Industry and science minister Ed Husic has been dropped from the new federal government’s cabinet as Labor’s factions jostle for position amid a swathe of new MPs heading to Canberra.
Husic was widely admired in the startup and tech sector, implementing a series of reviews into the sector during his three years in the role, with the hope that in his second term as minister, they’d turn into action to bolster Australia’s digital transformation.
But Labor’s success in Victoria has seen that state’s Right faction, led by deputy PM Richard Marles push for a bigger slice of the ministry cake and Husic and Attorney-General Mark Dreyfus have been sacrificed to make way for them.
Victorian MPs Sam Rae and Daniel Mulino are expected to join the ministry, along with NSW senator Tim Ayres when the Labor caucus meets today to endorse prime minister Anthony Albanese’s new cabinet ahead of their swearing in next week.
On ABC radio on Friday morning, health minister Mark Butler described the decision to drop Husic and Dreyfus as “tough”.
“They can be tough, and they’ve been tough for Mark Dreyfus and Ed Husic, who I’ve served with for a long time, but that’s how democratic processes work,” he said.
“A government’s got to balance stability with some renewal, and I think we’re going through that process right now.”
Labor elder and former prime minister Paul Keating issued a furious statement saying that dumping of Husic, a Muslim, and Dreyfus, a Jew shows “poor judgement, unfairness and diminished respect for the contribution of others”, calling the Victorian Right “a faction demonstrably devoid of creativity and capacity”.
“As the cabinet’s sole Muslim member, Husic’s expulsion from the ministry proffers contempt for the measured and centrist support provided by the broader Muslim community to the Labor Party at the general election,” Keating said.
“And for what? To keep up some notional proportional count between factions and elements of the Right of the party between states, in this case between representatives of New South Wales and Victoria.”
The loss of the science minister “represents an appalling denial of Husic’s diligence and application in bringing the core and emerging technologies of the digital age to the centre of Australian public policy” Keating said.
“And to round out the day, the factional lightweights also dumped the cabinet’s most effective and significant Jewish member, the attorney general Mark Dreyfus.”
Keating criticised Albanese for not intervening to save Husic, who won his seat of Chifley, in Sydney’s west, which he’s held since 2010, with 70% of the two-party preferred vote.
“The prime minister has recently made notable ‘captain’s calls’ in a number of otherwise rules-based pre-selection ballots,” Keating said.
“His non-intervention in respect of a New South Wales minister on this occasion is, in effect, an endorsement of a representative of another state group – in this case, the Victorian Right faction led by Richard Marles.”
Keating had flagged Husic as a future Labor prime minister.
VC investor and industry leader Alan Jones was filled with praise for Husic and his support for innovation, arguing the decision to drop him from cabinet “for the stupidest of reasons” shows the government’s rhetoric on innovation doesn’t match its actions.
Alan Jones
“Ed hasn’t been the kind of minister who shows up to deliver a 10min think bubble on stage and then disappear into a huddle of staff. He’s there to listen, he asks smart questions, and would rather the limelight be focused on a scientist or engineer than himself,” Jones said.
“It’s not just the 2025 Albanese government that doesn’t really care about science and technology though. Australian governments on both sides have had a decades-long problem with churning through short-term appointees in science and technology portfolios, usually filling them with careerists for whom it’s just a stepping stone to a more powerful ministry.
Jones said Husic engaged with the tech industry “because he genuinely cares about it and like me, believes it’s key to our economic and social future.”
“Please don’t tell me Australia is serious about becoming a contender in science and technology, about creating advanced technologies for export and the high-value jobs they will create,” he said.
“We obviously care more about short-term inter-party factionalism than we do the innovation industries.”
It remains to be seen who the tech industry will have to deal with in the new Labor government, but after the Coalition used the portfolio like a FIFO donga, with three industry, science and technology ministers in three years, one thing everyone is hoping for is stability and an understanding of the sector’s needs. Husic got it, although his colleagues in cabinet seem less enthused about the future of tech.
Hopefully whoever’s next will believe in digital transformation too.
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