Was watching The Dismissal this evening - I had no idea George Harris was so caught up with all of that stuff with Jim Cairns during that era!

I was a bit too young to fully understand what was going on, but does anyone out there have memories specifically of hearing about Harris's roll in all of that stuff?

Just curious.

Rich

What was the mini series like? Worth a watch? Saw it at JB Hi Fi the other day and being a big Labor man nearly purchased it.

"In an attempt to raise funds for a massive Keynesian pump-priming exercise, Cairns and another senior minister, Rex Connor, tried to borrow huge amounts of petrodollars from the Middle East through an intermediary, a Pakistani banker called Tirath Khemlani (the so-called "Loans Affair"). When the Liberal Opposition learned of this, Cairns and Connor denied to both Parliament and to Whitlam that they had given Khemlani authority to act in the name of the Australian government. When it emerged that this was untrue, Whitlam moved Cairns from Treasury to the Environment ministry.

In addition to his involvement with Khemlani, Cairns also attempted to raise overseas funds through George Harris, a businessman and president of the Carlton Football Club. Cairns provided Harris with written authorisation to raise A$2,000 million, offering him a 2.5% commission. Cairns denied the existence of this letter, and when it was produced he denied having signed it. In July 1975, Whitlam sacked him from the ministry."

Malcolm Fraser the then Prime Minister and George Harris attending a match at PP in the late 70s and when they arrived incessant booing and invective being spewed by a number of the crowd - one of the PM Staff took umbrage at the invective hurled at the PM and told the crowd it was no way to treat a PM - one of the ringleaders replied Im not booing him Im booing that Carlton Bastard Harris