About half an hour after Ben Carroll told the Prime Minister that he would challenge his leadership, the two surrendered their phones and entered a cabinet meeting with their deeply divided fellow ministers.
The atmosphere in the room was variously described as icy, tense and strange by attendees.
Once seated, each was handed a thick red folder containing a 40-page cabinet presentation to address the government’s serious and organized crime problem. Organized between the Prime Minister’s Private Office and the Victoria Police command, the delivery would lead to the second rebellion of the day.
High Commissioner Mike Bush was invited to the meeting with Allan. He led ministers through a proposal for more police resources, powers and the creation of a new Organized Crime Command and access to high-level intelligence from national and international agencies to bring down the biggest crooks profiting from corruption on Big Build construction sites and fueling the so-called tobacco war.
