The woman whose romance with Bob Hawke caused the end of the former prime minister’s long-term marriage says she feels sorry for Vikki Campion.
Blanche d’Alpuget has expressed concern for the pregnant 33-year-old girlfriend of former deputy prime minister Barnaby Joyce.
The 74-year-old writer, who had a long affair with Mr Hawke before marrying him in 1995, said she felt for Ms Campion, whose relationship with Mr Joyce triggered the collapse of his 24-year marriage to Natalie and the loss of his powerful job.
Bob Hawke’s wife Blanche d’Alpuget has expressed concern for the pregnant 33-year-old girlfriend of former deputy prime minister Barnaby Joyce
Ms d’Alpuget said Ms Campion (left) would be ‘attacked by the mob’ following the demise of Mr Joyce’s 24-year marriage
‘It’s horrible. It’s absolutely horrible. It’s frightening. You’re being attacked by a mob,’ she told 7.30 host Leigh Sales.
As someone who was blamed for ending Mr Hawke’s 39-year marriage to Hazel, Ms d’Alpuget said it was understandable Ms Campion needed to live in the northern New South Wales town of Armidale with her 50-year-old Nationals MP boyfriend.
‘Good on her, that she went and hid up in whatever the country town was,’ she said.
However, she was worried about the couple’s unborn baby, who is due in April.
‘That poor baby. That baby is feeling all its mother’s anxiety and that’s getting pumped into … him,’ she said.
Ms d’Alpuget, who married Mr Hawke in 1995 after a long affair, is worried about the welfare of Ms Campion’s unborn son
The writer said Ms Campion’s baby with the former deputy PM would have a ‘terrible start to life’
‘This is a terrible start in life for a child. I was really distressed on account of the baby.’
Ms d’Alpuget met Mr Hawke in 1970, when he was a new president of the Australian Council of Trade Unions and released a biography about her future husband in 1982, the year before he become Australia’s longest-serving Labor prime minister.
She said she her love for Mr Hawke, who is now 88, was ‘rare’, with the author tying the knot with him after he had retired from politics.
‘We married when I was 51 and he was 66 so we’d had a lot of experience and we knew a lot of the things that could be wrong,’ she said of the couple, who had both remarried.
The scandal of Mr Joyce’s affair with his much-younger former media adviser not only ended his marriage but ultimately led him to stand down as Nationals leader, and Deputy Prime Minister.
Ms d’Alpuget met Mr Hawke in 1970 when he led the ACTU and continued an affair with him when he was prime minister
The author said it was easier marrying a second time for both of them as they had experience
Ms d’Alpuget wrote a biography on her future husband before he became Australia’s longest serving Labor prime minister (pictured in 1984 launching the ALP’s re-election campaign)