Anthony Albanese’s nemesis, Max Chandler-Mather, has hit back at the Prime Minister after he poked fun at the ousted Greens MP during the Midwinter Ball.
The Prime Minister regularly clashed with the former member for the Brisbane seat of Griffith, with both men infamously trading barbs in a heated clash on the floor of the House of Representatives two years ago.
Chandler-Mather, who was narrowly defeated by Labor’s Renee Coffey at the May federal election, clearly still plays on Albanese’s mind because the PM cracked a gag at his expense at the Midwinter Ball on Wednesday night.
The black tie, three-course dinner, where politicians from every party and their plus ones rub shoulders with ‘s corporate bigwigs and journalists in the Great hall of Parliament, is meant to be off-the-record.
But the Daily Mail was not in attendance so is not bound by the rules prohibiting the journalists present from reporting what is said and on Thursday, we revealed that Albanese had not been able to resist taking a sly dig at Chandler-Mather.
‘This election, we farewelled my favourite Green,’ Albanese told the audience, as a picture of Max Chandler-Mather flashed on the screen.
‘Not that Green,’ the PM said, ‘This Green,’ he added as a picture of the ABC’s now-retired chief election analyst Antony Green appeared.
But now Chandler-Mather has returned fire, saying ‘how sad for him’.
‘If the Prime Minister keeps treating everyday working people like dirt, while wining and dining with CEOs and lobbyists and lining the pockets of big corporations and billionaires with tax handouts and loopholes, I’ll be the least of his concerns,’ Chandler-Mather told the Daily Mail.
‘Personally I’ve been enjoying life outside parliament, carefully thinking how best to continue to fight on behalf of the millions of everyday people screwed over by this Labor government.
‘I’m a bit surprised the Prime Minister remains so fixated on me, because I haven’t really thought about him at all.’
Chandler-Mather, who used to donate $50,000 of his parliamentary salary to fund free school meals in his electorate, also shared a meme as his official response.
The meme is from a scene in the TV series Mad Men, when the main character Don Draper shuts down his colleague’s claim that he ‘feels sorry’ for him with the immortal line: ‘I don’t think about you at all’.
It is not the first time Albanese and Chandler-Mather have traded barbs.
Indeed, there has been a long history of enmity between the two men.
While in parliament, Chandler-Mather earned the nickname of ‘Albo’s arch-nemesis’ due to his clashes with the PM over housing policy.
In 2023, tensions came to a head during a debate over the $10billion Housing Future Fund.
As Albanese was leaving the House of Representatives chamber, he reportedly turned back and directed an angry remark to Chandler-Mather, saying: ‘You’re a joke, mate.’
Last year, Chandler-Mather also questioned why the Prime Minister was able to rake in an extra $115,000 a year in rental income while he lives rent-free at The Lodge and Kirribilli House during a housing crisis.
These confrontations led many young ns to see Chandler-Mather as a strong voice representing young people’s concerns about the housing crisis.
The pair also traded words shortly after Chandler-Mather was ousted in May, with the Greens firebrand telling Triple J Hack that the PM had often directed ‘personal abuse’ at him in the House.
‘The Prime Minister spent a lot of time in my electorate attacking me, the property industry, the mining industry, all coming after us,’ Chandler-Mather said.
‘We would get up (in the House) and say “all we want is for the government to do something for the one-third of the country that rents” and I had the Prime Minister come up to me in the Chamber and call me a “joke” and personally abuse me.’
But Albanese has said the former MP needed to look at his own behaviour.
‘He should have a good look at the way that he asks questions in the parliament,’ the Prime Minister told ABC’s 7.30 afterwards.
‘Maybe what he needs is a mirror and a reflection on why he’s no longer in parliament.
‘This is a guy who stood before signs at a CFMEU rally in Brisbane describing me as a Nazi.
‘I think it’s a bit rich for him of all people…who has been rejected by his own electorate after just one term.’