The Dead Can't Sue

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Sharpen your knives and joins us as we dissect the recipe for Joh Bjelke-Petersen's political magic and figure out how he held onto the premiership for decades, despite his truly staggering corruption. 

Then we dine out on Joh’s downfall (could the Fitzgerald Inquiry report be the read of 1987?!), before asking whether Joh really deserves his reputation as Australia's number one political villain. 

Plus, Leigh comes for the fourth estate (hey, that's us!). 

SOURCES 

Bjelke-Petersen, Joh. The Joh Tapes on Leadership. Interviews produced by Richard Lancaster and Barry Martin. Seven-part video oral-history collection. Accession 720849. John Oxley Library, State Library of Queensland, Brisbane. 

Bjelke-Petersen, Joh. Don’t You Worry about That! The Joh Bjelke-Petersen Memoirs. North Ryde, NSW: Angus & Robertson, 1990. 

Queensland. Commission of Inquiry into Possible Illegal Activities and Associated Police Misconduct. Report of a Commission of Inquiry Pursuant to Orders in Council. Chaired by G. E. Fitzgerald. Brisbane: Queensland Government Printer, 1989.  

Megarrity, Lyndon. “The Lion and the Fox: Whitlam, Bjelke-Petersen and the Queensland Electorate, 1961–1975.” ANU Historical Journal II, no. 3 (2022): 23–52 

Robinson, Shirleene. “Homophobia as Party Politics: The Construction of the ‘Homosexual Deviant’ in Joh Bjelke-Petersen’s Queensland.” Queensland Review 17, no. 1 (2010): 29–45 

Walter, James. “Johannes Bjelke-Petersen: ‘The Populist Autocrat.’” In The Premiers of Queensland, edited by Denis Murphy, Roger Joyce, Margaret Cribb, and Rae Wear, St Lucia, QLD: University of Queensland Press, 2003. 

Wear, Rae. “‘Never-Ending Story’: Public Accountability and Public Administration Reform in Queensland since 1989.” Queensland Review 18, no. 2 (2011): 175–89 

Wear, Rae. Johannes Bjelke-Petersen: The Lord’s Premier. St Lucia, QLD: University of Queensland Press, 2002. 

Whitton, Evan. The Hillbilly Dictator: Australia’s Police State. Crows Nest, NSW: ABC Enterprises, 1989. 

Williams, Paul D. “Leaders and Political Culture: The Development of the Queensland Premiership, 1859–2009.” Queensland Review 16, no. 1 (2009): 15–34 

• Hosted by Alecia Simmonds and Leigh Boucher
• Supervising Producer: Hannah Reich
• Producer: Hannah Jose
• Video producer: Christian Harimanow
• Executive Producers: Clare Rawlinson and Eric George
• Head of ABC Audio on Demand: Jessica Radburn
• Theme: Martin Peralta
• Artwork: Gabriel Virata-Alves

Queensland's longest-serving premier is basically the bogeyman of Australian politics, a police-loving proto-Trump 'hillbilly dictator' the Sunshine State is still recovering from. 

This week we retrace Joh’s rise from fail son to peanut farmer, and finally to the highest office in Queensland.  

Plus... Joh marries a woman named Flo and then begins calling her ‘mum’ (not weird at all). 

Also, while you’re here, please do our listener survey.

SOURCES 

Bjelke-Petersen, Joh. The Joh Tapes on Leadership. Interviews produced by Richard Lancaster and Barry Martin. Seven-part video oral-history collection. Accession 720849. John Oxley Library, State Library of Queensland, Brisbane. 

Bjelke-Petersen, Joh. Don’t You Worry about That! The Joh Bjelke-Petersen Memoirs. North Ryde, NSW: Angus & Robertson, 1990. 

Queensland. Commission of Inquiry into Possible Illegal Activities and Associated Police Misconduct. Report of a Commission of Inquiry Pursuant to Orders in Council. Chaired by G. E. Fitzgerald. Brisbane: Queensland Government Printer, 1989.  

Megarrity, Lyndon. “The Lion and the Fox: Whitlam, Bjelke-Petersen and the Queensland Electorate, 1961–1975.” ANU Historical Journal II, no. 3 (2022): 23–52 

Robinson, Shirleene. “Homophobia as Party Politics: The Construction of the ‘Homosexual Deviant’ in Joh Bjelke-Petersen’s Queensland.” Queensland Review 17, no. 1 (2010): 29–45 

Walter, James. “Johannes Bjelke-Petersen: ‘The Populist Autocrat.’” In The Premiers of Queensland, edited by Denis Murphy, Roger Joyce, Margaret Cribb, and Rae Wear, St Lucia, QLD: University of Queensland Press, 2003. 

Wear, Rae. “‘Never-Ending Story’: Public Accountability and Public Administration Reform in Queensland since 1989.” Queensland Review 18, no. 2 (2011): 175–89 

Wear, Rae. Johannes Bjelke-Petersen: The Lord’s Premier. St Lucia, QLD: University of Queensland Press, 2002. 

Whitton, Evan. The Hillbilly Dictator: Australia’s Police State. Crows Nest, NSW: ABC Enterprises, 1989. 

Williams, Paul D. “Leaders and Political Culture: The Development of the Queensland Premiership, 1859–2009.” Queensland Review 16, no. 1 (2009): 15–34 

• Hosted by Alecia Simmonds and Leigh Boucher
• Supervising Producer: Hannah Reich
• Producer: Hannah Jose
• Video producer: Christian Harimanow
• Executive Producers: Clare Rawlinson and Eric George
• Head of ABC Audio on Demand: Jessica Radburn
• Theme: Martin Peralta
• Artwork: Gabriel Virata-Alves

Referendum won, tick. Next up, Faith has a new fight on her hands: one that includes exposing the sugar giants who profited from her father’s abduction and unpaid labour. Watch out. 

But first, she must return to the island paradise where her father grew up: Ambrym. What she finds there will spur her on for decades of fighting. 

Alecia and Leigh get fired up as they retrace Faith’s staggering journey for justice and connect Australia’s 1800s slave history to farming practices still in operation today. 

SOURCES

Marilyn Lake, Faith Bandler, Gentle Activist, Allen and Unwin, 2002  Ryan Butta, Blackbirding, Black Inc, 2026 

Tracey Banivanuar Mar, Stabilising violence in colonial rule: Settlement and the indentured labour trade in Queensland in the 1870s, Liverpool University Press, 2017 

Tracey Banivanuar Mar, Decolonisation and the Pacific: Indigenous Globalisation and the Ends of Empire, Cambridge University Press, 2016   Faith Bandler and Len Fox, The Time was ripe: a history of the Aboriginal-Australian Fellowship (1956-69), 1983 

Faith Bandler oral history interview by Carolyn Craig, MLOH 307, Mitchell Library, State Library of New South Wales 

Ryan, M. D. J. (2024). ‘A great many of them die’: Sugar, race and cheapness in colonial Queensland. Journal of Agrarian Change, 24(2), e12574.

• Hosted by Alecia Simmonds and Leigh Boucher
• Supervising Producer: Hannah Reich
• Producer: Hannah Jose
• Video producer: Christian Harimanow
• Executive Producers: Clare Rawlinson and Eric George
• Head of ABC Audio on Demand: Jessica Radburn
• Theme: Martin Peralta
• Artwork: Gabriel Virata-Alves

Faith Bandler was the daughter of a slave, who became the face of the 1967 referendum and a celebrity in the process. And she did it all while keeping house and raising kids. 

Few know her name now, yet Alecia argues that Faith is just as important to the fight for racial justice in Australia as Martin Luther King was to the USA. 

Despite many people’s assumptions, Faith was not a First Nations Australian. So how did a South Sea Islander woman, with Indian and Scottish heritage, become the face of one of Australia’s biggest Indigenous causes?   

Special thanks to ABC's senior cultural advisor Miriam Corowa and Waskam Emelda Davis. 

SOURCES

Marilyn Lake, Faith Bandler, Gentle Activist, Allen and Unwin, 2002  Ryan Butta, Blackbirding, Black Inc, 2026 

Tracey Banivanuar Mar, Stabilising violence in colonial rule: Settlement and the indentured labour trade in Queensland in the 1870s, Liverpool University Press, 2017 

Tracey Banivanuar Mar, Decolonisation and the Pacific: Indigenous Globalisation and the Ends of Empire, Cambridge University Press, 2016   Faith Bandler and Len Fox, The Time was ripe: a history of the Aboriginal-Australian Fellowship (1956-69), 1983 

Faith Bandler oral history interview by Carolyn Craig, MLOH 307, Mitchell Library, State Library of New South Wales 

Faith Bandler, ASIO file: Mitchell Library 3/55. FCAATSI 

• Hosted by Alecia Simmonds and Leigh Boucher
• Supervising Producer: Hannah Reich
• Producer: Hannah Jose
• Video producer: Christian Harimanow
• Executive Producers: Clare Rawlinson and Eric George
• Head of ABC Audio on Demand: Jessica Radburn
• Theme: Martin Peralta
• Artwork: Gabriel Virata-Alves

To rise to stardom, our OG diva needed a rebrand, so she trades her given name - Helen (not exactly giving superstar, no offence to all the Helens) - and takes on Nellie Melba.  

In the second part of her story, Nellie becomes the Kylie Minogue of her time, charming the masses in London's best theatres and touring the world drumming up support for the war effort (with some suspicious accidents along the way). 

But beneath the glamour, Nellie is in a domestic war of her own. Leigh and Alecia try to make sense of how she faced her own battles, and then how she came to her own sudden, somewhat peculiar death. 

Warning: This episode discusses intimate partner violence.

SOURCES

Melba, Nellie. Melodies and Memories. London: Thornton Butterworth, 1925. 

“Melba Remembers—An Interview with Dame Nellie Melba.” The Home: An Australian Quarterly 3, no. 2 (June 1, 1922) 

“Coombe Cottage: Dame Nellie Melba’s Home—Third of a Series of Studies of Notable Australian Homes.” The Australian Home Beautiful: A Journal for the Home Builder 6, no. 6 (June 1, 1928) 

“In Dame Nellie Melba’s Paris Home.” The Home: An Australian Quarterly 11, no. 7 (July 1, 1930) 

Campbell, Rachel M. “Dame Nellie Melba: Celebrity and the Portrait.” Context: A Journal of Music Research, no. 40 (January 2015): 69–79. 

Modjeska, Drusilla, Susan Dermody, and John Docker, eds. Nellie Melba, Ginger Meggs and Friends: Essays in Australian Cultural History. Malmsbury: Kibble Books, 1982. 

Blainey, Ann. I Am Melba: A Biography. Melbourne: Black Inc., 2008. 

Wainwright, Robert. Nellie: The life and loves of Dame Nellie Melba. Allen and Unwin: Sydney, 2021 

Davis, Richard. Nellie Melba: The legend lives. Mile End: Wakefield Press, 2025

• Hosted by Alecia Simmonds and Leigh Boucher
• Supervising Producer: Hannah Reich
• Producer: Hannah Jose
• Video producer: Christian Harimanow
• Executive Producers: Clare Rawlinson and Eric George
• Head of ABC Audio on Demand: Jessica Radburn
• Theme: Martin Peralta
• Artwork: Gabriel Virata-Alves

Opera star Dame Nellie Melba is the face of our $100 note, and the inspiration for the famous Peach Melba dessert. In short she’s an icon – one of Australia’s original divas. But how did she go from young Melbourne tomboy to domestic abuse survivor and then global superstar? 

Leigh dives deep on Nellie’s life of tragedy and drama, worthy of its own opera, and proves to Alecia this diva is a little saltier than the sweet pudding named in her honour. 

Plus, we explore the origins of long service leave and how Nellie falls flat on her face during her first audition in Europe. 

Warning: This episode discusses intimate partner violence.

Melba, Nellie. Melodies and Memories. London: Thornton Butterworth, 1925. 

“Melba Remembers—An Interview with Dame Nellie Melba.” The Home: An Australian Quarterly 3, no. 2 (June 1, 1922) 

“Coombe Cottage: Dame Nellie Melba’s Home—Third of a Series of Studies of Notable Australian Homes.” The Australian Home Beautiful: A Journal for the Home Builder 6, no. 6 (June 1, 1928) 

“In Dame Nellie Melba’s Paris Home.” The Home: An Australian Quarterly 11, no. 7 (July 1, 1930) 

Campbell, Rachel M. “Dame Nellie Melba: Celebrity and the Portrait.” Context: A Journal of Music Research, no. 40 (January 2015): 69–79. 

Modjeska, Drusilla, Susan Dermody, and John Docker, eds. Nellie Melba, Ginger Meggs and Friends: Essays in Australian Cultural History. Malmsbury: Kibble Books, 1982. 

Blainey, Ann. I Am Melba: A Biography. Melbourne: Black Inc., 2008. 

Wainwright, Robert. Nellie: The life and loves of Dame Nellie Melba. Allen and Unwin: Sydney, 2021 

Davis, Richard. Nellie Melba: The legend lives. Mile End: Wakefield Press, 2025 

Woollacott, Angela. To Try Her Fortune in London: Australian Women, Colonialism, and Modernity. Oxford University Press USA, 2001. 

• Hosted by Alecia Simmonds and Leigh Boucher
• Supervising Producer: Hannah Reich
• Producer: Hannah Jose
• Video producer: Christian Harimanow
• Executive Producers: Clare Rawlinson and Eric George
• Head of ABC Audio on Demand: Jessica Radburn
• Theme: Martin Peralta
• Artwork: Gabriel Virata-Alves

While the blokes were off on the frontlines of WWI, Miles Franklin used writing as her weapon for changing the world. But was our much-loved matriarch of Australian literature a tad fascist? 

In the second part of Miles Franklin's story, we see her go from bush girl to political animal. Starting with Miles’s globe-trotting feminist and labour activist days, to her flirtations with not one but two millionaire brothers, it’s a wild ride. 

Warning: This episode discusses sexual assault. 

SOURCES 

Roe, Jill. Her brilliant career: the life of Stella Miles Franklin. Harvard University Press, 2009 

Barnard, Marjorie. Miles Franklin, Hill of Content, 1967 

Roe, Jill. Miles Franklin: A Short Biography, 2018 

Lapierre, Alexandre. The Very Secretive and Passionate Stella Miles Franklin, Allen & Unwin,  2026 

Sheridan, Susan. "Louisa Lawson, Miles Franklin and Feminist Writing, 1888–1901." Australian Feminist Studies 3.7-8 (1988): 29-47 

Knowles, Sandra. "The not quite real Miles Franklin: Diaries as performance." Journal of the Association for the Study of Australian Literature 4 (2005): 185-200 

Franks, Rachel. "Miles Franklin." State Library of New South Wales, 2022 

Knowles, Sandra. The performances of a psychic privacy: waiting for the real Miles Franklin. Diss. UNSW Sydney, 2007 

Bird, David. Nazi Dreamtime: Australian Enthusiasts for Hitler's Germany. Anthem Press, 2014 

• Hosted by Alecia Simmonds and Leigh Boucher
• Supervising Producer: Hannah Reich
• Producer: Hannah Jose
• Video producer: Christian Harimanow
• Executive Producers: Clare Rawlinson and Eric George
• Head of ABC Audio on Demand: Jessica Radburn
• Theme: Martin Peralta
• Artwork: Gabriel Virata-Alves

Miles Franklin’s name is inseparable from Australian literature. She’s a late 1800s bush girl who told a bold story of marriage rejection (My Brilliant Career) that went global. And it continues to captivate audiences today (see: the new Netflix adaptation by the same name). 

Everyone read the book as semi-autobiographical, with its protagonist, Sybylla, standing in for a young, flirty Miles. But how much more is there to Miles Franklin’s story beyond this juicy novel?  

On this first part of her story, Alecia and Leigh explore the temptations Miles Franklin faced as a writer and a woman, and the many other lives she lived beyond Sybylla’s. 

SOURCES

Roe, Jill. Her brilliant career: the life of Stella Miles Franklin. Harvard University Press, 2009 

Barnard, Marjorie. Miles Franklin, Hill of Content, 1967 

Roe, Jill. Miles Franklin: A Short Biography, 2018 

Lapierre, Alexandre. The Very Secretive and Passionate Stella Miles Franklin, Allen & Unwin,  2026 

Franklin, Miles. My brilliant career. ReadHowYouWant. com, 1986 

Sheridan, Susan. "Louisa Lawson, Miles Franklin and Feminist Writing, 1888–1901." Australian Feminist Studies 3.7-8 (1988): 29-47 

Franklin, Miles. Childhood at Brindabella: my first ten years. Ett Imprint, 2018 

Knowles, Sandra. "The not quite real Miles Franklin: Diaries as performance." Journal of the Association for the Study of Australian Literature 4 (2005): 185-200 

Franks, Rachel. "Miles Franklin." State Library of New South Wales, 2022 

Knowles, Sandra. The performances of a psychic privacy: waiting for the real Miles Franklin. Diss. UNSW Sydney, 2007 

Davies, Kerrie. Miles Franklin Undercover, Sydney: Allen & Unwin, 2025 

• Hosted by Alecia Simmonds and Leigh Boucher
• Supervising Producer: Hannah Reich
• Producer: Hannah Jose
• Video producer: Christian Harimanow
• Executive Producers: Clare Rawlinson and Eric George
• Head of ABC Audio on Demand: Jessica Radburn
• Theme: Martin Peralta
• Artwork: Gabriel Virata-Alves 

Yes, the undercurrent tragically killed our 17th Prime Minister, but were his days in office already numbered? 

Leigh argues that Holt was sinking (politically) before he died. So how did the man whose brief tenure as PM included the 1967 Referendum and the start of dismantling the White Australia Policy lose his audience?  

We tell you how we think it all went down and give you the final say on the conspiracies that swirl around his disappearance. 

Plus, charisma bomb Gough Whitlam makes an appearance thereby flustering Holt and all of us. 

SOURCES

'Prime Minister Harold Holt's Briefcase' National Archives M4298,1

'New Prime Minister and His Wife' Australian Women's Weekly Feb 2 1966

Hancock, Ian (2026). 'Harold Edward Hold' in Australia's Prime Ministers edited by Michelle Grattan (New Holland Publishers)

Walker, Ross (2022). Harold Holt: Always One Step Further (Latobe University Press)

Frame, Tom (2005). The Life and Death of Harold Holt (Allen and Unwin)

• Hosted by Alecia Simmonds and Leigh Boucher
• Producer: Hannah Jose
• Supervising Producer: Hannah Reich
• Video Producer: Christian Harimanow
• Executive Producers: Clare Rawlinson and Eric George
• Head of ABC Audio on Demand: Jessica Radburn
• Theme: Martin Peralta
• Artwork: Gabriel Virata-Alves

It's fair to say for a lot of Australians, Harold Holt has become more of a meme than a man, let alone Australia's 17th Prime Minister.

Yes, he drowned in mysterious circumstances and it's weird there's a pool named after him, but Leigh is more fixated on the less well-known quirks of our dear Harry.

For example, did his pretty privilege charm Canberra? Where did his high school nickname 'puss' come from? How did his ex-girlfriend end up marrying his father? And were Zara Holt's kids — born while she was married to another man — actually Harold's?

SOURCES

'Prime Minister Harold Holt's Briefcase' National Archives M4298,1

'New Prime Minister and His Wife' Australian Women's Weekly Feb 2 1966

'Speeches by Harold Holt' PM Transcripts: Australian Government, Department of Prime Minister and Cabinet

Hancock, Ian (2026). 'Harold Edward Hold' in Australia's Prime Ministers edited by Michelle Grattan (New Holland Publishers)

Walker, Ross (2022). Harold Holt: Always One Step Further (Latobe University Press)

Frame, Tom (2005). The Life and Death of Harold Holt (Allen and Unwin)

• Hosted by Alecia Simmonds and Leigh Boucher
• Producer: Hannah Jose
• Supervising Producer: Hannah Reich
• Video Producer: Christian Harimanow
• Executive Producers: Clare Rawlinson and Eric George
• Head of ABC Audio on Demand: Jessica Radburn
• Theme: Martin Peralta
• Artwork: Gabriel Virata-Alves