Prime Minister Anthony Albanese appointed his mate and Labor Party crony Mike Kaiser to the position of Secretary of the Department of Climate Change, Energy, Environment and Water (DCCEEW) for a 5-year term on an annual salary of $932,100.

Mike Kaiser’s appointment is a massive fraud on the Australian people that not only involves current Prime Minister Anthony Albanese but also former Prime Minister Kevin Rudd as this is not the first time confessed vote rigger Mike Kaiser has scandalised the federal government with a dodgy appointment.

With regular pay raises, likely annually, Mike Kaiser will go very close to, and possibly exceed, $5 million over the 5 years. So, it’s not a minor amount and it leads straight back to Prime Minister Anthony Albanese’s office.

Mike Kaiser’s dodgy $450,000 appointment to the NBN in December 2009 by the Kevin Rudd government was a substantial scandal at the time and that should have been the last time we ever heard of Kaiser’s name in federal government.

Let’s have a quick look at Mike Kaiser’s CV first which includes his electoral fraud, then we’ll dig deeper into the NBN scandal, which most of the latest reporting by other media has missed key details, and when put it together it shows Prime Minister Anthony Albanese has a lot of questions to answer with Mike Kaiser’s latest appointment.

Mike Kaiser’s CV

Mike Kaiser was State Secretary of the Queensland branch of the Labor Party from 1993 to 2000 and is good friends with former Prime Minister Kevin Rudd.

Kevin Rudd was chief of staff to Queensland Premier Wayne Goss from 1988 until 1992 when Goss appointed him Director-General of the Office of Cabinet.

Wayne Goss resigned as Premier in February 1996 after losing government at a by-election and Kevin Rudd resigned not long after. Kevin Rudd stood for the seat of Griffith at the 1996 Federal election which he lost but ran again at the 1998 federal election and won. 

Mike Kaiser and Kevin Rudd’s careers overlapped at the top of the Labor Party in Queensland in the 1990’s and they worked closely together which is relevant to the dodgy NBN appointment in 2010.

Mike Kaiser is infamous in the Labor Party for confessing to electoral fraud which forced his resignation from the Queensland parliament, which he had been elected too in 2000, and he resigned from the Labor Party in 2001.

Kaiser’s Wikipedia page says:

Kaiser conducted his own consultancy for several years until he was rehabilitated by the Labor Party in 2003 and served as its Assistant National Secretary in the lead up to and during the 2004 federal election.

Kaiser was subsequently employed as chief of staff to New South Wales Premier Morris Iemma before becoming chief of staff to Queensland Premier Anna Bligh in late 2007.

In December 2009, Kaiser commenced employment with NBN Co, the company established by the Rudd Labor government to design, build and operate a National Broadband Network, as its Corporate Affairs Executive. In September 2011 he became NBN Co’s Head of Quality, responsible for customer/consumer satisfaction, process improvement, data quality and response management. (Click here to read more)

Mike Kaiser’s dodgy appointment to the NBN as head of government relations and external affairs in November 2009

The SMH published an article in February 2010 titled “How to get a $450,000 job: no ads required – just a nice word from the minister” which says in part:

But whatever the nation’s need for speed when it comes to communication, it does not justify rushing decisions, cutting corners, and side-stepping good governance when it comes to deploying taxpayer funds.

The latest instance of the government’s erosion of the normal processes of policy-making and public administration is the appointment of Mike Kaiser as a senior executive with NBN Co.

A highly-regarded Labor political strategist, Kaiser was appointed last November to the $450,000 a year position as head of government relations and external affairs for NBN Co, the government-owned company which is to build the $43 billion broadband network.

Now we have learnt that there was a singular lack of process around this hiring – and apparently around many of the hirings at NBN Co.

In response to Opposition questions at a Senate estimates hearing on Monday, NBN Co’s chief executive Mike Quigley said it was Communications Minister Stephen Conroy who had suggested Kaiser for the position.

Quigley told the hearing that after Kaiser was mentioned by Senator Conroy he had referred the name to NBN Co’s head of human resources.

Kaiser was hired after two interviews, one with Quigley, and reference checks. The job was not advertised. There was no executive search process. No other candidates were short-listed. (Click here to read more)

It gets worse. How did the NBN Co’s chief executive Mike Quigley work out the pay for the $450,000 a year position? Quigley said that is how much Mike Kaiser said he wanted so that is how much they paid him. The old write your own check routine.

Jobs for the boys and girls is very common in politics and Kevin Rudd was never immune from looking after his mates while Rudd and his wife looked after themselves with government contracts. 

In February 2010 Prime Minister Kevin Rudd told the media:

“Prime Minister Kevin Rudd has defended the NBN Co recruitment process, saying it made an independent decision to hire Mike Kaiser as its government relations officer. At a press conference, Rudd told journalists he “defended completely the integrity of the [recruitment] process” of the company responsible for rolling out the Government’s $43 billion National Broadband Network (NBN).”

But it turned out that: “I suggested him [Kaiser] as a person of possible relevant experience,” Senator Stephen Conroy said.” and “Kaiser was the sole candidate and the job was not advertised.”. (Click here to read more) In other words a job for the boys routine.

Stephen Conroy, who is from Victoria, would not have known Mike Kaiser if he fell over him and it is blatant to everyone it was the then Prime Minister Kevin Rudd who sent word down the line to get his mate Mike Kaiser a cushy big paying job.

At the time of Mike Kaiser’s appointment to the NBN there was a lot of discussion why a government owned entity like the NBN would need a “Government relations manager”. It’s worth noting Mike Kaiser’s Wikipedia page says he was the NBN’s “Corporate Affairs Executive” so someone has touched up his Wikipedia page.

Mike Kaiser’s Wikipedia page also says:

From January 2021 until April 2022, Kaiser was appointed as Director-General of the Queensland Department of Resources. He was Director-General of the Department of State Development, Infrastructure, Local Government and Planning from April 2022 until December 2023. 

On 21 December 2023, Kaiser was appointed as Director-General of the Department of the Premier and Cabinet (Queensland). 

On 27 October 2024, he was stood down by Premier-elect David Crisafulli following the 2024 Queensland state election.

In July 2025 Kaiser was appointed as the Secretary of the federal Department of Climate Change, Energy, the Environment and Water by Anthony Albanese. (Click here to read more)

Department of Climate Change, Energy, Environment and Water (DCCEEW) appointment

On Tuesday the 8th of July Prime Minister Anthony Albanese posted on his website:

I am pleased to announce that I intend to recommend to the Governor-General that she appoint Mr Mike Kaiser as Secretary of the Department of Climate Change, Energy, the Environment and Water.

Mr Kaiser has extensive experience in both the public and private sectors including in senior roles in the Queensland public service, having served as Director General of the Department of Premier and Cabinet, Director-General of the Department of State Development, Infrastructure, Local Government and Planning, and as Director General of the Department of Resources.

Mr Kaiser’s experience includes delivering on large scale projects, administering complex regulatory regimes and leading the Queensland Government’s policies on planning and infrastructure. (Click here to read the full statement)

Prime Minster Anthony Albanese’s statement makes no mention of Mike Kaiser’s time at the NBN. I wonder why? Because it was a dodgy appointment and Albanese doesn’t want to draw attention to it.

I wonder how Mike Kaiser found out about the Secretary of the Department of Climate Change, Energy, the Environment and Water job vacancy and who was the decision maker? Albanese?

Conclusion

I recall hearing that when people like Mike Kaiser are given high paying jobs because of their political connections, known as jobs for the boys and girls, they are expected to donate a small percentage of their wage to the Labor Party.

Even at 2% of Kaiser’s $932,100 wage it would be a donation of $18,642. A win-win for Mike Kaiser and the Labor Party but I would argue it is also likely a criminal offence of fraud and/or theft.

In February 2023 Labor announced “No more ‘jobs for mates’ as Labor promises public sector board review” which has gone nowhere and was clearly lip service by Albanese and his government.

We could make a complaint about Mike Kaiser’s appointment to the National Anti-Corruption Commission but as we know Albanese and his government have made sure the NACC is nothing more than a toothless tiger. 

Why aren’t the old media reporting the Anthony Albanese / Mike Kaiser scandal?

The old media are financially reliant on the federal government for funding via the News Media Bargaining Code where the government forces the likes of Google to pay the old media companies hundreds of $millions per year.

When the old media are reliant of the government for $millions they are less likely to report government corruption.

The old media were all over Mike Kaiser’s dodgy NBN appointment in 2009 but very few are reporting how dodgy his latest appointment by Prime Minister Anthony Albanese is and not to the detail I have above.

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