‘Borderline racism’: Embattled Bennelong Liberal candidate cries foul

For the Liberals to have a hope on Saturday, they need to reclaim Bennelong, John Howard’s old stomping ground now held by Labor on a wafer-thin margin.

So it is far from ideal for the blue team that the party’s candidate, Scott Yung, has spent much of the election campaign trying to outrun the dreaded “embattled” tag.

Several reports in this masthead have outlined Yung’s questionable campaign finance issues during his 2019 state election run, and his ties to a Chinese Communist Party-linked casino high roller. He also copped heat for handing out Easter eggs to primary school students while campaigning, an election sweetener gone awry.

Yung has been relatively evasive when confronted with questions from this masthead, even fleeing his own campaign launch at Ryde-Eastwood RSL. But he found a softer landing across the mic from his former boss Mark Bouris, founder of mortgage lender Yellow Brick Road, who is carving out a niche as Australia’s Aldi-brand Joe Rogan thanks to his lengthy podcast interviews with various politicians.

The hour-long discussion on the business bro’s Straight Talk podcast delves into the far reaches of the rich Yung lore, including the story of how a teenage Scott approached Bouris and asked for a job, eventually getting his foot in the door after former Yellow Brick Road director turned Liberal frontbencher David Coleman pulled a few strings to help his ace doorknocker. They’re not the party of opportunity for nothing!

An hour in, Bouris finally, sorta, got into some of the reports that have rocked Yung’s campaign.

“I just want to clarify for the sake of this conversation: you’re not a communist are you?” he asked.

“Mark, seriously, I find it an absolute joke, and you know I used to get offended by it … I think it’s borderline racism,” Yung said. “Just because I’ve got an Asian face, my parents have come from China and Hong Kong, they call me a communist.”

“You go to hundreds, if not thousands of events, you meet all sorts of people, you take all sorts of photos,” he said, in a gross mischaracterisation of the reports which have trailed Yung since before the election campaign even began.

“I have heard some people say that about you because you look Chinese and your surname is Yung,” Bouris said.

“The bullshit that people throw around during these elections,” he mused.

CBD’s eyes were drawn to the fine print on the podcast, disclosing that it was authorised by Yung’s campaign – often a tell-tale sign of a paid post or collaborative material.

Nothing fishy, we hear. Just that given the Australian Electoral Commission’s crackdown on influencer content, and the halo of negative publicity around Yung, the authorisation was added out of an abundance of caution, to avoid any further damaging headlines.

Build the wall

The scion of one of Australia’s grandest faded media dynasties has been given the green light for a renovation at his $22 million Vaucluse mansion, months after the initial plans hit a wall.

Charles Fairfax, son of the late Lady (Mary) Fairfax AC OBE, and heir to the family that once published this masthead, lodged a development application with Woollahra Council to build a new wall last year.

The resort-style Olola Road property, picked up by Charles and wife Kate in 2022, is just 10 minutes down the road from his childhood home, Fairwater estate in Double Bay, that lush harbourside Xanadu now owned by billionaire tech baron Mike Cannon-Brookes.

After the initial development application was rejected, Fairfax appealed to the Land and Environment Court, with acting commissioner Gwenda Kullen holding a conciliation conference between the parties.

That led to extended discussion, and the development of a revised plan for the wall that seems to have kept everyone happy … and out of court.

Festival fallout

The showdown at Sorrento continues following the invite-only literary “sunset garden talk” hosted by Josephine and James Baillieu, of the prominent Victorian family, on Saturday night, while the Sorrento Writers Festival was in full swing.

That event, held in a marquee at the Baillieus’ clifftop property, included official Sorrento Writers Festival speakers Josh Frydenberg and Joe Aston, has put the cat among the pigeons, if we can drop another cliche.

While some thought the event was a conservative counterpoint to a typically lefty literary festival, the Baillieus say the independent event was in good spirits and designed to build on and be a counterpoint to the official festival as a sort of “SWF off-piste”.

The next day, SWF director Corrie Perkin, as CBD reported previously, wondered “why there are people in our community having a crack at our festival”.

Which further upset James Baillieu, who thought it unfair that Perkin should criticise an invite-only event in their private home.

“Sorrento is not your town,” Baillieu texted Perkin. “You are a visitor only, even more reason to mind your own business.”

CBD was pleased to attend both the SWF and the garden party as a guest of both organisers.

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