Australian Son: Inside Mark Latham (Craig McGregor, Pluto, $24.95 pb, ISBN 186403288X, August) ****

Australian Son could easily be portrayed as a voters' guide to Mark Latham: read this book and you will know what you could expect from a Latham-led Labor government. Craig McGregor has conducted interviews with Latham over the last eight years. He has talked with Latham in his constituency of Werriwa, in Canberra and more recently on the road as the Leader of the Opposition tours the country with his 'old-fashioned meet-the-people' engagements. The result is an intimate account of Mark Latham the man and a concise commentary on his ideas and the challenges he presents for the voters of Australia and for the Australian Labor Party.

McGregor puts Latham in context as a 'Westie'. He details Latham's early life in the western suburbs of Sydney and the importance of family values and community in his subsequent political life. He traces the roots of Latham's theme 'climbing the ladder of opportunity' back to Latham's own struggle to escape from the old public housing estate of Green Valley. Education gave him a way out, off to Sydney University to study political economy and into politics.

Latham's studies contain the key to much of his economic philosophy: his convictions have already created well-documented conflict within the ALP. Latham is, in his own words 'an economic rationalist with humanitarian overtones,' a convinced believer in private ownership as a key to self-respect and security for all members of society. McGregor has identified this and other key policy areas where Latham will have to convert Labor stalwarts as well as voters. Latham's own publishing history reflects a keenness to express his views but also to explain them. It was his intellectual activity rather than his upfront, aggressive style that won him enough votes amongst his parliamentary colleagues to secure the leadership of the ALP.

McGregor describes how Latham continues to learn by experience. Working for Gough Whitlam broadened his mind; a period as mayor of Liverpool gave Latham his first opportunity to put his ideas into practice. Since he became leader of the Opposition he has tried to change public perceptions of his style.

This book provides concerened Australians with a concise guide to one of our most important public figures and his vision for the future of Australia. It paints a picture of Latham as a prime minister-in-waiting, a man who feels that he offers a coherent, alternative view to that of the Howard government. He states his view that 'here was someone with enough passion and enough sense of authenticity about him to rescue the Labor Party from its lack of direction and commitment and enough sheer intellectual willpower to give Australian politics a shake-up as well.' We will all have to wait and see.

Chris Harrington is the president of the ABA and a co-owner of Melbourne's Books in Print

This review from Australian Bookseller & Publisher magazine is reproduced by kind permission of Thorpe-Bowker, a division of R R Bowker LLC. © Copyright 2004, Thorpe-Bowker