Anthony Albanese has revealed that he was almost given up for adoption after his mother gave birth to him as a single woman in the 1960s.
The Prime Minister opened up about the early sliding doors moment in his life in a candid and wide-ranging interview on Mark Bouris’ podcast Straight Talk.
Mr Albanese’s voice almost cracked as he spoke movingly about how his late mother, Maryanne Ellery, made the ‘difficult decision in 1963 to have a child out of wedlock’.
‘The plan at St Margaret’s, Darlinghurst (maternity hospital) was for me to be adopted out, which was very much a part of what occurred a lot at that time,’ Mr Albanese said.
‘Now, there was a nun there at the hospital (who) brought me, the young baby, in to her and she knew that my mum wasn’t the sort of person who would want to give up her child, would want to avoid it regardless of the circumstances that were difficult…’
The Labor leader said there was a ‘lot of pressure placed on people in those days in the early sixties’.
‘(But) my mum chose to keep me and to give…we didn’t have a lot of money but we had everything else, something that’s more important which is that unconditional love and support.’
Mr Albanese said his mum encouraged him to stay on at school and instilled a strong work ethic.
Anthony Albanese’s voice almost cracked as he spoke movingly about how his late mother, Maryanne Ellery, made the ‘difficult decision in 1963 to have a child out of wedlock’ (pictured: a young Mr Albanese with his proud mother)
The Prime Minister opened up about the early sliding doors moment in his life in a candid and wide-ranging interview on Mark Bouris’ podcast Straight Talk (the pair are pictured together)
This began with paper runs and jobs at McDonalds and Grace Brothers (now known as Myer) during his high school years, while he started work at the Commonwealth Bank the day after his last HSC exam.
His mother suffered from rheumatoid arthritis and many of his early years were spent living along as she was in and out of hospital while living on a disability pension.
Asked what is the one thing he would like to say to her he said ‘thank you, as simple as that’.
‘She scarified a lot for me and one of the things that drives me is repaying that,’ Mr Albanese said.
The Prime Minister said his mother adopted his father’s name while telling him and his ‘close-knit neighbourhood’ that his father, Carlo, had died in a car accident, which was not true.
His parents had met in March 1962 on a cruise from Sydney to Southampton in the UK where his father worked as a steward but the pair did not continue their relationship as Carlo was already married.
Mr Albanese later tracked down his father in Italy after the death of his mother at the age of 65 in 2007 and finally met him and his two half-siblings two years later.
He also revealed that on the night before his first official day as Prime Minister in 2022 he was visited by eight of the friends who grew up in the same public housing block in Camperdown in Sydney’s inner-west.
Asked what is the one thing he would like to say to his his mother, Mr Albanese said: ‘Thank you, as simple as that’
‘They’d all decided that their mate who they grew up with – I’ve kept in contact with them – was becoming Prime Minister of Australia and they all travelled to Canberra,’ he said.
‘It was so good. it was so uplifting and I had them all round to dinner at The Lodge,’ Mr Albanese said, adding that the evening was ‘one of the moments of my life’.
He also played up his everyman image, insisting he was ‘as comfortable in a pub as I am in a boardroom’.
The Prime Minister has so often repeated his humble origin story of growing up in public housing with a single mum that he is sometimes mocked for it.
This is especially true in light of last year’s revelation that he and his fiancee Jodie Haydon bought a $4.3million clifftop mansion in Copacabana on the NSW Central Coast.
But his rags-to-relative-riches success story is something that the Prime Minister insists he never takes for granted.
‘I don’t take it for granted and I also understand the responsibility that I have in having this privilege,’ he told Mr Bouris.
