In his first days back at work, Chris Picton shares turmoil over his brother’s death
An emotional Chris Picton returned to his role as the state’s health minister this week and today shared the impact of his brother’s recent death on his life.
It was December 27 last year when the life of the state’s health minister Chris Picton, and his family changed forever.
Chris’s brother Tim Picton was attacked outside a licensed premises in the West Australian capital of Perth in the early hours of the morning, and the 36-year-old was rushed to hospital after suffering a serious head injury.
In an emotional interview after returning to work this week, Chris tells how a phone call from his sister Johanna first told him about the single punch that led to his brother being placed in an induced coma.
“We were actually just packing the car to head out for a catch-up for friends for lunch, but obviously diverted straight to go pick my parents up and take them to the airport, and we jumped on the first plane,” Chris says.
“Perth’s a really long way away, and a three-hour flight when you’re facing that sort of uncertainty at the other end was really difficult.”
Tim underwent immediate emergency surgery and was placed in an induced coma to give him the best possible chance to survive. But on January 19, he tragically died.
Chris said that knowing what happened, sitting by his bedside and hoping for his recovery, “has been the hardest thing that our family has ever had to deal with”.
“The shock that we had on that Saturday morning, getting that phone call that my brother was in hospital, he was being rushed into surgery, and he might not come out, still haunts me and my family and me to this day,” he said.
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“This has been a nightmare that we keep thinking ‘are we going to wake up from’, and it’s been very, very difficult for us all to face.
“There’s a hole in our family that’s never, ever going to be filled.”
One lasting memory Chris had in relation to his brother, the former Labor strategist and mining executive, was watching the “diabolically awful” Crows final at a pub in Perth last year.
“I feel that our relationship was as good as it had ever been, and that was particularly after a couple of good nights that we shared together,” he said.
“One was watching that Crows game and spending the night and having a really good heart-to-heart chat for hours afterwards.”
Another memory that he would treasure forever was a recent family reunion in Adelaide for their father’s 70th birthday.
“My brother, my sister and I went out, just the three of us, something that we’d never really done before, and just had a night. Just the three of us, and that was a really special night. And it was the sort of night you go, ‘I hope that there’s going to be a lot more of these in the future’,” he said.
“I got a message from one of Tim’s mates in Perth, who I’d never met before. It was a really heartfelt message, and he said in that how Tim had told him he’d been so touched by that night that we spent together as siblings just a month before he was attacked.”
An outpouring of tributes has followed the death of the former political strategist. Tim Picton played a key role in guiding WA Labor to a landslide 2021 election victory, in which the opposition Liberal Party was left with just two seats.
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He also worked as an advisor for SA Senator Don Farrell in the Gillard government, then in the office of former Victorian Premier Daniel Andrews.
Farrell told of being “truly heartbroken at the tragic loss of Tim Picton”.
“I strongly believe that he had so much potential ahead of him, and while he achieved so much, there was so much more that he was no doubt going to achieve in the future,” Chris said.
Chris also had a message for the doctors who cared for Tim at the Royal Perth Hospital.
“All of the doctors, all of the nurses, all of the other staff, could not have given Tim better care, or have given our family more compassion and more understanding and more time to listen and answer our questions and to explain things to us,” he said.
Asked how it would change his approach to the job as Health Minister, Chris said that he will be reminded “to try to remind yourself not to sweat the small stuff, that life is short, that we’ve got to make the most of every day”.
And he has already spoken to Attorney-General Kyam Maher about strengthening South Australia’s laws around one-punch attacks.
“There is more and more awareness that one punch can kill, as opposed to where we were, say 10 years ago, is that now for these sorts of cases, manslaughter is on the table for prosecution,” he said.
Chris said his brother’s greatest legacy would be his daughter Charlotte, and his wife Priya who had to “be so strong” particularly for their little girl. Charlotte turned four years of age while her Dad was in the hospital.
“I’m so proud of her and the way she’s been able to navigate this most awful of circumstances,” Chris said.
“She’s such a gorgeous little girl, and you asked before about, ‘What’s Tim’s legacy?’. Tim’s number one legacy is going to be Charlotte.
“As I said in the memorial, she is like a tiny Tim. She’s got the spark, got the determination that Tim has, and she’s just turned four, which means that probably the full impact of this hasn’t hit home yet, and this is going to be an impact that will be there for the rest of her life.
“I got to spend time around Tim and Charlotte over her life and see how he interacted with her, how his eyes lit up when he was with her and how devoted he was to her, how we can make sure that she knows that, how we can make sure that she knows how much her dad loved her.”
Chris said being part of the decision to turn off life support “is obviously the worst possible situation that you could possibly be in”.
“I think after the first few days, things did start to become apparent that it was unlikely that Tim was going to come back, but we were still obviously all hoping for a miracle,” he said.
He urged people to ensure they have an advanced care directive, a power of attorney, and a will in place “because you don’t know when this sort of situation might happen, and it is a really difficult situation for families to have to think through”.
