Fremantlebiz - Paul's Letter from Australia

Mr Packer packs it in

I don't know much about Kerry Packer except what I read in the newspapers. The Australian newspaper had gone to press yesterday when it was announced he had expired. By then much of the Australian media was going into a sort of swoon. This is reflected in The Australian this morning. There is page after page of sycophantic reports by aging journalists, all who seem to have suckled on his financial teats at one time or another. This is curious because the paper is not in the Packer stable. It's a vehicle for the Murdoch family. However, Bill Leak's cartoon seemed to have all this platitudinal excess weighed up.

Mr Packer was Australia's richest man. Seven billion big ones they reckon. I don't suppose anyone knows for sure how much he had, but seven billion looks like this: $7,000,000,000,000. Chicken feed really, because he was only 94th on the list of the world's richest people.

All his mates, including the Prime Minister reckon he was a good bloke, and a closet philanthropist. It is claimed that he gave away one hundred and fifty million dollars during his lifetime. That amount looks like this: $150,000,000. He was 68 when he died so that means he donated about $2.2 million dollars to charity for each year of his life. Not much when compared to the $7,000,000,000,000 smackeroos he ended up playing with.

Mr Packer's first lucky break was when he was born into a wealthy family. A very wealthy family. One with a media empire. It must help to have a big inheritance when setting out in life. According to Philip Adams who did a piece on him titled "Goanna tales" a few weeks ago, Mr Packer always regarded himself as less than academically talented. When it came to things like books, he was a pictures man rather than words.

Of course this doesn't matter at all when you have seven billion dollars and are surrounded by sycophants. From the tone of Mr Adam's article I felt we were being told that Mr Packer was not going to be around much longer. I wasn't really surprised when I heard the news of his death on the radio mid-morning yesterday.

The bloke has led a controversial life. In the early 1980s he became forever known as the "Goanna," a media code name for an alleged Mr Big during a NSW investigation into organised crime. The allegations were not sufficiently substantiated for formal charges, but the stigma remained through to the end of his life. This was not helped by his addiction to gambling of immense sums, and a hobby of buying up casinos, including the one here in Perth recently.

The man was not blessed with film star looks. My guess is that this misfortune inspired the nickname. It was probably to do with the beady eyes. However all the other features of his face seemed to be mismatches, and as he aged they became more conspicuous. Plus he suffered from carcinogenic looking lesions at various places, including his lips. It would probably have been a long time since he experienced a French kiss. It seems ironic that he was the power behind the major beauty and cosmetic monthly magazine The Australian Woman's Weekly and no one there could help him.

He was not a well man. Possibly because he was a heavy smoker. Internal plumbing a mess. Lots of heart attacks during his latter life. The most celebrated of these was at a 1990 polo match when he became almost dead for several minutes.

When I heard of his death yesterday, without any prompting I immediately remembered the quote following his past revival, "I've been to the other side and let me tell you son, there's fucking nothing there." I see today this has been now modified by many sectors of the world's prestigious media to read, "The good news is there's no devil. The bad news is there's no heaven. There's nothing." How pathetic. They are also referring to him as "big feller." That's pathetic too. Call a Goanna a Goanna and be done with it.

Then a few years ago one of his employees, his private helicopter pilot, donated a kidney. That was a strange business. I guess it was good while it lasted.

The gambling and media empire is now to be run by Mr Packer's lad James, who is in his mid-thirties. Son of Goanna. He's a smoker too. I suspect he is the main reason why the media sycophants and politicians have been pouring on the platitudes. Even the disgraced Alan Bond has made an effort. Naturally they don't want to thought of as sucking up to James and what is now his seven billion bucks. They just loved his dad Kerry because he was - well he was so loveable.

I guess the Packer empire is at a crossroads. All that stuff about the dreaded third generation and how businesses fail. Hard to ignore. All his competitors might be saying nice things today, but...

If I could give some advice to James and his seven billion big ones I would say, "Quit smoking and avoid raw oysters"

© MMV Paul R. Weaver.

About the writer

Check out each month's subject index on the Calendar Page for my "common-man" monologues about survival in 21st century Australia – plus a little history occasionally. An original essay is added most days.

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