Opposition Leader Peter Dutton has spoken for the first time about the secret conception of his daughter Rebecca.
Rebecca, now 21, was born just weeks after Mr Dutton’s maiden speech in 2002 but very little was known about her for years.
She was born to another woman a year before Mr Dutton married his wife Kirilly – circumstances the Liberal leader describes as ‘difficult’.
Opposition Leader Peter Dutton has spoken for the first time about the secret conception of his eldest daughter Rebecca
Mr and Mrs Dutton with Rebecca and sons Tom and Harry
‘So Rebecca’s mum, Rachel, she, and I, weren’t together at the time of her birth,’ Mr Dutton tells Annabel Crabb on the ABC’s Kitchen Cabinet tonight.
‘And so that was, that was a difficult period. But Rebecca is 21 now and yeah. Just turned into the most beautiful young lady. You describe it as a mistake at the time, but the best mistake I ever made. She’s just a gorgeous girl.’
Crabb then puts it to Mr Dutton that his now-wife Kirilly was ‘obviously hugely accepting of your one-year-old that you had’.
He replies: ‘And yeah, she’s an amazing wife and an incredible mother and, you know, to the boys and to Rebecca as well.’
Mr and Mrs Dutton have two children together, sons Tom and Harry.
Mr Dutton was first elected to Parliament in November 2001 and delivered his first speech there in February 2002.
Mr Dutton married Kirilly in July 2003
Peter Dutton gives his maiden speech to Parliament in 2002
Rebecca was born weeks later but neither her or her mother were mentioned in his speech. She didn’t appear in family photos online until she was a teenager.
He instead spoke about his grandmother and siblings.
‘My grandmother, who worked hard on the farm all her life, joins me today in the gallery,’ he said.
‘It makes me very pleased to see her well and enjoying this very proud moment for all of us. My parents, who have been my lifelong inspiration, are also with me today, as are my brother, sisters, family and close friends-the people who have stood with me through the ups and the downs, the highs and lows that life has to offer.’
Mr Dutton married Kirilly in July 2003.
He also had a short marriage to his first wife, who he wed in 1993 but separated from just months later.
‘We just got married too young,’ he told the ABC.
‘So I just came home one day and that was, you know, not love anymore. And that was sort of the end of it. But you know, at the time, you deal with all of that emotion and then and, you know, you’ve got to deal with it.’
The Leader of the Opposition told the ABC about his own struggles as a teenager when his parents, Bruce and Ailsa, divorced.
‘I think I felt sort of disappointed and angry at the time that they weren’t able to work things out,’ he said.
‘But you know there’s always money pressure growing up. We were very lucky in terms of the environment that we grew up in. There was a lot of love and support. And we were all treated very well.’
Annabel Crabb (right) is under fire for featuring federal Opposition leader Peter Dutton (left) in a friendly interview on her popular talk show Kitchen Cabinet
Kirilly told the Sunday Mail how personal attacks on her husband and family make her ‘angry and really upset’.
She said she understood why her husband was so disliked, but said people didn’t see the real side of him.
‘He is a really good man. He is a really good father and he’s not a monster,’ she said.
Elsewhere in the show, Mr Dutton will address topics like his controversial comments about Lebanese immigration in 2016 and how he most likely suffers from post-traumatic stress syndrome from his time on the police force.
The 52-year-old Liberal leader also spoke about Indigenous culture and his surprise by the amount of ‘squalor’ some communities are living in.
His comment marks the latest criticism against conditions in the Northern Territory after he claimed in April sexual assault of Indigenous children was ‘rampant’, prompting him to call for a Royal Commission.
Mr Dutton expanded on his claims about some communities living in squalor.
‘Well, it depends on where you go,’ he told Crabb.
‘If you go to East Arnhem Land, kids at school 90 per cent of the time they’ve got an attendance rate equivalent to what we would see in a capital city.’
‘There’s employment programs and a building company that has been established, this up in Yunupingu land and there’s a functioning society.
‘It’s quite remarkable that you hop on the plane and then go to Alice Springs and people living in town camps or in absolute squalor.
‘The health system’s not functioning. The law-and-order system is not functioning. And there’s a complete breakdown. It is literally heartbreaking’.
Mr Dutton (right) explains he is struck by the ‘absolute squalor’ of how some indigenous communities in Alice Springs are living in a new episode of ABC’s Kitchen Cabinet hosted by Annabel Crabb (left)
The ABC host noted the Opposition leader went ‘straight to law and order’ – with Mr Dutton previously serving in the police force between 1990 and 1999
Crabb described Mr Dutton’s comments as interesting pointing out she had asked for him to comment on Aboriginal culture.
The ABC host noted the Opposition leader went ‘straight to law and order’ – with Mr Dutton previously serving in the police force between 1990 and 1999.
Mr Dutton said he found it remarkable that a community rich in culture and history could ‘mask an underbelly’.
‘You ask what sort of strikes you most when you go into that community. It is the squalor,’ he said.
‘And the culture, the arts, dance, the storytelling, all of that is remarkable when you go into a community.
‘But in some communities, it masks an underbelly, which is something that none of us in the part of Australia that we live we would tolerate.’
Mr Dutton then told the ABC host he regrets not voting for the national apology and that he now appreciates its symbolism for First Nations people.
The Liberal Opposition Leader (centre) also defended his comments about ‘African gangs’ in Melbourne but admitted he regrets his remarks about the resettling of Lebanese migrants
Former prime minister Kevin Rudd made a formal apology to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples with Mr Dutton notably absent.
Mr Dutton was a shadow minister under Opposition leader Brendan Nelson at the time and boycotted the apology. It would take 14 years before he changed his tune and admitted to making a mistake in May 2022.
Ms Crabb then asked Mr Dutton if he is at risk of making the same mistake by voting against the Indigenous Voice to Parliament, to which he replied: ‘I don’t think I am’.
‘This is inserting a new chapter into the Constitution,’ Mr Dutton said.
‘It’s a nation’s rule book. And I think if you’re going to do that, the onus is on the proposer to have the detail available.’
‘People in our country should have the ability to air their views without being shouted down.’
Mr Dutton added the biggest issue in relation to the referendum was the ‘form of words’ arguing its open to ‘significant interpretation’ by the High Court.
He suggested a Voice in legislation would work better because it would allow amendments to be dialled up or down.
‘I believe in the principle, of wanting to hear from Indigenous Australians, particularly at the coalface,’ Mr Dutton said.
‘I’m strongly in favour of hearing that voice and acting on it. And the question, when you speak to a lot of Indigenous people in communities is not about their voice being heard or not, it’s whether it’s acted upon. And I think that’s failing in the system at the moment.’
Mr Dutton also touched on his time with the force revealing he likely suffers with PTSD
Ms Crabb also questioned Mr Dutton on controversial remarks he made in relation to Melbourne residents being too scared to go to dinner because of ‘African gangs’ in 2018.
Street violence was rampant at the time with then-prime minister Malcolm Turnbull blaming premier Daniel Andrews for ‘growing gang violence and lawlessness’.
Crabb asked if Mr Dutton had ever thought his comments would make an African Australian mum worry that her teenage boy would be perceived as a thug.
Mr Dutton doubled down on the remark explaining the comment was made after he spoke to friends in Melbourne about incidents where cars were stolen and people were going into restaurants causing havoc.
‘The incidents in Victoria at the time were related to kids, predominantly from a particular community,’ he said.
‘It didn’t come from a place of hatred, it came from a place of seeing people suffering at the hands of crime. And that’s what motivated me.
‘Could it have been said more sensitively. Yes, of course.’
The veteran ABC star has acknowledged that she’s taking a softer approach with her show and doesn’t want to engage in combative dialogue with her guests
Mr Dutton was then questioned about his controversial claims that the Fraser government made a mistake by resettling Lebanese Muslim migrants.
Mr Dutton was immigration minister at the time and was critical of former prime minister Malcolm Fraser’s immigration policy in the 1970s.
He argued the context of the comment was during a time when a number of terrorist attacks were thwarted.
‘At the time it was in the context of an attempted attack to bring down an A380,’ Mr Dutton said.
‘There were a number of terrorist attacks that were thwarted in our country and there was an overrepresentation. And you can sort of tiptoe around it and pretend that it’s not an issue.’
Crabb questioned the appropriateness of the comments prompting Mr Dutton to respond: ‘You know they’re comments that I shouldn’t have made. I’ve apologised for that.’
‘But again, when you’re in the thrust of it and in the thick of it, we were dealing with people who had been radicalised and many of them shared a background and that’s sort of the factual reality of what we were dealing with.’
Outside of Mr Dutton, the latest season of Kitchen Cabinet will feature a wide variety of political figures including Bridget McKenzie of the National Party and former Greens and now independent senator Lidia Thorpe.
Kitchen Cabinet airs tonight on the ABC at 8pm