Rugby league kingpin Peter V’landys will no doubt have been riding high heading into Wednesday evening, after getting Nine Entertainment, owner of this masthead, and Foxtel, to beat the $5 billion valuation he’d set for the fresh NRL broadcast rights deal inked this week.
It wasn’t all cash, of course. But we doubt that detail will take away from V’landys’ victory lap. With the NRL broadcast rights now settled, the chatter in sporting and media circles was focused elsewhere. Namely, the looming prospect of V’landys’ ascension to the all-powerful role of rugby league executive chairman, following the departure of NRL chief Andrew Abdo.
Only fitting, then, that the $5.3 billion man of the moment could look forward to keeping the company of multiple prime ministers while basking in the afterglow at the State of Origin decider at Suncorp.
V’landys held court with Prime Minister Anthony Albanese heading into Wednesday evening, just weeks after the pair were seen hobnobbing at game two in Melbourne. But Albanese wasn’t the only prime minister on the guestlist.
Also rubbing shoulders with V’landys in Brisbane were Lord Fakafanua, the Prime Minister of Tonga, and Laʻauli Leuatea Schmidt, the Prime Minister of Samoa, along with James Marape, the Prime Minister of Papua New Guinea.
Queensland Premier David Crisafulli got pride and place with a seat bearing his name next to V’landys in the stadium, with Albanese seated to his other side. Nine chairman Peter Tonagh, meanwhile, was seated next to the Tennis Australia-bound Abdo, and was joined by a string of his Nine colleagues, including the company’s broadcast boss, Amanda Laing.
Westpac chief executive Anthony Miller was a guest of V’landys, as was Sportsbet chief executive and corporate empath Barni Evans, no doubt thrilled by the Albanese government’s lukewarm resolve to (kind of) crack down on gambling advertising.
After a big day being recalled from holiday to deal with the Telstra outage, CBD hears Sports Minister Anika Wells decided to give Origin three a miss. No doubt she’ll be glad to swerve the sports and media executives expected to descend on V’landys’ chairman’s box, where a run-in with representatives of Telstra – an NRL sponsor – would have made for high art.
Sisterhood of the travelling Hanson
What is it with politicians and pop stars this week? First we had PM Anthony Albanese and his tawdry “shag, marry, date” comments about pop princess Kylie Minogue.
Now One Nation firebrand Pauline Hanson has been snapped having a beer with former pop performer turned outspoken cheerleader for the UK’s Reform party Holly Valance, who she described as “my mate” – despite it being the first time they had met in person.
Melbourne-born Valance may have found fame as a soap star on Neighbours, but she has morphed into a celebrity in right wing political circles in Britain and in the US in recent years along with her billionaire property developer husband Nick Candy, from whom she separated from in mid-2025.
She was photographed with Donald Trump at Mar-a-Lago in 2022 and counts Nigel Farage as a close friend. She told GB News that year that “everyone starts as a lefty”, but “wakes up … then realise what crap ideas they all are”.
As fits with her international political stance, Valance is an admirer of Hanson, telling The Karl Stefanovic Show last month “I’m really behind her. I think she’s amazing.”
Earlier this year Valance even rerecorded her biggest hit, Kiss Kiss, renaming it Kiss Kiss (XX) My Arse to promote Hanson’s satirical film, A Super Progressive Movie.
So, when the pair caught up in the English countryside they no doubt had a lot to talk about.
Hanson and Valance spent a day sightseeing at Blenheim Palace before having a beer at The Farmer’s Dog, a pub in Oxfordshire owned by Jeremy Clarkson of Top Gear fame.
“While here in England, I took some time out to catch up with Holly Valance who has been a staunch backer of true conservatives both here in the UK and myself in Australia,” Hanson tapped out on her verified Instagram account on Wednesday, alongside happy snaps of the pair’s day out
“We visited Blenheim Palace for a wonderful private tour of this enormously historic beauty in Woodstock before stopping off at the Farmers Dog for lunch and a few of Jeremy’s beers. What a wonderful day!”
The city-dwelling senator for western Sydney
Senator Jess Collins is again the subject of intrigue in Liberal Party circles. But no longer, the senator may be relieved to learn, because of the alleged behaviour of her husband.
This time around, the chatter has instead been focused on the location of Collins’ principal office, in the heart of Sydney’s CBD, despite lashing out at her Liberal Party colleagues in the Senate more than two years ago for working from office towers in none other than Sydney’s CBD.
What’s more is Collins not only criticised Liberals for not being visible in seats the party doesn’t hold, she went one further and promised she’d base herself in western Sydney if she won Senate preselection.
“We have four Liberal Senators, and they’re all based in office towers in Sydney’s CBD. We have no Liberal Senator in Western Sydney, and we have no Liberal Senator in Regional NSW,” Collins wrote in the email, which was sent out to her party colleagues in May 2024.
“It’s a missed opportunity. How can we expect people to vote Liberal if they never get the chance to meet one? I would not be another Senator hidden away in a high rise Sydney office tower. If I am elected to the Senate, I will be based in Western Sydney.”
Safe to say the missive didn’t age well. When we reached Collins’ office to ask about her office, we were told the one she moved into at the beginning of her term still had 15 months on the lease, and that she was working on finding something new. But absent from the response, of course, was any commitment to western Sydney.
“I informed the Department the day I moved in that I would not stay beyond the end of lease – which is September this year – and they commenced searching for a new office location,” Collins said in a statement provided by her office.
John Buckley is a CBD columnist for The Sydney Morning Herald and The Age.Connect via email.
Fiona Byrne is the CBD columnist for The Age and The Sydney Morning Herald.Connect via email.
Max Maddison is a state political reporter at The Sydney Morning Herald.From our partners
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