The new Greens leader's plan to take on Australia's 'three death cults'

Sacha Barbour Gatt (0:08)

Hello, Sacha Barbour Gatt with you. Welcome to today's Deep Dive. Now, just before I get started, a reminder, the headlines is in a separate episode today. So if you click back in your feed, you can listen to all of today's latest news, and then you can dig in to this.

The Australian Greens have a new leader, with David Shoebridge taking over from Larissa Waters. After she announced last week, she was stepping down to look after her health. A former human rights barrister turned political brawler, the New South Wales senator has built his reputation taking on government secrecy, police accountability and corporate influence. In recent years, he spearheaded the campaign for digital rights, demanding an independent AI regulator, strict guardrails on big tech, and protection for human creators. But amid reports of deep divides within the party about who should take the Greens to the 2028 election, Shoebridge emerged victorious last week, to plenty of criticism. So what does he have to say about the state of the Greens right now and the choice to elect a male leader? In this wide-ranging chat, we also discuss how the party plans to cement itself as a true alternative to the major parties, being squeezed between the Greens' progressive base and Labor, and his stance on key issues heading towards the 2028 election. Here's my chat with David Shoebridge.

Senator David Shoebridge, welcome to The Briefing.

David Shoebridge (1:29)

Yeah, lovely to be here.

Sacha Barbour Gatt (1:30)

And in person. I know you've spoken to Chris multiple times over the screen, but you're actually here in studio. It's lovely to have you here.

David Shoebridge (1:36)

Yeah, it's been nice navigating my way through to the studio and actually seeing you all IRL.

Sacha Barbour Gatt (1:40)

So first off, congratulations, you're the new leader of The Greens. Do you feel prepared to take on the immense challenge in front of you?

David Shoebridge (1:47)

Well, absolutely. And I feel really, really lucky that I can do it together with Steph Hodgins-May as a deputy leader.

We've spoken about how we make this a really collaborative project, and not only with our leadership team, but with the whole of the Federal Party room. Looking forward to taking on the challenge. The messages I've received in the last week are this level of excitement about the project, about how our project here is not to make Labor slightly better or marginally amend this, but actually see The Greens as this force to actually replace the Labor Party and give people a sense of hope in politics. The messages I've been getting back from across the country have been really, really positive. I think people have been waiting for this.

Sacha Barbour Gatt (2:29)

Do you feel like the party's lost its way a little bit in recent years, with that being the direction?

David Shoebridge (2:33)

Well, I don't think the party's lost its way. I look at the work of the previous leaders of Adam Bant and Larissa Waters, and no one wanted Larissa to step away.

She had the rock solid support of the party room, really held together the party and built this kind of collective leadership model after the last election, which we had pretty challenging time. We lost Adam and some other lower house members, and Larissa did a great job bringing the team together. I feel really grateful for her, actually, because her model of showing leadership by bringing out the best in the team, I think is one of the reasons I'm here having this conversation with you now, because she really gave trust in the other members to get out and prosecute the case. And, you know, when it was out advocating against AUKUS and the insanity of spending the better part of $400 billion on nuclear submarines, or it's out there saying we should be taking on the tech bros, not giving in to the tech bros and the AI data centers, like Larissa really gave the whole team the ability to get out and do that. And I feel like we've got a great foundation to build on.

Sacha Barbour Gatt (3:31)

Do you feel like, though, that we are now, what, two-ish years out from the next federal election? We're pretty much in the midway point.

David Shoebridge (3:37)

It's always so rude talking about the next federal election.

Sacha Barbour Gatt (3:39)

I can't help it. I have to put something in place. I have to put a parameter around.

David Shoebridge (3:44)

No, it's true.

Sacha Barbour Gatt (3:45)

But do you feel that this is a good time for a change in leadership? I know that Larissa Waters stepped down due to health reasons and that wasn't forced internally from the party at all. But do you kind of go, well, if it was gonna happen, this is the best time and it gives us a lot of time to lead into 2028?