model of him in the corner and various photographic reminders of his time at the top of business and football (including one of Elliott, Dick Pratt and Wes Lofts singing the Carlton club song after a victory).
A few days earlier he gave a eulogy at his mother’s funeral. “Doing eulogies is exceedingly tough, particularly for parents,” he says. “My father died six years ago — he was 91. Mum died at 93. I said on Friday, she never sought the limelight but she was always there. She did a lot of charity work. Big crowd at St Paul’s; overflowing with people.”
In the same week Elliott’s son, Tom, announced his engagement. “About time,” he says. “I get on well with all my children. I’m a grandfather four times and fifth one on the way.”
What sort of grandfather is he? Engaged? Involved? “Not greatly. I don’t think any of my children would trust me to babysit.” Why? “I wouldn’t be good enough. You learn certain things that you want to be good at and things that you don’t.”
You know your limitations. “I get on very well with my grandchildren. The oldest one’s about five. Two boys and two girls.”
Elliott hasn’t been overly burdened by this new trend towards grandparents looking after their grandchildren substantially while their parents work. “I’d be no good at all. I still go to work. (A friend) once said to me, ‘People like you and me, John, we never retire’. I don’t play golf because I’ve got a bad back from playing footy, I can’t pivot. I’d much rather come to the office and work than wander aimlessly around a golf course.”
I suggest there’s no point in retirement if you’re still hail and hearty. “That’s right. I’ve been my own boss since I was 31 so I’m used to motivating myself. But there are a lot of people who do as they’re told all their lives and they don’t have the amount of travel I’ve had … I’ve lived in New York, Chicago, London, south of France, travelled most cities in the world.
“I’ve never done the tourist thing much. But a lot of people don’t get to see the world until they retire and they’re forced to retire at a certain age, and as a result they want to (travel the world), which is a good thing. My father did that, being a banker. He didn’t see any of the world until after he retired.” Bit late in life? “I think that’s right. I couldn’t agree with you more.”
The crazy schedule might be over, but Elliott’s diary is filling up. He is planning to launch a football program on Channel 31. On June 1, he’s appearing, alongside Ita Buttrose and Steve Bracks, in a version of David Williamson’s play Emerald City at the Malthouse Theatre. He’s playing a “cranky old producer”. And he’s halfway through writing a book on politics.
With Tom, he runs a website called The John Elliott Report where he raps on politics, business and sport. Recent topics include the death of Osama bin Laden, the royal wedding, the record AFL television viewing rights and “Carlton’s Chris Judd’s outstanding game last Friday night”.
“We get 700 hits a day,” Elliott says. “I don’t think you ever make much money out of them … It gives me a good opportunity to voice my opinion on public affairs, which I am still very interested in, and have a bit of fun.
“If I go on Q&A, which I’ve done several times, I always give it a plug, and we find the next day there’s thousands of people making comments about Q&A.”
Elliott’s last appearance was with former Age columnist Catherine Deveny, with whom Elliott shared a cigarette backstage. “Some of her views are very odd, I think. I had to sit next to the Greens leader last time (Bob Brown). I don’t know where he gets a lot of his ideas from. All over the place.”
Neither the website nor the TV show will make him rich again, so he has to work. “I do a bit of commodity trading, things like iron ore out of Brazil, coal out of Indonesia into China and Asia. I get retained by a couple of financial groups to advise them how to run their business. I help people raise money through my private connections. It’s a varied sort of thing.
“When you’re running a big business you’re busy all the time. I go back and look at my diaries and I don’t know how I fitted everything in. I was federal president of the Liberal Party, chairman and chief executive of Elders, president of the Carlton Football Club. Now, I’m waiting for other people to make decisions, so I get a lot more spare time, which annoys me a bit.
“I’ll make about 10 calls after you go, then I’m waiting. Some of them mightn’t come back for a couple of days. I’ve got time to do good lunches. Maybe go and have a holiday on occasion. The best part of the world is the south of France. I had a house there for 10 years. And the Italian coast. We do that when we can.”
Is this life better for him physically? “Health-wise I’m good. I go to the physio once a month. My partner gives me all these vitamins to take, I get a check-up once a year. ‘You’re in perfect health’, the doctor told me a month ago, I said, ‘Well, I’m wasting my money coming here, aren’t I’?” What about the ciggies? “The condition of me going to him was that he wasn’t going to advise me on those sorts of things.”
If he has a regret, it would be never going into politics. “I would have liked to have gone in, but in my life I’ve never looked back, always forward. I couldn’t find a seat, because the then member for Higgins wouldn’t stand aside. I had the numbers then to lead the party, I know that, but if you don’t have a seat …
“And I was running Elders, which had over 20,000 employees. You couldn’t just sit round and wait for another opportunity. I had to make up my mind. I told the board. They gave me six months to see if I could get a seat. Wasn’t able to, so I said, ‘Forget about it, I’ll go back and run Elders’, which I did.”
He has lived in Carlton for 10 years. “Wonderful part of the world. Very cosmopolitan, Carlton. I’ve got a penthouse on the fourth floor, which overlooks Carlton Gardens and the city. Very pleasant.”
Does he walk into work? “I think I’ve walked in once. I do go for a walk — through the Botanic Gardens. I’m not one of those lunatics that runs round the Tan. It’s good to get exercise, but it’s so much better walking through the gardens.”
His partner of 10 years is Joanne Hurley, a flight attendant with Qantas. “She’s been flying 20 years. It’s an interesting relationship because she’s away three or four days a week. She goes to LA most of the time. We have a wonderful life together. She’s an exceptional person. I’ve never had an argument with her.” How does he achieve that? “I’m rational. I prefer to be rational rather than emotional. As long as people are logical, I never have arguments with anybody. Her politics and mine are pretty much the same; she’s conservative. She’s a star. My mother was very fond of her.”
When Elliott travels, do people recognise him? “Oh yes. I’m still well known in London and New York. The Australians come up, ‘What are you doing here, John’?” I did stay with one of the dukes 10 years ago and he had a huge home (in northern England), which was open to the public and we were staying with him for the weekend.
“I said, ‘I want to go and see what all the public are seeing’. He said, ‘I just don’t want to embarrass you, but when we walk through, a lot of people will say hello to me. I said, ‘Oh I expect that’. So we walk in there and there are 30 Australians going through and they all came over, recognised me, didn’t recognise him at all.”
He doesn’t look back much — onwards and upwards is better. “I’ve had a very fortunate and pretty successful life. The only mistake I really made was being pushed by several of my directors to make a bid for Elders, which in hindsight we shouldn’t have done. When we were cleaning out things in my parents’ home — the garage, of all things (I was supervising) — I came over 30 BRWs and all those magazines from the late ’70s to early ’90s. It was quite funny to see the pictures; you see yourself, your mates … I don’t read it all. But it was interesting.”
How did he think he was seen in those days? “Towards the late ’80s I was seen as the salvation of the Liberal Party. My public image was always good until I got charged by the NCA (National Crime Authority). It was a real mistake, which I didn’t recognise at the time, that it’s very difficult to be running a very large company and also be federal president of a political party because they get into you. I got charged … it was all about politics.”
Elliott took them on. “And we won. That doesn’t mean some mud doesn’t stick. Always
does.” A painful chapter. “Yeah it was tough. Cost me a lot of money too. About $10 million.”
He was once worth about $80 million but lost most of that. “Most of it was tied up in Elders shares. I never worked for money. Money is incidental. What you need is enough to live comfortably. I could do with a bit more at the moment. Could come any day. I really work because I want to drive and succeed.”
Was he offended at being portrayed as boorish? “No, I never worried about it. I didn’t like it, but there was nothing I could do about it. It was a bit like water off a duck’s back.”
He still loves the Carlton Football Club. “Hopefully we’ll make the top four this year. I still go to most of the games. I’ve barracked for Carlton since I was seven years of age, over 60?years. I was made a member since I was eight.”
Is he still welcomed at the club? “Oh yes. Stephen Kernahan, president, is a friend of mine. I have a lot of good friends there. I did 20 years there, which is the second-longest serving president of any club in the history of the AFL.”
Looking back, was 20 years too long? “Well, the biggest problem you’ve got, you’ve got to find someone to replace you. It’s one of the hardest jobs to find the right people for, because at a football club you’ve got to be able to speak well, you’ve got to be able to mix with, I suppose, the great unwashed public, and also deal with the Dick Pratts and Sam Smorgons of this life and you’ve got to have enough money that you are putting into the club because you can’t ask other people for money if you’re not putting in.”
His passion is collecting. “I’ve always been a collector; 17th-century oak furniture. All the (John) Gould birds. Parrots, cockatoos in Australia. I had a wonderful collection. Had to sell a lot when I separated from my wife, had to split it all up. And elephants. I’ve got 400 elephant ties and about 600 elephants.” Ever tempted to go on Collectors on the ABC? “No. I’ve been asked.”
He agrees that relationships are what’s important in life. “I have a fantastic number of friends dating back to my school days at Carey, Melbourne University … a lot of friends in business from Henry Jones right through. The most important thing is for the people who know you — it’s all very well for the press, who don’t know you at all, they form an opinion based on nothing much of the time, based on what they think you must be like … You can get up every morning and say, ‘Well, I always tell the truth and I’ve got a high level of integrity’. That’s very important.”
What wisdom is he passing on to his grandchildren? “Well, they all barrack for Carlton. The only three things my children (had to do) was vote Liberal, barrack for Carlton and always do your best. I said, ‘I’m not going to criticise you for anything you do in life; it’s up to you what you do, but you get more enjoyment out of achieving yourself than you will relying on your father’. I’ve told them I’m not going to leave them any money.”
How did they take that? “Well, they accepted it. My son said, ‘What are you going to do with it, dad?’ I said, ‘I’ll give it to the Anti-Cancer Council and the Heart Foundation’.”
It’s time to leave Big Jack to his day. He seems happy to step out of the spotlight. “Now Tom’s become a fairly public person … They used to say, ‘You’re the son of John Elliott’, now it’s ‘You’re the father of Tom Elliott’?”
» John Elliott will appear in Emerald City at the Malthouse Theatre on June 1. Tickets $200, $100 at www.onenight.org.au. Money raised goes to the performers’ charity of choice and the CorriLee?Foundation.
» The John Elliott Report is at jdereport.com.au